Daisy Chains

By: Lynn Vande Stouwe

Narrated by: Louisa Krause

Length: 1 hr and 39 mins

Publisher's Summary

A chilling thriller that puts listeners inside the mind of a teen sociopath on her prom night.

This content contains sensitive themes of suicide and mental illness that may be disturbing to some listeners. If you or someone you know is struggling with these issues, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: [phone].

There’s a dress in Daisy’s closet. Silver. Low-backed. Tiny spaghetti straps. She’ll wear it to prom on the arm of Harris Zandari, the most gorgeous senior at her school.    

How did quiet, barely-there Daisy, land Harris Zandari? She watched him. She watched him so closely, and for so long, that she saw things no one else did. She saw through his charm, his bright, smiling face, to the sad, broken person underneath just waiting for the perfect sad, broken girl to complete him.    

Daisy was that girl. Not only because her mother died and everyone still felt sorry for her. But because she made herself perfect for him. She fashioned herself into his broken dream girl, and now, they were going to prom. And Daisy was going to make it a night she would never forget.

No one but Daisy knows this, but there’s another dress in her closet, buried in the back. Tea-length. Little cap sleeves.    

Funeral black.  

©2020 Lynn Vande Stouwe (P)2021 Audible Originals, LLC.

Like watching the train wreck

Author perfectly captures sociopathic Daisy’s cruelty and manipulation. Morbid and horrific, yet hard to turn away. It should be obvious from the summary, but ... trigger warnings on teen suicide and bullying. If Black Mirror isn’t your thing, pass on this. On the other hand, if you like this, then you may also enjoy A Eulogy for Pretzel (another short freebie) or even A Certain Hunger (a full length book from the sociopath POV that goes even farther down the dark trail- a little verbose and full of itself, but unique and twisted).

Disturbing

The story was written well but it's awful. Damn near traumatizing. It's interesting seeing inside the mind of a sociopath like this though. I assume this generation has a lot of Daisy's walking around...

In very poor taste

This is a ripped from the headlines story. The story it is based on is tragic. Every character is overly simplified and the dialogue is supposed to represent the narcissistic depravity of the main character and the absolute stupidity of everyone else. This story seems opportunistic and In extremely bad taste. Those of us whom have lost loved ones to teen suicide know the unrelenting guilt that persists. Suicide leaves questions unanswered and opportunities to intervene and help impossible. Some subjects need to be approached with levity and not dangerously reimagined.

Ripped from the headlines

This is a retelling of a very sad story that happened recently. It’s just too soon for me. If I’d have realized where this was going I would NOT have even considered this.

What in the world did I just listen to????

I wish I'd read the description of this story more before listening to it. It was very similar to a headline not long ago. This story has a lot of foul language, bullying, self-entitlement, shallow teen thinking and so much more that is wrong with that generation. Daisy is one of the most shallow and easy to hate characters I've read about in a long time.

A short entertaining disturbance

I enjoyed this! Well written from the perspective of a demented teen. Made me wonder how many teens think this way in this current world of non reality we live in. Very good performance! I liked this short story.

horrific

appalled that something like this could be published, don't our young people have enough going on in their minds/ world!

Excellent!

loved it! leaves you wanting more! great reading by story teller...any other suggestion from this author

Surprisingly Entertaining

very interesting story. kept my attention and felt like I got a new perspective on love. the wrong kid of love lol

fine line between socio and psychopath

how do ppl who think this way Not see the inevitable ending?! nothing, Nothing, is every truly deleted from the internet! hitting 'delete' doesn't mean it's gone. not only that but, life is more like a soap opera than we'd like to think. mostly in how the truth Always comes out in the end ...

Very interesting read.

This of course touches on a very dark subject so it’s not for everyone.

I found Daisy’s character very interesting. She is clearly a sociopath and attention hungry.
There are obviously some deep rooted issues.
I feel that her character was portrayed well, clear she thinks differently to the ‘norm’ she’s very egocentric and desperate to be seen.
I liked that she wasn’t portrayed as just completely evil, she did question her decisions at time and showed glimpses of real emotion.

The other characters were very blah. Her father in particular was ‘too’ neglectful. For someone who’s a psychiatrist not to have any real interactions with your child or to spot any of the troubling signs seems a bit unbelievable. However this a short story based on the span of a day mostly so there’s not a lot of room to give us a deeper picture.

Overall it was a very easy and Interesting listen.

Very short story

Maybe I should have checked the length time. This would have made a great full novel, shame as was just starting to get into it.