Nagasravika's Book Reviews Blog

 The Eyes of the Dragon  By Stephen King  Published Year: 1984 Page Count: 430 pages  Medium Used: Oneplus Nord Ce6  Genre : Horror, Fantasy, Thriller, Action, Demons, Dragons, Suspense, Young Adult, 2026-read. Rating : 5/5 😎 😎 😎 😎 😎  This book is just so amazing and gripping that I couldn't put it down. Its fast paced. The character development is just amazing. Only thing is I felt the author has made even 16 - 17 year old teenagers sound like children. He is very good .. no absolutely phenomenal .. in writing young kids going on adventures and if we choose to overlook the ages and such  details, we can enjoy the story thoroughly. Reading from the title, I assumed this story is gonna be surrounding or involving dragons. I postponed picking the book on this account. But now having finished it, I know the title is very misleading. The only dragon in the story is the head of a killed dragon mounted on a hook in the king's private room. The king Rola...

 The Divorce  By Freida Mcfadden  Published Year : 2026 Page Count : 380 pages  Medium Used: Oneplus Nord CE6 phone Genre: Contemporary Fiction, Thriller, Psychological, Twists, Suspense, Mystery, 2026-read. Rating: 3.75/5 😎😎😎😎 The main characters in the story are Naomi Roth the wife, Jeremy Roth the husband, Veronica the mistress and Teddy the child. Right off, I felt Jeremy and Veronica's characterization is not realistic. They seemed forced and melted to fit the mold of the story. While reading the Veronica's version of the tale,I was rushing through it and stifling a yawn. Its hard for me to see her in the light of her projection. The first narrative from Naomi showed her in a negative light so her own ought to show her in an exact opposite and pink light? I would have believed if there was some deception or weakness in her nature but the absence of it made me uneasy. And Jeremy - his story doesn't add up. He married so his kid can have two parents but he had...

 The Book Of Doors  By Gareth Brown  Published Year: 2024 Page Count: 436 pages  Medium Used: ipad Air  Genre: Fantasy, Magical Realism, Magic, Magical Books, Action, Suspense, Thriller, Science Fiction,Time Travel, 2026-read.  Rating: 5/5 😀😀😀😀😀 I couldn't put this down. I started it as a means to break my boredom and sleeplessness by reading one or two chapters in a well received work of science and speculative fiction. This book hooked me right away. It kept me up way longer than I expected. The first chapters I read on my phone but then i had to switch to a bigger screen. I couldn't leave out the time I was charging my phone. That good this book was. Definitely try it if you happen to like all the magic books could deliver.  The first thing that came to mind as I kept devouring this book was how thorough the author was while writing it. He was very careful and thoughtful about not having any loopholes, flaws and weaknesses in his plot. Had a qu...

 Bad Blood  (The Naturals #4) By Jennifer Lynn Barnes  Published Year: 2016 Page Count: 375 pages  Medium Used: Paperback  Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Crime Fiction, Suspense, Cults and Secret Societies, Young Adult, Blood and Gore, 2026-read.  Rating: 4.5/5 😀😀😀😀😀 This series is so much fun to read! Hands down. I had formed various threads in my mind of how this book would unravel and how the ending would play out. There are many twists and surprises in the story but the one that came in lieu of Cassie's mother's dual nature felt redundant. Why can't she justify herself as someone who wanted to survive against all odds because she wasn't someone who would give up easily ? Why introduce this new element into an already twisted and mind bending story? I also felt that the author had not laid enough groundwork for establishing a solid timeline ( because so much was happening all through) to the succession of Masters and their apprentices - like the relation...

