The Companion

By: Katie Alender

Narrated by: Taylor Meskimen

Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins

Publisher's Summary

Winner of the Edgar Award for Young Adult Fiction!

The other orphans say Margot is lucky.

Lucky to survive the horrible accident that killed her family.

Lucky to have her own room because she wakes up screaming every night.

And finally, lucky to be chosen by a prestigious family to live at their remote country estate.

But it wasn't luck that made the Suttons rescue Margot from her bleak existence at the group home. Margot was handpicked to be a companion to their silent, mysterious daughter, Agatha. At first, helping with Agatha - and getting to know her handsome younger brother - seems much better than the group home. But soon, the isolated house begins playing tricks on Margot’s mind, making her question everything she believes about the Suttons...and herself.  

Margot’s bad dreams may have stopped when she came to live with Agatha - but the real nightmare has just begun.

©2020 Katie Alender (P)2020 Listening Library

Critic Reviews

"Margot’s narration feels intimate, especially when she reflects on her potent grief, and Agatha is never used as a prop: She and Margot develop a silent communication that transcends speech. The palpable and steadily building sense of dread throughout is enhanced by a whisper of the supernatural. A pitch-perfect contemporary gothic.” (Kirkus Reviews)

"The suspense and chills are there, and the plot advances the story to a dramatic conclusion that, even if readers can see it coming, is still startling. This book hits all the notes of a solid thriller - creepy mansion, dark family secrets, a little romance, and a plucky heroine. Fans of suspense will enjoy this outing. Alender creates another tingly tale just right for escaping into this summer.” (School Library Journal)  

Reads more like a YA Novel than anything else

**NO SPOILERS** While the book was great at being concise and to the point, I didn’t really enjoy the climax. Was too predictable in my opinion and I saw it coming a mile away. I think the premise had amazing potential and the author could have taken it in many different directions to keep it fresh and interesting.

I’ve seen or read different versions of this story way too many times in the last 3-4 years or so. Lastly, while the main character was a teenager and it makes sense for certain dialogue or inner monologues to be a certain way, I sometimes found it jarring as it got very gimmicky at times and took me out of the story.

Not worth the ending

Margot needs to grow a brain. I had hoped that there was some great twist coming but no, it's exactly what you think/figure out pretty much at 50% in.

Big start, simmering between, and let down finish

Great sign I was already creeped out by Chapter 5. When Chapter 7 came around.....nope no nope Margot run, run away now. The next chapter the book took a straight nose dive. Agatha was the only saving grace of this book and even her power over the writing was taken away.

Then after a while the atmosphere which was so potent dulled down to a simmer. Honestly I just got through reading back to back amazing twisty reads and this book suffered even more for it. Before you say it, yes I know I'm judgmental. But I also know that this is my review so scram. I won't lower my expectations just because it had an easy writing style.

By Chapter 4 I already had figured out the culprit and by 7 the motive. What more was there to learn? Who lived and who died. Besides Agatha, I didn't relate or care for any of the other characters. To me they felt dry and unrealistic. Margot's character was agonizingly obtuse. Even the romance felt carelessly tossed in to try to pry our eyes away from what we already knew.

Although I did think Taylor Meskimen did a great job narrating with one exception. Garrett. His voice seemed underage and miniscule. Bare with me my complaining is almost over. Even near the end of the story I learned that one of the main characters were a contradiction in and of themself.

To sum it up Agatha should have been the main bases of all that was unholy. Barrett should have never existed. Margot needed to grow a brain before I strangled her and most importantly in a thriller there should have been a twist.

Yeah feel free to burn me for my unpopular opinions down in the comments below. This compilation of complaining contradictions has been brought to you by Oolong tea. Nothing says this ramble was to long like Oolong.

says headline is optional..but it's not

would have been 5 stars but I hated the Barrett storyline - it was unnecessary

Interesting

Narrator was tolerable. The story was engaging and then super of had gaps towards the end. It was ok.

