Monday, March 31, 2014

Omens (Cainsville #1) by Kelley Armstrong



Publication: August 20, 2013

Publisher: Dutton Adult



#1 New York Times bestselling author Kelley Armstrong begins her new series with Omens, featuring a compelling new heroine thrust into a decades-old murder case and the dark mysteries surrounding her strange new home. 

Twenty-four-year-old Olivia Taylor Jones has the perfect life. The only daughter of a wealthy, prominent Chicago family, she has an Ivy League education, pursues volunteerism and philanthropy, and is engaged to a handsome young tech firm CEO with political ambitions.

But Olivia’s world is shattered when she learns that she’s adopted. Her real parents? Todd and Pamela Larsen, notorious serial killers serving a life sentence. When the news brings a maelstrom of unwanted publicity to her adopted family and fiancé, Olivia decides to find out the truth about the Larsens.

Olivia ends up in the small town of Cainsville, Illinois, an old and cloistered community that takes a particular interest in both Olivia and her efforts to uncover her birth parents’ past.

Aided by her mother’s former lawyer, Gabriel Walsh, Olivia focuses on the Larsens’ last crime, the one her birth mother swears will prove their innocence. But as she and Gabriel start investigating the case, Olivia finds herself drawing on abilities that have remained hidden since her childhood, gifts that make her both a valuable addition to Cainsville and deeply vulnerable to unknown enemies. Because there are darker secrets behind her new home and powers lurking in the shadows that have their own plans for her.


“A Bad Omen is a warning. A sign to stop and reconsider. Proceed with caution.” 

Olivia is a well-bred socialite living a good life in Chicago, with her gorgeous finance James and adoptive mother Lena Taylor. James is poised to run for the Senate. And in a short time, Olivia and James are planned to be married.

Until the moment a photographer happens to spot and notices the resemblance she carries to her birth mom, Pamela Larsen. From there on out, things go from good to incredibly bad so fast Olivia doesn’t have a whole lot of time to properly process the information she is given.

Through an odd stream of occurrences, Olivia winds up in Cainsville Illinois. A town filled with an odd yet interesting sort of residents that respects its elders, values its privacy, protects their own, and seems to be hiding a dark secret yet to be uncovered.

I liked how Olivia was determined to do things on her own in her own terms. She wasn’t some soft, whimpering delicate flower. She was tough, resourceful, and she had a natural talent for spotting and deciphering omens. 

From the very beginning I was intrigued. A young woman finding out that she is adopted and that her biological parents are serial killers? Count me in. Even though, I was excited to read it, it took me awhile. Don’t ask me why. But either way, I finally gave it a go and I ended up enjoying it a lot. From the backdrop of the mysterious small town, the supernatural elements thrown in, and the strange inhabitants and their expectations…this was a book I easily got into.  Everything went together at a good pace and soon I found myself reading page after page, wanting needing to know more.

Kelley Armstrong has written an entertaining book with unique situations and fun characters. I’m looking forward to exploring Cainsville and its inhabitants a little more in the second book, Visions releasing August 19, 2014.



RATING: 4½ out of 5.



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1 comment:

  1. I couldn't possibly imagine what it would be like to know your bio parents were serial killers. This sounds fantastic!

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