Book Review - Echoes of Silence by Anne Malcom -

 

Title: Echoes of Silence (Unquiet mind, #1)

Author: Anne Malcom 

Genre: Young Adult

Rating: ★★★★☆

Blurb: 

People make love seem complicated. Intricate. Novels try to capture its intensity; music tries to rein in its soul.
I’ve read every novel I could. I’ve lived and breathed every song that I could listen to. The sounds fill my unquiet mind.
Then he came.
Killian.
He brought with him the beauty of silence that echoes through my soul and showed me love isn’t complicated. It’s simple. Beautiful.
Some say love at first sight doesn’t exist, that you can’t find your soul mate at sixteen years old. Those are people rooted in reality, chained to the confines of life that dictates how you are meant to think. Killian broke those chains. He broke everything, shattered it so I can see that reality is overrated, that daydreams can somehow come to life.
My life tumbled into darkness in the time after I met him, so dark I’m not sure I’ll ever see the light again. But he is always at my side. His life means he knows how to navigate the dark and he can lead me out.
I wade through the darkness with him at my side.
We’ll be together forever; I’m certain of that.
Until I’m not.


Note: This is book one of two. Killian and Lexie's story does not end here and will be continued in a following book.

Review: 

This book was exactly the read I needed right now. 

I actually picked this book up after seeing the authors TikTok about it. I’ve only read one other book by Anne Malcom, which I also loved, but was very different from Echoes of Silence. I decided to pick this book up to try and switch up genres and to get me out of my month long reading slump, and boy am I glad that I did. 

I absolutely loved Killian and Lexie. Even being so young these two had a connection like no other. Like she says in the book they are each other’s person, and this is very evident in their journey. 

“I didn’t forget about books the same way I didn’t forget about oxygen. They were necessary to my survival. That and music.”

This book starts off super sweet. Lexie is not the type of character I usually read about, seeing as I don’t usually connect with the sunshine, happy, and innocent type of characters, but I couldn’t help but to love her and her development as the story unfolds changes her and you get to see her grow up. 

You see the transition from her being that sweet innocent teenager, into seeing her experience the horrors and heartbreak that the world holds and the destruction of that innocence when the truth of the world is revealed. But you also see her first experience with love, and some truly amazing friendships. 

“I wanted the fairy tale. I wanted a love as deep as the ocean, as unyielding as the wind, stronger than diamonds, and as unpredictable as a volcano. I wanted a love that made me crazy and sane at the same time. The feeling that the world slipped into place the moment you laid eyes on that person. Your person. The one meant for you.” 

I really loved Anne Malcoms writing. It is beautiful and almost lyrical in a way. I loved the characters, and the family dynamics. The MC and Lexie and her mom’s connection to them. All of the characters and their relationships in this book were so special. 

This is not a standalone, Lexie and Killian’s story concludes in 'The Skeletons of Us', which I’ve already dived into.

“But surprisingly, right there in his arms, feeling safer than I ever had in my life, I fell. Fell right into the depths of Killian. Down a rabbit hole I hoped never to return from.”

If you need something to switch up the genres you are reading, or just love a beautiful tale of love, heartbreak, and growing up, i highly recommend Echoes of Silence.