 Pig Island  By Mo Hayder  Published Year: 2006 Page Count: 340 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre : Thriller, Suspense, Horror,Crime,Murder Mystery,  Religious Cults, Twists, Shocking Elements, Science Fiction, 2026-read.  Rating : 5/5 😀😀😀😀😅 Wow. What did I just read?! Beautiful beautiful book!!  I was a bit wary going into this. I was craving for a good horror book when a friend suggested me the title. Then I read a few discouraging, low rating reviews on goodreads which said this is not a horror book and the characters are not likeable. I still went ahead with the book and now I am like, yes the reviews are correct on both fronts but what they failed to highlight is that this is one solid hell of an evocative story. I was hooked from the first page. The writing is so gorgeous and riveting. There are some shocking elements and suspense driven plot line that doesn't let up. I didn't see the end coming and I got a huge adrenaline rush w...

 The Naturals  (The Naturals #1) By Jennifer Lynn Barnes  Published Year: 2013 Page Count: 306 pages  Medium Used: Paperback  Genre: Thriller, Young Adult, Suspense,  Murder Mystery, Detectives, FBI, Intuition, Solving Murders, 2026-read.  Rating : 5/5 😀😀😀😀😀 I usually read up every genre that falls under the banner of Fiction and never have I come across such a simplified yet complex, thrilling story. It is just structured and constructed differently. I felt really invested in diving into the psyche of the serial killer that was disrupting everyone's peace of mind. The author deftly took me through the motivation, needs and cause-effects of victims and the psychopath that was brutalizing them. I was enjoying the read while also learning something about the world of investigators and criminology. How cool is that!! I had committed to my memory important terms like MO, Signature, Victimology among others. I finished this book earlier than I thought....

 The Cruel Prince  (Elfhame #1, The Folk of the Air #1) By Holly Black Published Year: 2018 Page Count: 370 pages Medium Used: Paperback  Genre: High Fantasy, Suspense, Game for the Throne, Faeries, Cruelty, Princes, 2026-read. Rating : 5/5 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰 Jude and Taryn are twin sisters, spending a lazy, normal day with their parents who are busy doing household chores. They have an elder step sister Vivienne from their mother. A stranger pays an unexpected visit and murders the parents, whisks away the children from mortal world to his world of Faerie. Vivienne is his daughter and he feels obligated to not leave the offspring from his unfaithful wife behind. This stranger happens to be the war hungry and brutal military general of Faerie, Madoc. Ten years pass in Faerie, with the children developing into teenagers. While Vivienne doesn't like the world of Faerie, doesn't forgive her father Madoc for the murder of her mother and takes a girl friend from the human world, the t...

 You Should Have Known  By Jean Hanff Korelitz Published Year: 2014 Page Count: 425 pages Medium Used: iPad Air  Genre: Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Murder Mystery, Detectives, Drama, 2026-read.  Rating : 5/5 😇😇😇🤗🤗 Grace Reinhart Sachs had been married to Jonathan Sachs for over eighteen years. They have a young son of eleven, Henry who is very well behaving, well mannered kid for his age. Grace is a psychotherapist, counseling in marriage issues and has a private practice in New York. Jonathan is a pediatric oncologist, dealing with cancer cases in children. Grace considers hers to be a happy family and herself, lacking in nothing. She is a very understanding and accommodating wife who gives her husband his space and time to deal with his work. The main character is Grace and we see a third person's perspective of her life and circumstances in the unraveling plotline. According to her, Jonathan is often gripped with pain and misery of other people, usually...

 Sea of Tranquility  By Emily St. John Mandel  Published Year: 2022 Page Count: 166 pages  Medium Used: Kindle PW  Genre: Science Fiction, Time Travel, Colonization of Space, Mystery, Suspense, 2026-read.  Rating: 5/5 ❤❤❤❤❤ In the year 1912, on a Caiette island, off the shore of British Columbia, a young man experiences a time space anomaly. He stands under a maple tree and in a flash of darkness, hears violin playing, airship taking off before he is brought back to reality. He becomes aware of the presence of a priest nearby whom he hasn't seen before and soon after, the priest vanishes. The young man - a Edwin St. John - brushes away the experience as one where he is hallucinating and probably experienced some derangement of the brain. Similar experience is recorded towards the end of 20th century when a music composer Paul Smith, while playing his orchestra, shows a video footage where the glitch is obvious. Then, in a separate incident in the 22nd centu...

