Hiding in Sunshine Review

It has been a while since I reviewed a book, but that doesn't mean I haven't been reading. I have! As part of my Holiday VoxBox from Influenster, I received Hiding in Sunshine written by John and Caitlin Stuart. Fresh after finishing The Casual Vacancy, I jumped into this fresh novel.

From Amazon:

"Living lives of quiet affluence in a historic, suburban Boston town, Gavin and Lisa Brinkley had no idea how quickly and decisively their lives, and those of their two young daughters, could be upended. A series of events - a mysterious break-in at their home, some menacing tailgating on the highway from Boston, a startling visit from an F.B.I. agent warning of an imminent kidnapping attempt - leads to the family's abrupt uprooting from its comfortable existence into a terrifying new existence on the run, under new identities. This taut thriller by a father-daughter team follows the eleven-year odyssey of an American family on the run, in hiding through the mountain states of the American west, where survival skills and living off the grid are paramount, but so are friendship, cooperation, and resilience. The enemy, always lurking just out of sight, is a foreign cyber-criminal enterprise that launches breathtaking assaults on the American banking system and physical infrastructure, but the Brinkleys also know that the threat is deeply personal, reaching ever closer to them from the shadows of the past. At the same time, Gavin and Lisa discover the perils of wandering too close to the edges of the dark side, in the murky world of cyber-security."

When I read the description of this book and the back jacket, I was worried. I am not the biggest fan of techie pieces or thrilling mystery type pieces. I am more a fan of big, complex plots with numerous characters and twists. To be honest, I was afraid it was going to be a little cheesy.

Boy was I wrong! Although the story was slow to start, once it picked up the plot was thrilling and enthralling. The incorporation of the government memos and the side stories that build up the main story really pulled me in and made this book enjoyable for me. I even got a few plot twists towards the end that really made the book exciting.

I do have some annoyances. Mainly with the ending of the book. While the beginning chapters seemed to drag on, the ending chapters were short and ended abruptly. I felt more like the narrator was just listing the events instead of telling the story. Lastly, I could tell the transition in writing between the two authors. It was not enough of a difference to detract from the story, it was noticeable.

Overall, I give this book 4.7 out of 5. I highly recommend it to everyone! I even made Berkeley stop reading Catching Fire (which has taken him several months) to read this book, and even he likes it and we like totally different styles of writing.