Lights Over Emerald Creek by Shelley DavidowPublished: February 28th 2014 by Hague Publishing
Pages: 195
Lucy Wright, sixteen and a paraplegic after a recent car accident that took her mother's life, lives in Queensland on a 10,000 acre farm with her father. When Lucy investigates strange lights over the creek at the bottom of the property, she discovers a mystery that links the lights to the science of cymatics and Scotland’s ancient Rosslyn Chapel.
But beyond Chapel is an even larger mystery. One that links the music the Chapel contains to Norway's mysterious Hessdalen lights, and beyond that to Saturn and to the stars. Lucy's discoveries catapult her into a parallel universe connected to our own by means of resonance and sound, where a newly emerging world trembles on the edge of disaster. As realities divide, her mission in this new world is revealed and she finds herself part of a love story that will span the galaxy.
"At sixteen, Lucy believed she was a pragmatic realist, but what she'd seen twenty-four hours ago seemed to defy all logic."Actual rating: 1.5 stars
Thank you Netgalley and Hague Publishing for providing me with a copy of this book!
For once, I don't know where to start this review. Lights Over Emerald Creek is such a strange and weird book, and yet even those words don't even begin to cover it. I could say I was once again fooled by the pretty looking cover with the pretty looking lights, because I am. After having read the entire thing, I can definitely say that the premise of this book is misleading. This is certainly not a novel for everyone out there. Because of the topics this book handles, it would only come across as interesting to people with an interest for cymatics. I, for one, am not a fan of that, which quickly resulted into not being a fan of this book either.
The plot seemed to start off nicely, with Lucy discovering cymatics in the sand and asking a Scottish young man for aid. When I was a few chapters in, the plot started to take a turn into a strange direction. Events start to take place, and none of them happened because of a specific reason. It seemed more like the author herself wanted things to happen, so they eventually did. These different thin storylines had no coherence and drifted off to nowhere. The book just seemed to have a lack of an actual plot. There were so many elements to this book that seemed completely out of place that I wondered what they were doing there, or what importance they had. I found myself starting at what I just read more often than the actual reading.
In the end, Lights Over Emerald Creek resembles to a combination of contemporary, sci-fi and fantasy. That particular combination didn't work out all too well, because I have no idea in what genre this book actually belongs. If someone could tell me, that would be great.
The characters in this book are straight out flat. Throughout my reading experience, there little to zero character development. At the end of the book, all the characters are still the same as they were in the beginning. None of these characters also seemed to have a personality of their own, something I just find to be really frustrating. The only sparkle of truth was Lucy. This protagonist is kind of special, without trying or wanting to be. This girl is unlike any heroine I've read about, and that is mainly because of her pragmatic situation of being stuck in a wheelchair. She's not able to use her legs anymore after a tragic accident which killed her mom, and the pain she carries with her throughout the book is the only thing that feels real. Reading a young-adult novel from the perspective of someone with a disability is truly refreshing.
The romance didn't do anything good to the book either. Although it started out interesting, the actual love seemed to have popped up at such a random moment I couldn't again believe what I just read. It just all started completely out of the blue, with not a sign of chemistry to be found. Lucy had even better chemistry with her ex than with Jonathan. It's without a doubt one of the most forced relationships I've ever seen, and that definitely says something.
Lights Over Emerald Creek was not only a strange read, but surprisingly bad too. A short read, yes, but considering how rushed this book actually is, it doesn't come as a surprise now that it's such a short read. If you're not that interested in cymatics, I'd suggest to ignore the pretty cover because there is nothing interesting here to be found.
