Tricia T. LaRochelle’s FLICKERING HEART is a book that isn’t afraid to traumatize its main couple, and readers with associated triggers should be warned that it might not be an easy book for them to read. The heroine starts out as the only survivor of a car accident that killed her entire family, about to attend college after having lived fairly socially isolated at a girls-only boarding school for most of the time since then (apparently long enough not to have realized that she was an incredibly beautiful young woman, which strains credibility a touch). Her mutual attraction to her new classmate Scott is instant, and quickly followed up on. Their romance feels a bit rushed in the beginning, though that’s hardly unusual for a first relationship and does have the positive effect of adding some credibility to the events that threaten that relationship. After they are an established couple, though, the real drama starts, beginning simply with nasty comments from the college’s Mean Girls and finishing with actual violent crime.
Heartbreak piles on heartache until the emotional intensity builds to the final action sequence and its aftermath, and the resolution comes as a substantial emotional relief after all that has happened. Be prepared to consume this book in one sitting – it’s a fairly quick read, and fast-moving enough to be difficult to put down. The characters are reasonably likeable, and most of them feel substantial enough to be real people rather than just cardboard stereotypes. The villain of the piece is deceptive, and clever enough, to make their ability to fool Sara believable without any detriment to her intelligence or good sense, and her reactions – and those of her friends – feel natural and understandable under those conditions. For some, however, the emotional intensity and the nature of the traumatic situations in the story might be too much to be believable (at least in a work of fiction – real life has a tendency to be more dramatic than fiction is permitted to be) and for others too much to handle. If what you want is an easy, uncomplicated, and cozy romance, this is not for you. For those who like having their hearts captured, broken, and put back together again by fictional characters featuring dramatically intense emotion, FLICKERING HEART is the perfect read.
Tricia T. LaRochelle’s FLICKERING HEART is a love story piled high with traumatic and devastating events, full of intense emotion and dramatic action.
~Catherine Langrehr for IndieReader