Living Dead Girl by Elizabeth Scott

Living Dead Girl By Elizabeth Scott
Published by Simon Pulse, 2008
Pages: 170
Genres: Kidnapping, Rape, Stockholm syndrome

Reviewed by Kate

Summery: Once upon a time, I was a little girl who disappeared.
Once upon a time, my name was not Alice.
Once upon a time, I didn’t know how lucky I was.

When Alice was ten, Ray took her away from her family, her friends her life. She learned to give up all power, to endure all pain. She waited for the nightmare to be over.
Now Alice is fifteen and Ray still has her, but he speaks more and more of her death. He does not know it is what she longs for. She does not know he has something more terrifying than death in mind for her.
This is Alice’s story. It is one you have never heard, and one you will never, ever forget.

Wow, this book was so dark and disturbing, yet so enlightening on a very serious subject. I'm a strong believer in knowledge and learning about things, I think it's very important to be knowledgeable about the world around us, even if it's a really bad dark thing that we do not want to know about, it's still important. This book is one of those books that I believe all "older" teens should read. This book was so well written. The writing flowed very well and the way Scott wrote her characters was truly amazing to me. I think that some of the hardest characters to write are characters like this, Alice, a kidnapped girl forced to be a victim in a sick sexual game and Ray, the sick sadistic man that kidnapped her. Now I'm not sure what went into writing these characters but I feel like they could easily been made not believable, not at all in the case of this book. I really felt Alice and her feelings, I started to understand better what goes into living with an abusive, especially sexually abusive, captor for years and why that "Alice" made the choices she made and felt the things she felt. Once Ray's story is told in the book it's understandable why he is the way he is, it is definitely wrong but you can see the events that lead up his decision to kidnap "Alice". Overall this book was amazingly written, it was a very dark and disturbing book but I would read it again. I really think that all older teens should read this, it does contain sexual references and implies sexual things but does not go into to much detail. It is weir but I actually felt dirty after finishing every time after I finished reading a part, I actually wanted to go wash my hands. I know it is weird but that's the feeling I had. This book is that impacting. A Definite read!

4.5 Kisses!

Stolen By Lucy Christopher

Stolen by Lucy Christopher
Publisher: Chicken House, Scholastic 2010
Pages: 299
Genres: Adventure, Kidnapping, Australia, and sort of romance
Reviewed by: Kate

Gemma is going on a very normal vacation until she is kidnapped from an airport in Bangkok. She is taken to the Australian outback by a very non-stereotype guy named Ty. Ty is young, fit, and completely gorgeous. Ty has planned this for years, he loves Gem and wants her to love him back. This story is a letter from Gemma to Ty reflecting on her time with Ty.

I can describe this book in two words. Disturbingly Beautiful. This book is extremely well written. It tells all of what Gemma's going through at the time and her relationship with her captor. It gives beautiful and amazing descriptions of the outback and everything in it. It's also interesting to learn Ty's story and his connection with the desert. It can make you see many things in a new light and find things from nothing, if that makes any sense.

Ty is a disturbing character but I couldn't help but falling in love with him through Gemma's eyes and perspective. It makes me think that I should be really worried if I ever get kidnapped by a hot guy because I'll probably get Stockholm Syndrome as well. It's weird but it's as if Christopher not only writes about Gemma and her having Stockholm Syndrome but she gives it to you as well, or really Ty gives it to you. Either way what Gemma was feeling I was feeling. I don't think this is a really big spoiler but at the end Gemma insists that she doesn't have Stockholm Syndrome and I agreed with her, I didn't feel like she did. Though I'm not sure if I was agreeing about her or me at the time, or even both of us. I felt like the things that happened were justified to an extent, about why she was feeling the way she felt, as well as me too. It wasn't wrong; it was how she should have felt in the situation. Looking back after a few days I still feel the same about some things and others have me confused as I'm sure Gemma was confused. Why should I hate Ty, before I started this story I knew how I should feel about a kidnapper who takes you away from everything and everyone, after the story I have these whole new confusing feelings. It's very easy to get confused about Ty and his actions.

I don’t feel like Stockholm Syndrome is really all that bad. I mean it’s not like you’re
going crazy or anything, although maybe some of you think I’m crazy for saying that. I mean yes it is a survival tactic but what’s the alternative when you think your captor may hurt or even kill you? It’s not like you’re going to stand there and say “Yes, come and hurt me or even possible kill me” that in my opinion is crazy. You hear about Stockholm Syndrome in shows like CSI and even Ghost Whisperer and those people, aka kidnappers, were really bad evil people but Ty, he just doesn’t fit in their category, maybe a different version of bad but not pure evil. Unlike those terrible people, Ty believed that what he was doing was best for Gemma.

*Sigh* I'm still confused about him, as you can tell, and I don't think I'll ever get the answers. By the end of the book he doesn't seem like a bad guy at all even though everything associated with him should point to evil, like Gemma I just can't think of him that way. So I know this review is very confusing because I am still very confused. I didn't like the end of the book because it was sad but even I'll admit that it was the right ending and for the best. I mean no one should go around promoting Stockholm Syndrome. So with all that it was a beautifully disturbing story that I loved.

Easily 5 KISSES!




I can't give this book justice with a few short quotes from the book so I recommend you go and read it! Instead I'll give a warning and a piece of advice, Warning: If you read this book you'll probably get a slight case of Stockholm Syndrome, but it's not a bad feeling. Advice: Have something really light and funny to read after this book.