I Am Watching You

Product Information

We’ve had a look at the CCTV, Sarah. From the club.’ It is the detective’s voice now – firmer. ‘Some of the cameras weren’t working, unfortunately. But there are some things we’re not quite understanding, Sarah. Also, we’ve had a call from a witness.’ Ella is on the train eavesdropping as we all do—except the tea she heard was exceptionally disturbing. Two fresh out of prison ex-convicts hitting on two teenage girls. Ella tries to forget what she heard, but that soon proves impossible when one of the girls, Anna, goes missing, and the two ex-cons are suspects. Already hated on by the media for being a bystander, Ella starts receiving mysterious hate mail. Why is this person so mad? And what really happened to Anna? The narrative. This story is from multiple perspectives. It was a bit all over the pace in the beginning, but it weirdly becomes enjoyable as the story flows. We get every character in the third POV while Ella told her own story in the first POV. My Favorite Quotes THE WATCHER — An unidentified person who had been watching Ella and was involved with what happened to Anna.

It’s not merely about solving a mystery of a missing girl but rather a tragedy that ties families together. It reminds us as well of the carelessness of the youth.First, I had a really hard time with the characters. The characters intrigued me in the beginning with the story and how things were progressing, but as I got further and further in, I couldn’t find a character that I liked or related to. There were so many point-of-views that I found myself confused and having to restart. Thank you to Kindle First for allowing me to read this before the publication date in exchange for an honest review. Now another thing with this one that seemed to make it a bit tougher to connect to the story for me was the way the book changes the point of view between several different characters. The chapters are titled with things such as The Witness (Ella), The Father, The Friend and eventually The Private Investigator along with a couple of other POVs later in the book so as it's switching I was struggling to match who was who and the characters were just not popping out to me and taking a life of their own. Perhaps it was the style or perhaps I just didn't feel there was enough depth to them to really connect but it gave the story another bit of slowness to it. Some great points about this book, firstly I do enjoy the stories/chapters from all the different main characters in the book.

The kettle screaming angry clouds onto the mirror while I am planning the calls in my head all at once.

Ella (The Witness) is taking the train and noticed two young girls. She immediately decides she should keep an eye on them when two young men board the train and start talking to them. She eavesdrops and realizes the two men are fresh out of jail and the girls and the men end up talking and drinking together. She overhears the one girl's name (Anna) and is able to piece together that she lives on a farm. Ella is tempted to call Anna's parents or warn the girls for talking to these men. When she walks to get something and overhears one of the girl's having sex in the bathroom (Sarah) she gets upset that she thought they were nice girls and washes her hands of them. For me, this book serves two major stories — the mystery of the disappearance of Anna and the experience of parenthood with losing and having a child. I am not a parent myself but the book succeeded to feel these situations beautifully. I was really intrigued after reading the description for "I Am Watching You". If I was on a train or other public transportation and I saw young women getting ready to head off with men just released from prison...would I intervene? First of all, I would probably have earphones in and wouldn't hear their conversation. But if I did hear it? I'm honestly not sure what I would do. The next day, the news of Anna Ballard, one of the girls on the train, missing was on the TV broadcast. Ella heard the news and guilt crept into her instantly like never before. She should’ve done something that night. What would have happened if she didn’t stay still?

I just ended up losing interest in everyone. I only kept reading to see if I was right about the villain in this one. I was off, but honestly, the author doesn't even lay out any clues for you to get this is the bad guy/girl (being vague on purpose). It comes out of left field and the wrap up is just ham-fisted. It keeps you on the edge of your seat (somehow) as well as in the dark; so that you don’t know what happened until the end. Well, unless you can read between the lines and take hints OR unless you are super intuitive. Everyone has secrets, which we know because the story is told from multiple points of view. Sarah doesn’t tell the police the whole truth. Anna’s father isn’t telling the whole truth. Ella’s son has secrets. What’s initially ominous to Ella, however, is the series of threatening notes she receives—and also doesn’t tell the police about. She does let a private investigator know. Matthew quit the police force to become a PI for reasons that are kept secret to the reader for most of the book.The next day one of the girls, Anna, is reported missing, and Ella is beside herself, wondering if she could have helped the girl instead of turning away. Anna's friend Sarah is saying much about what had happened to them the previous evening and the police soon run out of leads. But what is Sarah hiding? Who else in the girls' families are keeping secrets? And who is sending Ella anonymous postcards?