ARC Review of "Shade Me" By Jennifer Brown

Shade Me 

By Jennifer Brown 

Stars: 5 

Source: EW 

Release Date: January 19th 2016 

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A phone call from the hospital in the middle of the night. Someone you don't know has been attacked and your number is the only one in their cell phone. They need you to identify the body. Do you go? 

Nikki Kill does. And what she finds out is that the schools most popular girl has been beaten within an inch of her life, left for dead and she is now in a coma. 

Any normal person would identify her and let the police take care of it. But Nikki isn't exactly what you would all 'normal'. 

Thanks to a rare phenomenon called 'synesthesia' Nikki can see things that other people can't. Her senses are overlapped in a way that allows her to see emotions, numbers and letters as colors. 

Lies are gray, lust is violet, etc, etc. 

Nikki has always thought of her diagnosis as a disadvantage, a disability, but it might be just what she needs in order to solve the mystery of Peyton Hollis before someone else gets hurt.   

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"Shade Me", book one, in what I hope will be a very long series, sucked me in from the first couple of pages. 

Nikki is like the (slightly) less kiss ass version of Veronica Mars. She may not have a giant drooling sidekick (Backup, not Wallace!) or a taser (though she should invest in one) but she's got her seriously cool diagnosis of 'synesthesia', the mysterious death of her mother and now the mystery of Peyton Hollis' attack. 

Add in a hot brother (Peyton's not Nikki's) a nosy cop and (of course) an absentee parent and you've got yourself a thrilling suspense YA.

Her synesthesia is originally what drew me in but Brown's writing and characters are what I ended up staying for. 

Yes there were those "Oh no she didn't" moments where you're screaming at her to run away/lock the doors/call for help/let the police handle it, but without those moments we wouldn't have this book so I just rolled with the punches and tried not to let her total lack of self preservation bother me. 

I do admit that some times her color clues (what I called her synesthesia) threw me a little bit, but all in all I still couldn't give this book anything less than 5 stars, because a book that you stay up until 3AM to finish when you have work in the morning is a book deserving of 5 stars.  

That being said I almost wish this had been an adult novel. Nikki is 18, her dad was barely in the book and for it being 'young adult' there was a ton of sex and violence. Plus I feel like it would've been longer if it had been adult or even NA. And I'm ALL about more Nikki Kill. 

I can't wait for the next book! 

Until next time, 

Ginger 

P.S *SPOILERS* 

Well spoiler-ish but whatever. 

Am I the only one who instantly shipped her and the cop (whose name I cannot remember!!!)??? 

Maybe I'm crazy but I really love them together and I can see a good working relationship between them (with benefits of course ;)).

In compliance with FTC guidelines I am disclosing that this book was given to me for free to review. 

My review is my honest opinion.