Review: Blind Spot by Laura Ellen

Publisher: Thomas Allen and Son
Published: October 23, 2012
Pages: 336
Source: For Review from Thomas Allen and Son
Rating: 2 Stars

There’s none so blind as they that won’t see.

Seventeen-year-old Tricia Farni’s body floated to the surface of Alaska’s Birch River six months after the night she disappeared. The night Roz Hart had a fight with her. The night Roz can’t remember. Roz, who struggles with macular degeneration, is used to assembling fragments to make sense of the world around her. But this time it’s her memory that needs piecing together—to clear her name . . . to find a murderer.

In short: Blind Spot by Laura Ellen was not the riveting murder mystery I had hoped and instead had too much of a focus on high school drama than I am a fan of.

Blind Spot was not the book I had been expecting from the synopsis - it sounded like an intense psychological murder mystery thriller. What I got instead was a whole bunch of high school drama, the mystery taking a back seat for most of the novel. Because I tend not to be a fan of teen drama, Blind Spot was a bit of a disappointment to me. It's a shame because I think the basis of a good murder mystery was there, it was just underdeveloped in favour of some seriously cliched and immature teen feuding.

Roz has macular degeneration, a condition that causes her to have a "blind spot" in her vision. For me, how Roz deals with living with this condition was the best and most interesting aspect of Blind Spot. From what I understand, Laura Ellen herself has experience with living with this eye disease, and it showed - the difficulties that arose for Roz seemed very astute and accurate for what you might expect situations to be like. It made me sympathize with Roz and the bullying she had to endure, and it also made me realize how much I take for granted having - relatively - good eyesight.

Now for what I didn't like: I did not like ANY of the characters in Blind Spot, I'm sorry to say. What an utterly immature, selfish, and pitiful lot! Perhaps some of these characters were meant to be unlikeable, but I highly doubt Laura Ellen meant for all of them to be. Some characters are pathetic, some are clearly exploiters (though Roz is oblivious to this), and one in particular is INFURIATING (and not in a "it's fun to hate them" kind of way). And my sympathy for Roz with her condition extends only so far.

Blind Spot contains a series of nauseatingly repetitive "he-said, she-said" moments that had the characters forming alliances with one another in one moment and then fighting with each other only a few pages later! The romance between Roz and her love interest was especially frustrating. Sure, they were sweet for the little bits they were together, but they went back and forth so many times over the course of Blind Spot that I found myself wondering why I should even care or want to see them get together in the end.

So yes, I was misled by the synopsis and Blind Spot wasn't for me. I would recommend it more to readers who enjoy a healthy dose of teen drama. Just don't go into it looking for a riveting murder mystery as the mystery part takes up only about a third of the novel... and has a bit of a disappointing ending to boot. I also feel that Laura Ellen has a lot of room for growth as a debut author, and I sincerely hope she continues to improve in all her subsequent books.

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