 The Widow  by John Grisham   Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 416 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe Genre: Court Room Drama, Suspense, Crime Thriller, Murder Mystery, Contemporary Fiction, 2026-read. Rating: 3.25/5 I guess I cannot write a review, driving my points across, without introducing all the main players in the story. Simon Latch is an estate lawyer - attorney and counselor at law - dealing in wills and bankruptcy cases from a small town of Braxton, Virginia. He has been at his gig for over eighteen years and is working his routine cases without much enthusiasm. He has a strained relationship with his wife, Paula and he seems to care enough for their kids to not miss any of the major events in their lives. He hasn't got divorced with his wife because they simply haven't got the money to go through with the proceedings. He regularly plays video poker and gambles small amounts at a joint run by a bookie Chub. His secretary Matilda has been working for him fo...

 The Tenant  By Freida McFadden  Published Year: 2025 Page Count: 380 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre : Thriller, Murder Mystery, Drama, Suspense, Action, 2026-read.  Rating : 5/5 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰 Wow. What a fantastic read. The twists - well, the one major one actually - blew my mind. My heart leapt into my throat and my brain did a sky dive into an abyss of unexpected thrill. Miss McFadden has proven herself again as a master of her craft. Superb story telling. Creating blood curdling thrillers and murder mysteries. She had me hanging onto every sentence and it really worked because I wrapped this book in under a day. I was fully engrossed and some of the moments are etched into my memory. It is so good - don't miss up on this read! I liked how well the author has written both male and female voices/povs without blurring the lines between. This book has earned second place in the Goodreads Choice Awards for Mystery Thrillers and its totally worth my ti...

 The Housemaid is Watching  ( The Housemaid #3) By Freida McFadden  Published Year: 2024 Page Count: 402 pages  Medium Used: Kindle Scribe  Genre: Thriller, Murder Mystery, Suspense, Drama, Family Dynamics, 2026-read.  Rating : 4/5  I really, really didn't like the ending. The last three to four chapters are so incredulous that it is hard to accept them as plausible. Yes, I agree the author wanted to add an element of surprise and also bring Millie's family out of the trenches but the way she did it is laughable! You don't just go and threaten a person into taking the fall for something they haven't done, right? Is it ok to do bad things to bad people and get away with it? The answer seems to be an yes here. Shouldn't it be the job of the justice department to decide who goes free and who gets punished, once all the secrets are laid bare in front of them?  Apparently not. It is easy to trick the system, to fool the people involved. Just so unbelie...

 The Marriage Portrait  By Maggie O'Farrell  Published Year : 2022  Page count : 376 Pages  Medium used : Kindle PW  Genre : Historical Fiction, Italy, Uxoricide, Suspense, Psychological Fiction, 2024-read.  Rating : 5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ I was wavering between a 4 and 4.5 rating while reading the book. But the last few pages solidified my decision into a firm 5 point category. The prose is so delicious and refreshing. The suspense is both chilling and thrilling to unravel. The plot is riveting. Lucrezia de Medici, the duchess of Ferrara and daughter of Duke of Tuscany, one year into her marriage, senses that her husband is set to kill her. The book opens on a note of his being coy and nice to her, where she is not fooled for a second. This sense of danger with no hope for escape is shocking and revelatory of the times the narrative takes place in. There is also a sense of adventure, in planning for escape from her enslaved, dreary existence juxtaposed with the da...

 Where are the Children?  By Mary Higgins Clarke  Published : 1975 Page count : 166 pages  Medium Used : Kindle PW  Genre : Suspense, Mystery, Murder, Fiction, 2024-read  Rating : 5/5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ A couple of kids, Michael and Missy, go missing. Either they are kidnapped by someone or are killed .. by their own mother who had a history of killing her kids. Yes, some six years ago, she stood and got off from the trial of accused for murdering her children - Peter and Lisa. She got off that trial without conviction because the key witness bolted and disappeared. Things don't look very bright for her this time since everyone is looking directly at her and not at other options. A man from her past, reappears and actually takes the children hostage. He has diabolical and creepy plans in mind. He almost makes them happen. Different folks come together to form a team unraveling the mystery. Who was the man from her past? What has he got on her that he wants to keep hurti...

