Review: The Sight: Premonitions and Disappearance by Judy Blundell

Book Description from Goodreads:

Gracie has premonitions. They’ve haunted her since before her mother’s death, and she can’t get rid of them. She doesn’t know how to deal with them and she doesn’t want to--they’ve never led to anything good. She never knows whether she’s seeing the past, the present, or the future--it just comes to her. But Gracie is forced to try to use her premonitions. Her best friend, Emily, disappears, and the premonitions lead to the only clues to where she might be--and how she might be saved. Gracie’s long-absent father reappears, and his history appears to be mysteriously linked to the disappearance of a student many years ago--and the recent appearance of a body. Only Gracie’s premonitions lead to answers to some dark family secrets. In these two novels, Judy Blundell (writing as Jude Watson) takes readers on a suspenseful journey where premonitions become a matter of life and death.

My Thoughts:

I’ve always been interested in ESP, in visions, in those kinds of abilities. So it only took me three words to convince me that I need to buy The Sight.

Gracie has premonitions.

Gracie is still grieving for her mother’s death. There is so much pain in losing the one person she treated as her family and has invested so much love and loyalty in. After manifesting ‘troubled’ behaviour, she is sent to Beewick Island and moves in with her aunt, Shay and her cousin Diego. Gracie is the type of her person who wants to deal with her grief and fear alone. Oftentimes, she pushes people away and locks herself alone in her shell. But as time passes, she grows emotionally, learning to accept the true meaning of family and opening up herself to Shay and to Diego.

Judy Blundell takes readers into the labyrinth of questions through flickers of psychic flashes, revealing bit by bit of clues and information. Past, present and future collides in a chaotic and suspenseful experience that will leave readers thrilled and curious. Blundell explores the depth of pain and grief in this dark novel.

The second novel Disappearance captured my attention more than Premonitions did. There was a stronger pull with the flashes. The danger heightened to another level as Gracie discovered dirty secrets hiding in the shadows of Beewick Island. Blood is smeared in her visions. Her dad’s sudden reappearance makes her rethink her judgment of his character and his role in her life. But deep inside, Gracie knows that her dad is linked with the disappearance of a student a long time ago. What are the chances that his reappearance is related to a dead body that just turned up?

There are times that I was frustrated and slightly annoyed with Gracie. Let’s face it, she isn’t a likable character. She pushes away the people who want to help her, who want to reach out to her. I know that she wasn’t in the state of accepting outside help at that point. But a part of me was asking: What is she doing?! I mean, sure, you can turn down people’s efforts. But do it in a nice way. Another thing is her recklessness. When she assumes that she knows something because of her flashes, she just goes with it and oftentimes gets in trouble. Although, this could also be a factor of her being a teenager. She’s young. She doesn’t think as rationally as mature people.

And I wanted to read more about Zed. I hoped that he would get close to Gracie.

On the brighter side of things, I really liked the flow of the novel. The tension built up with every flash. And I wasn’t able to guess who the bad guys were. I got to peek in the heads of most of the characters via Gracie. It was great to be able to see the struggles of these characters in their lives, as well as their vulnerability.

The Sight is the story of Gracie, a girl with the gift and the curse of visions, a teenager struggling with grief and pain, a niece and a cousin who finds hope, love and acceptance in the house of her aunt. This is a novel that encourages us to use our talents, our skills, whether it is supernatural or not, for good.

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