Hidden Deep - Amy Patrick

Hidden Deep – Amy Patrick

I received an Arc copy of this from Net Galley in exchange for an honest Review.

First let me start with the synopsis of the book:

Sixteen-year-old Ryann Carroll has just run into the guy who saved her life ten years ago. You might think she'd be happy to see him again. Not exactly. She's a bit underdressed (as in skinny-dipping) and he's not supposed to exist. 

After her father's affair, all Ryann wants is to escape the family implosion fallout and find a little peace. She also wouldn't mind a first date that didn't suck, but she's determined not to end up like her mom: vulnerable, betrayed, destroyed. Ryann's just moved into her grandma's house in rural Mississippi, the same place where ten years earlier she became lost in the woods overnight and nearly died. 

She's still irresistibly drawn to those woods. There she encounters the boy who kept her from freezing to death that long ago winter night and was nowhere to be seen when rescuers arrived. He's still mysterious, but now all grown-up and gorgeous, too. And the more she's with him, the greater the threat he poses to Ryann's strict policy-- never want someone more than he wants you. 

Seventeen-year-old Lad knows the law of his people all too well: Don't get careless and don’t get caught. 
It's allowed his race to live undetected in this world for thousands of years, mentioned only in flawed and fading folklore. Lad's never been able to forget about Ryann since that night ten years ago. When he sees her again, his fascination re-ignites and becomes a growing desire that tempts him to break all the rules. He's not even supposed to talk to a human, much less fall in love with one. 

And the timing is atrocious. The Assemblage is coming, the rift between the Light and Dark is widening. Lad may have to trade his own chance at happiness to keep the humans, especially Ryann, blissfully ignorant and safe.

I love nothing more than a good, supernatural romance story. If I read the back of a book and see that there is a whole new world to be explored which contains these general areas, then I am sold. This book certainly did not disappoint.

Amy Patrick delivers a great magical and mysterious world, with brilliant characters. Ryann, our lead female protagonist, not only has character, but great humour and charm to her too. This is brilliantly shown through the writing style of this book. It easily flows off the page and you quickly become immersed within the world. It took me all of two days to read this book, and safe to say if I didn’t have work during the day, I would have easily finished it in one.

There are only a few characters that we see in this first book, which I feel is all that was needed, anymore and I feel like it would have veered away from the focus of the story. We have Emmy, Ryann’s friend, who is completely absorbed in the world of celebrity news and culture, desperately seeking a way to get into the ever growing fan pods that specific celebrities have, I found Emmy an interesting contrast to Ryann and at times even wondered how they were friends. Shay is another of Ryann’s friends, but we don’t really see much of her unless at a gig or a casual evening out at the ball park. We have Grandma Neena, who Ryann and her mother have had to move back in with after Ryann’s father had a ‘midlife crisis’ and left. I thought Neena was an awesome character, especially alongside Ryann, you could see between the two of them there was a great bond and understanding, Ryann is more like her Grandma than anyone else, and that connection is clear to see. With Ryann’s mother, we see that after the separation from Ryann’s dad, has become incredibly bitter and anti-men, constantly drilling into Ryann to always focus on herself and her life and that a man is just ‘icing on a cake’ just an addition as such that isn’t really required. At first we feel Ryann is more like her mother than we thought, with the same mantra and feelings towards not needing a man in her life, until she meets Lad.

I found Lad an incredibly interesting character. A boy she stumbles upon in the woods, only to realise it is the same boy who she saw when she became lost in the woods at 6 years old. Lad is the mysterious attractive young boy who clearly has many hidden secrets. He too has humour and charisma, which I found enjoyable to read, especially with his interactions with Ryann. I feel that there is still so much more to learn with his character. Finally we have Nox, the attractive newcomer to town, in a band and popular, tall dark and handsome, and yet something eerily mysterious about him. I did find Nox’s character interesting, how his confidence and almost arrogance at times towards Ryann was able to draw her in, and fluster her. However I don’t know if it was because I was team Lad all the way, but I did find him irritating as I was worried Lad would get the wrong idea…silly that I as a reader would think that when it is clearly just a story. But that is how involved you feel when reading this book, you are right there with Ryann through all of and this is a true credit to Amy Patricks writing.

As I have mentioned before I truly loved the writing style of this book, the humour that came through felt so similar to my own that I thoroughly enjoyed it. One of my favourite Ryann thoughts and comments was after Lad had helped Ryann, and she needed to jump down from a tree and be caught by Lad. Ryann has a crippling fear of heights, and Lad telling her how it was easy for him as he had been doing it as a child wasn’t helping , especially when  all she had to do was jump down and trust that he would catch her…easy…right? Well she responded with

‘No, No thanks. I can’t do that. When I was seven, I was still riding with training wheels. I’ll stay here’ I looked around for something, a staircase or an elevator to appear I guess.’

This is the sort of humour we continuously have through this book and it is such a joy and a breath of fresh air, the narration and almost internal monologue from Ryan is so relatable I couldn’t get enough of it.

The overall story was great too, at the start I was a bit dubious, and I wasn’t sure how it would pan out, what would happen or where it could go. But wow was I surprised, I really and truly loved it so much. I am shattered today because of it, as I just could stop reading it, and as a result ended up staying up late to finish it, even though I had an early start the next day. I just needed to know what was going to happen. One thing I would say is that I would love to know more about Grandma Neena and her past, and also the outcome of her with her family….this may seem cryptic, but I’m not giving anything away in this story, as you really have to read it yourself to get the full enjoyment of it all.

Safe to say I am eagerly awaiting book 2, in fact, I don’t think I can even wait; the cliff hanger at the end certainly makes me want to know, what happened? What’s going to happen? And what will become of Ryann and Lad? Also what will happen with Emmy? So many questions, I just need the answer too!! So if you love a good supernatural romance, with great characters and humour, then this is certainly a read for you.

I would give this book 4 out of 5 stars.