Tuesday, June 7, 2022

Review: The Curse of Misty Wayfair by Jaime Jo Wright

Genre: Mystery/Suspense
Publisher: Bethany House
Released: Jan. 22, 2019
371 pages
About the Book:

Left at an orphanage as a child, Thea Reed vowed to find her mother someday. Now grown, her search takes her to Pleasant Valley, Wisconsin, in 1908. When clues lead her to a mental asylum, Thea uses her experience as a post-mortem photographer to gain access and assist groundskeeper Simeon Coyle in photographing the patients and uncovering the secrets within. However, she never expected her personal quest would reawaken the legend of Misty Wayfair, a murdered woman who allegedly haunts the area and whose appearance portends death.

A century later, Heidi Lane receives a troubling letter from her mother--who is battling dementia--compelling her to travel to Pleasant Valley for answers to her own questions of identity. When she catches sight of a ghostly woman who haunts the asylum ruins in the woods, the long-standing story of Misty Wayfair returns--and with it, Heidi's fear for her own life.

As two women across time seek answers about their identities and heritage, can they overcome the threat of the mysterious curse that has them inextricably intertwined? 

My Rating & Thoughts:    

I have mixed feelings about this book. I found the story started off slow and I had to reread paragraphs to understand what was happening at the beginning. However, as I got further in it did get better and I became invested in figuring out how the two timelines connected and an explanation for the events that were happening. I struggled to really connect with any of the main characters, it was some of the secondary characters in both timelines that I preferred such as Mr. & Mrs. Amos and Connie & Emma Crawford. I found I preferred reading the historical timeline over the present day. Seeing how mental illness was treated back in the day was heart-wrenching, thankfully society’s acceptance has improved some. The family lineage and connections were difficult to follow and remember how certain characters were connected, trying to keep track of this distracted me from the story. I was able to figure out the explanation for the events in the historical timeline but the explanation of the present-day events took me by surprise and it made me dislike some of the characters even more. I do think Ms. Wright handled the theme of mental illness, anxiety and Autism well. I was expecting the story to have more of a creepy factor than it did due to the cover and the synopsis, but I did not find myself creeped out at all. Rather I found the story to be flat at times and repetitive.

Favourite Quote: 
“Was one’s purpose defined by knowing who they were, where they were from, or by something – Someone – greater?”
(I purchased my copy of this book; opinions expressed 
in this review are my honest opinion and completely my own.)

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