Made for You

by Melissa Marr

YA Thriller

Book Description

When Eva Tilling wakes up in the hospital, she’s confused – who in her sleepy little North Carolina town could have hit her with their car? Before she can consider the question, she finds that she’s awoken with a strange new skill: the ability to foresee people’s deaths when they touch her.

As she recovers from the attempt on her life, an old flame, Nate, turns up. Eva must traverse their rocky past and figure out how to use her new power – while the killer grows increasingly frantic. Can she stop him, or will he claim her?

MY THOUGHTS: 3.5 OUT OF 5 FLEURS DE LIS

Made for You by Melissa Marr

Made for You was a nice combination of a thriller with a little paranormal. The main character, Eva, darling of southern society, gains the ability to foresee people’s deaths after she is struck by a car one night. This new skill comes in handy as her friends start turning up dead after her accident.

The killer/stalker, Judge, was definitely creepy, especially for someone so young. I knew he had to be someone in Eva’s circle of friends, but that circle is so large that I didn’t really predict him until just before his identity was revealed. He has a singular fixation on Eva and believes what he is doing was told to him by God. His creepiness lies in his total belief that what he is doing is right and his calmness as he murders one girl after another.

Eva is alright as a main character. In the beginning of the book, right after her accident, I didn’t like her very much because she only seemed to be concerned about the fact that she was “not going to be pretty anymore.” She’s very vain and this continues throughout the book, even after several people tell her she’s still beautiful. As the book goes on she started to grow on me, and I like that she didn’t need a guy to fight for her.

There is of course a romance that blooms very quickly. Though Eva has a popular boyfriend when she is hit by the car, he doesn’t come see her in the hospital even though she is there for several days! But her old childhood friend Nate happens across her while visiting his little brother, and before long it’s the two of them together. I did feel this was sort of fast considering that they hadn’t spoken to each other in years. Not to mention the fact that she kept insulting him, calling him a “man-slut” over and over. I can only assume that he was giving her some leeway because of her brain injury, because she was pretty mean to him sometimes and he never really said anything to her about it.

I wish the book would have explored Eva’s death foreseeing ability more. The reader learns nothing about why she got it or if it will continue. I also felt the story presented some characters as rather one-sided. I definitely would have liked to learn more about Nate’s background and current family dynamics.

If you enjoy a thriller with a villain that will make your skin crawl, as well as a side of romance, you should give Made for You a try.

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About the Author

Melissa Marr is the author of the internationally bestselling Wicked Lovely series (currently available in 26 languages). In adult fiction, she is the author of the award-winning novel, Graveminder, and the newly released, The Arrivals. With Kelley Armstrong, Melissa is the co-editor of two anthologies and co-author of the Blackwell Pages trilogy (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers), a children’s series about the Norse myth of Ragnarök. Her upcoming HarperCollins 2014 release, Made For You, utilizes both her graduate degree in Southern Literature and her personal experience with stalkers in a story about a killer who terrorizes a small North Carolina town.

Melissa lives in Virginia with her family. You can visit her online at www.melissamarrbooks.com or on Twitter (@melissa_marr), Tumblr, or Facebook.

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