Eerily creepy and brilliantly smart

Ⓐⓤⓓⓘⓞⓑⓞⓞⓚ Ⓡⓔⓥⓘⓔⓦ

𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕮𝖔𝖒𝖕𝖆𝖓𝖎𝖔𝖓
𝕭𝖞: 𝒦𝒶𝓉𝒾𝑒 𝒜𝓁𝑒𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇
𝕲𝖊𝖓𝖗𝖊: 𝒴𝒜, 𝑀𝓎𝓈𝓉𝑒𝓇𝓎, 𝒯𝒽𝓇𝒾𝓁𝓁𝑒𝓇, 𝒢𝑜𝓉𝒽𝒾𝒸
𝕻𝖚𝖇𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖍𝖊𝖗: @puntnambooks
𝕻𝖚𝖇𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖍𝖊𝖉 𝕯𝖆𝖙𝖊: 𝒜𝓊𝑔. 𝟤𝟧𝓉𝒽 𝟤𝟢𝟤𝟢
@goodreads 𝕾𝖈𝖔𝖗𝖊: 3.84
𝕸𝖞 𝕾𝖈𝖔𝖗𝖊: 🧒🧒🧒🧒 / 𝟦 𝒪𝓇𝓅𝒽𝒶𝓃𝓈

{ @goodreads blurb}

The other orphans say Margot is lucky. Lucky to survive the horrible accident that killed her family. Lucky to have her own room because she wakes up screaming every night. And finally, lucky to be chosen by a prestigious family to live at their remote country estate.

But it wasn't luck that made the Suttons rescue Margot from her bleak existence at the group home. Margot was hand-picked to be a companion to their silent, mysterious daughter, Agatha. At first, helping with Agatha - and getting to know her handsome older brother - seems much better than the group home. But soon, the isolated, gothic house begins playing tricks on Margot’s mind, making her question everything she believes about the Suttons... and herself.
Margot’s bad dreams may have stopped when she came to live with Agatha – but the real nightmare has just begun.

{ 𝕸𝖞 𝕿𝖍𝖔𝖚𝖌𝖍𝖙𝖘}

A very eerily creepy novel and creatively written. I found the story at times a little slow. There were certain things in the story that I knew without a doubt and it seemed to take our protagonist forever to reach those very same thoughts. I found her a little dim witted in that aspect. Other than that, our protagonist was a very interesting character and so were the Sutton family.

The Sutton family history was very intriguing and found the wife Laura quite alluring. One thing that did bother me was the husband and the end of our story, he was no longer around. I was beginning to think he was dead and even though we are assured he is working in town; he never returns in the story even in the epilogue. I found that to be odd. Overall, I thought this dark gothic novel to be quite creative and creepily crazy.

" I let my hand rest on the banister, and as I did, I wondered how many people before had touched the gleaming polished surface as they went up or down these stairs. How many of them had been important or famous? How many of them had secrets? How many had tragedies in their pasts–or futures? An unpleasant tingle spiraled down my spine as I imagined the stairs crowded with the ghosts of all these people. Because if there were such things as ghosts, wasn’t this where they would be–stuck in the space between spaces?" ─ 𝒦𝒶𝓉𝒾𝑒 𝒜𝓁𝑒𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇, 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕮𝖔𝖒𝖕𝖆𝖓𝖎𝖔𝖓

Fell Flat

****SPOILER****
I came into this book with high hopes. The review I read from one of the bookworms I follow made me excited to read this. It's a slow burn that fizzles out at the end.

It's about a 16 year girl Margo, yuck, who survives a car accident in which her two sister, mother, and father die in. Because of her having no family, she has to go live in a home. There she has some issues with the other teens living there because she wakes them with her screams when she sleeps due to her nightmares.

An old friend of her Dad's, who is rich, allows her to come and live with him, his wife, and their sick daughter. Margo is to be her companion. Agatha, another yuck name, is the same age as Margo. As soon as Margo gets to the home things get strange.

Here is what I have issues with. Margo is said to be smart. But she doesn't figure out what is so obvious until like 90 % of the book is down! It's so obvious Agatha's mom is drugging Margo's tea. The book reads like there is a ghost and it is a bit creepy. It had me for a while.

It lost me when Margo started falling for Barrett and that whole thing was lame. He leaves and doesn't come back? His Dad is never around, which they do somewhat explain but come on, you don't see your wife is a nut?

The ending did it for me. It was so stupid!

Loved it!

I loved the way it was narrated! I had ideas of how it was going to end up but I was wrong! Kept me on my toes the whole time!

Oh MY GOD!!

OK! THIS STORY HAD ME FLIPPING BACK AND FORTH EVERY CHAPTER! IT'S GHOSTS! NO DEMONS! NO SHE IS A WITCH! OH NO THE GIRL IS POSSESSED! OH MY GOD SHE IS FAKING! HOLY SHIT SHE IS POSSESSED AF!!!! AND HER MAMA IS TOO!!!! wait... wtf... ohhhhh SHIIIIITTTTT!!! RUN BABY!! FUCKING GREAT BOOK!

Loved it

another great book by Katie Alender :) I can't wait until she writes another one :)

Meh

It was good but the ending was terrible and really underwhelming which totally ruined it