[Book Review] Glimpse by Jonathan Maberry

Glimpse by Jonathan Maberry is a refreshingly original thriller that kept me totally captivated (but also incredibly nervous!) throughout. I just couldn't wait to see how this story played out!

Full disclosure: I was given a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This did not affect my rating in any way. 

Let's dive in!

Glimpse by Jonathan Maberry 

Synopsis: 
How far would you be willing to go to save those you love? 

Rain is a young woman trying to rebuild herself after years of drug addiction and abuse. Ten years ago, at age sixteen, she gave up her baby after the father, her first love, dies in Iraq. Now, three years clean and on the way to a job interview, Rain borrows a pair of reading glasses from an old lady on a Brooklyn train. The lenses are cracked and through the crack she catches a glimpse of a little boy running and screaming. The boy looks so much like Rain’s dead lover. Like their son must look now. 

Rain realizes that the glasses give her quick glimpses of her lost son, Dylan, who needs her to find him. Dylan is important to our damaged, hopeless world. But he’s in terrible trouble because evil creatures - the Shadow People - are trying to corrupt and destroy him. If Dylan dies, then hope dies. 

But how does a recovering junkie fight supernatural monsters? And how far will one woman go to save her lost son?

Visit the Glimpse listing on Goodreads.


My thoughts:
I didn't really know what to expect going into this one, but holy cow! What a crazy ride! It was exciting and thrilling, but it was also a bit heartbreaking. All of the various elements that were included in the storyline were woven together so nicely. The plot was quite different from anything else I have read, which was very refreshing. Besides having a great idea behind it, it was also so wonderfully written! Examples can be seen in my favorite passages section below.

I also really enjoyed the characters. Each of the them were so perfectly developed for their roles. Of course we mainly focused in on Rain, as she was the main character. But for all of the supporting characters, I thought that the author gave us just enough information about each. I really loved that we saw a few chapters sprinkled in here and there that were from the other characters perspectives here and there, all of which were tales of Doctor Nine coming to them in dreams and then later being haunted by him.

Be warned, this book is very difficult to put down, especially when you get closer to the end!


Beware, the (slight) negatives:
Only two very brief negatives for me personally.

First, there were a couple of sexual scenes that seemed very unnecessary to me. I do understand why they were included, but eh. I think the story would have been better without them. Luckily they were very brief and the other sexual scenes were much better!

Second, the crack in the glasses on the cover doesn't align with any situation the glasses found themselves in in the story. It drives me crazy when these things don't line up. But this one was especially bad because I found myself imagining the glasses as they appeared on the cover and it kept throwing me off! I had to highlight this passages so I could keep going back to it when I had starting imagining the glasses as they appeared on the cover: They were old-fashioned, with horn-rims and a tiny hairline crack along the side of the left lens...


My favorite passages: 
Her alarm clock always sounded like an outraged cricket. It yelled her awake and then seemed to dodge her flailing hand until she finally caught it and slapped it silent.

Every single one of them had walked away from a train wreck of their own making.

The usual neighborhood suspects loitered in doorways, hoods pulled up, hands in pockets, heads tracking to follow everything that moved. Some of them nodded to Rain; one guy called out a crude comment to Yo-Yo, but she fired back a suggestion that he go do something that was improbable, obscene, painful, and which involved close relatives and livestock.

The car vanished into the pale gloom, whipping curtains of heavy mist around it like something out of a horror movie.

The darkness is bigger now, thicker. It smells of old sweat and oily rags. She doesn't turn on the bedside light, because she knows it offers no protection, even against the darkness. When you turn on the lights, the dark things just hide behind chairs and under the bed frame. They don't really go away.

It was like watching smoke - always changing and yet always smoke. Waves were like that, she thought, and fire. Always moving, never the same, and yet constant in important ways.

It's no more real than feeling powerful by wearing a Batman costume at Halloween. You may look the part, but you're a long way from saving Gotham City.

Life is what you dream it is.


My final thoughts:

I really enjoyed this book! I was so happy that it had a refreshing plot that kept me totally captivated throughout. I can't wait to read it again to pick up on foreshadowing that I may have missed during this first read. 

I highly recommend this book to thriller fans who love character driven stories with very dark and interesting elements of the paranormal. 

Thanks for reading! 

I will definitely be checking out more of Jonathan Maberry's work soon! Have you read any of his work yet? 

SaveSave