Sweet Unrest

Lucy Aimes has always been practical. But try as she might, she can’t come up with a logical explanation for the recurring dreams that have always haunted her. Dark dreams. Dreams of a long-ago place filled with people she shouldn’t know…but does.

When her family moves to a New Orleans plantation, Lucy’s dreams become more intense, and her search for answers draws her reluctantly into the old city’s world of Voodoo and mysticism. There, Lucy finds Alex, a mysterious boy who behaves as if they’ve known each other forever. Lucy knows Alex is hiding something, and her rational side doesn’t want to be drawn to him. But she is.

As she tries to uncover Alex’s secrets, a killer strikes close to home, and Lucy finds herself ensnared in a century-old vendetta. With the lives of everyone she loves in danger, Lucy will have to unravel the mystery of her dreams before it all comes to a deadly finish.
from goodreads.com

Beth says 3.5 Stars...
This book has a really cool premise and interesting narrative structure. Weaving past and present together in the form of dreams isn't necessarily new, but allows for creating a richer story. The old plantation/New Orleans setting helped enhance the weight of history on the current action of the plot. I don't want to give too much away, but suffice it to say that I guessed wrong as to the identity of the final villain. The plot was reasonably well executed, although it could have been tighter in parts. I was mildly frustrated with how long it took for Lucy to figure out some fairly obvious facts. With some information reveals a bit earlier (more in line with how long it takes the readers to put pieces together) the flow would have been much smoother. It also would have allowed for a little more time spent in the past to fully flesh out the characters and plotline there.

The biggest problem in the novel is the lack of development of the secondary characters. It's primarily Lucy's story and it shows in the flatness of everyone else. We get a slightly better picture of Alex than anyone else, but it takes until pretty far into the novel to really get anywhere with even him. The other characters severely lack depth and other interest, at least for me. I liked Lucy well enough, despite occasionally being a bit slow on the uptake. She did grow over the course of the novel, always a plus for the main character. I can't do too much more commenting about the characters because the others aren't worth it. The only other note is that the voodoo priestesses are quite fun and bring in a very different edge to the world.

Overall this is fun and well-timed coming close to Halloween. It's just enough spook for me to not freak out reading alone at night, but still compelling. If a bit of old school Creole voodoo and romance sound good to you I'd suggest giving it a whirl.
ebook from Netgalley