My Thoughts: Stolen (Lucy Christopher)

(Goodreads Summary/Link)
A girl: Gemma, 16, at the airport, on her way to a family vacation.

A guy: Ty, rugged, tan, too old, oddly familiar, eyes blue as ice.

She steps away. For just a second. He pays for her drink. And drugs it. They talk. Their hands touch. And before Gemma knows what's happening, Ty takes her. Steals her away. To sand and heat. To emptiness and isolation. To nowhere. And expects her to love him.

Written as a letter from a victim to her captor, STOLEN is Gemma's desperate story of survival; of how she has to come to terms with her living nightmare--or die trying to fight it.










Genre: YA
Published: May 4, 2009
Source: Bought

My Thoughts:

Stolen is a story about a 16 year old girl, named Gemma,  who gets abducted at an airport by a man several years older then her. He smuggles her away to an isolated desert in the middle of nowhere.  The book is written as a letter from victim to captor.  It's a good, solid captivating read that held my interest until the end.

The writing was very descriptive. I felt as though I was inside Gemma's head and was experiencing her fear and anger and confusion.  I could feel the brutality of the desert sun. I could feel the terror of not knowing what this man was going to do next.  The man who stole her, Ty, is not your straight-forward evil, easy to hate monster.  He's not a murderer or rapist. He allows Gemma to roam the house and go outside. Brings her food and water. Tries to care for her.   He's complicated and sure, a little crazy. But as the story goes on and Gemma reveals more insight into her captor and how he came to steal her, feelings start to change a little. And maybe you don't hate him as much as you should. And then you feel crazy yourself for not hating him.  Because he is a monster. He took a girl against her will and psychologically crippled her. But sometimes the author makes you forget.

You read the struggles Gemma goes through and it makes you think about what would you do if you were in a similar situation? There's no way you could know. Sitting here now, I could logically think of a plan but in that moment of sheer terror there's no telling what my mind would do to survive. Or what would be left in the aftermath.

While I was very invested in this story and read it quickly,  it didn't take me all the way.  It didn't take me to that raw, emotionally used up place that I was expecting and wanting it to. I don't know why. There's nothing wrong with this story.  Maybe it's just me.  I wasn't emotionally spent. And for some reason I was expecting at least one tear to form in my eye. But alas, my eyes are dry. 

AND I'm going to go ahead and give a shout out to the camel. I wants one.

Favorite Quotes:
"I pressed my hand to my chest. I could feel my heart. Boom, ba-boom, ba-boom.It was going to beat right through my ribs, cracking them all. I tried slowing my breathing. To do this, I tried to determine exactly where my heart was. Left side, or right? We'd learned that at school once. I pressed around, trying to find it, but it felt like my whole chest was made of heart. My whole body was beating. And it was getting faster. It felt like I was going to explode."

Bottom Line: Stolen is emotionally confusing, heartbreaking and real. A solid must read.  3.75/5