Black Sheep by Rachel Harrison

 

Black Sheep by Rachel Harrison - 289 pages

Nobody has a “normal” family, but Vesper Wright’s is truly...something else. Vesper left home at eighteen and never looked back—mostly because she was told that leaving the staunchly religious community she grew up in meant she couldn’t return. But then an envelope arrives on her doorstep.

Inside is an invitation to the wedding of Vesper’s beloved cousin Rosie. It’s to be hosted at the family farm. Have they made an exception to the rule? It wouldn’t be the first time Vesper’s been given special treatment. Is the invite a sweet gesture? An olive branch? A trap? Doesn’t matter. Something inside her insists she go to the wedding. Even if it means returning to the toxic environment she escaped. Even if it means reuniting with her mother, Constance, a former horror film star and forever ice queen.

When Vesper’s homecoming exhumes a terrifying secret, she’s forced to reckon with her family’s beliefs and her own crisis of faith in this deliciously sinister novel that explores the way family ties can bind us as we struggle to find our place in the world.

This is the first book I've read by this author, and I have to say that I liked it.  I'll have to try some of her other books.  I really enjoyed this one!

Divine Evil by Nora Roberts

Divine Evil by Nora Roberts - 576 pages

Sculptor Clare Kimball has returned home to Emmittsboro to try to make sense of her father's suicide years before.  She finds herself thriving in her old hometown artistically and romantically.  She falls in love with sherriff Cam Rafferty.  But there are secrets in Emmittsboro.  Girls and women are going missing.  People are being murdered.  Who is the mysterious group behind the scenes of everything in town?

This book was very mid-80s to me in its feel and plot.  The Satanism plot seemed very out of place from today's books.  I enjoyed the characters but thought the plot didn't connect.  I also thought the ending very abrupt without any closure.  It would have been very interesting to see how the town would have reacted and dealt with a Satanic group in  its midst.