Secret

Elemental, Book 4

By: Brigid Kemmerer

Narrated by: Charlie Thurston

Length: 10 hrs and 40 mins

Publisher's summary

Nick Merrick is stretched to the breaking point. Keep his grades sky-high, or he'll never escape his hometown. Keep his brother's business going, or the Merricks will be out on the street. Keep the secret of where he's going in the evenings from his own twin, or he'll lose his family. Keep his mind off the hot, self-assured dancer who's supposed to be his "girlfriend's" partner.

Of course, there's also the homicidal freak Quinn has taken to hanging around and the Elemental Guide who's counting the hours until he can try once more to kill the Merrick brothers. There's a storm coming. From all sides. And then some. Nick Merrick, can you keep it together?

©2014 Brigid Kemmerer (P)2015 Tantor

Critic reviews

"As with previous titles, the heart of the story is the human condition, and the paranormal aspect is the side note - a pleasing balance." ( Kirkus)

Secret is full of surprises

I live the developing characters. Lots of new twists in the story. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Great Book, Stupid Decisions

Where does Secret rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

I really enjoyed this bool. It was better than the last one. I wasn't too fond of Spirit.

What other book might you compare Secret to and why?

I would compare this book to the others of the series. They all follow the same formula: The author introduces you to a character, things are going okay, the character has a dilemma that they are afraid to share with others (even though it would solve a lot of problems if they just did), the conflict comes to a climactic point, and then everything is resolved and the main character learns a valuable lesson. This lesson is generally that if they would have just used common sense and been honest with the people he/she trusts, life would have been a whole lot easier than fighting the problems their ignorance and stubbornness caused.

What does Charlie Thurston bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

I hated the narration of the first book of this series which was done by another female narrator, but Charlie Thurston was SUPERB. He truly performed the book instead of just reading it. He sucked me into the story as I would have been if I'd read it myself but the voices added something that I would have been lacking. He has the ability to subtly change his voice so you know exactly when the character speaking changes.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

Yes, these stories suck you in. There is so much going on and so many problems that you see the answers to so clearly and you just want to keep listening as you are frustrated waiting for the character to finally see what is so clear to you. These characters definitely frustrate me with their stupidity sometimes, but I guess that's what keeps me reading.

Any additional comments?

I wish the author gave the characters more common sense. They don't have to be so dense every time. That being said, I do get that these books are probably written for a much younger audience.

Brigid knows how to keep you on our toes

Brigid really knows how to keep the audience's attention with the narrator's performance with the book!

Only 3 Stars

I have mixed feelings about this book. Although Nick was one of the characters that I liked best, I wasn’t too happy with the direction she took with him. At the same time, it was heartbreaking to know that people actually go through feelings like that.

We also got an insight of two other secondary characters in the series which makes it understandable of why they did certain things.

I didn’t care for the narrator for this book. It was almost as if he forgot what voice he used for each character, so they changed throughout the book.