Premeditated

Premeditated

YA fiction
The cover of Josin L. McQuin's Premeditated shows one blue eye
looking out through a pane of shattered glass. Beneath the title is
the sentence "cross her heart, you're going to die". The expectation
of suspense is created before you even open the book...
...which lives up to the promise of its cover quite nicely.
We're talking Alfred Hitchcock style carefully crafted character based
suspense. You see, protagonist Dinah's beloved cousin, Claire, who
should be starting high school, is in a coma, the result of a failed
suicide attempt. Dinah has the name of the boy who drove Claire to
this act of desperation. She's infiltrated his exclusive and
expensive prep school with vengeance on her mind, but not something as
simple as murder. She plans to make him sorry that he was ever born,
sorry enough to act on it.
"Do it right and their blood will be on their own hands. Just
another tragic teen suicide on the back of page three in the local
newspaper, with a memorial page in the school yearbook...Pretty words
and puffy, red-rimmed eyes from people who question why but don't look
hard enough to find out.
No matter how messy it gets, or how much blood's involved,
suicide's a clean kill."
Her target, the confident, charming, son of a very wealthy man,
is not about to go down easy. Dinah hasn't anticipated
complications. What if she falls for his spell? What of he isn't
guilty as charged?
You'll have to read the book to see what happens. This book
would make a great Christmas present for any suspense loving young
adults on your holiday gift list.
On a personal note, the Thursday before Thanksgiving I performed in
UMaine's Got Talent. Had to pass the audition to do it. It was in a
university auditorium that was way bigger and held way more people
that any of my previous venues. I went in, looked around, and said,
"YIKES!". I recited my poem, Silver Foxes, which I had committed to
memory. The minute I got out there in my silver sequin covered dress
that made moving spots of light swirling around me I owned that
stage. I got big applause. And people got the point of the poem. I
was in seventh heaven.
A great big shout goes out to the fraternity brothers who raised money
for a good cause, provided a night of live entertainment, and gave the
other performers and me a most excellent venue.
Julia Emily Hathaway


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