 The Woman in the Window  By A.J.Finn (2018) (430 pages Kindle Digital Edition) Genre : Contemporary, Fiction, Thriller, Psychological Fiction, Suspense,Detective, Mystery,Child abuse,Alcoholism.  Rating : 5/5 😀😀😀😀😀 Simply superb! Loved it! Wish I had picked this sooner! One in its own class! 🥰🥰 Translated into over 40 languages and millions of copies sold worldwide! A major motion picture from Fox, available on Netflix! Eager to watch Amy Adams and Julian Moore blow my mind! Will check this out.😀😇 A child psychologist,Anna Fox,has experienced severe trauma and is reduced to stay indoors with doors locked and shutters closed shut . She is suffering from Agoraphobia - fear of open spaces and crowded places. No one visits her except her psychiatrist and aerobic trainer. No one calls her except her distant, separated husband and daughter. Her day is split between watching black and white movies on repeat, excessive drinking, online chatting and snooping on her neigh...

 If We Were Villains  By M.L.Rio (2017) (428 pages Paperback) Genre : Coming-of-age, Contemporary, Shakespeare, Drama, Murder Mystery, Suspense , Playacting. Rating : 4/5 😃😃 The scenes are very vivid and brilliantly descriptive - they unfold before the eyes of the reader and the characters jump to life, out of paper. The emotions are raw and visceral. The story and the plot brought back visuals from 'The Secret History'by Donna Tartt and 'The Shawshank Redemption' by Stephen King. I thoroughly enjoyed both the books and the fondness is replicated here. I couldn't put the book down. I wanted to rip asunder the mystery and get to the bottom of the drama.  The main characters of the play/story are the seven fourth year theater art students of Dellacher University. The main focus of their curriculum is to learn, memorize and enact the various Shakespeare plays. The tightly knit friends become obsessed with these plays and of the Shakespearean characters. They personif...

Verity  By Colleen Hoover  Rating 4/5  Genre: Contemporary, Romance, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller. Finished this with my heart in my mouth..sitting on the edge of my seat. Goosebumps on my arms and chills down my spine.  I was expecting that the answer to this mystery would be found in the villainification of the husband but it didn't. There is a twist or there isn't. Which version of Verity is to be believed and which is fake? Its a thoroughly knitted plot solid and hard core. Would highly recommend. I have taken off one point because like graphical abuse, too much of sexual descriptions and steamy scenes make me a bit uncomfortable. But they are obviously necessary to make the plot what it is. Interesting and gripping !! 

The Searcher (2020) By Tana French  388 pages (Kindle Digital Edition) Rating 4/5  Genres : Contemporary, Mystery, Thriller, Defective, Noir, 2023-read  The author transports the reader into the world of a fictitious town in Ireland through the eyes of a retired American cop Cal Hooper .. makes us walk in his shoes ..  see the things he sees, feel the things he feels .. it is grand! She also takes time to build the people in the story into proper characters with their own personalities, eccentricities and natures .. so when they do something, it doesn't raise eyebrows coming from them.  This story mainly revolves around : A missing boy. A creature that is attacking at night and mutilating the bodies of sheep and ewes. Few people trying to figure out a mystery. Few others warning them off and knowing more than they let on. Its good! A cop with Chicago P.D. takes voluntary retirement and moves to a small rural area in Ireland to settle into an unchalle...

Gone Girl [2012] by Gillian Flynn  470 Pages {Kindle Digital Edition} Genre: Psychological Fiction, suspense, murder, thriller, best seller Rating 5/5 ✌👀👀👩   Someone in the need of a good mystery thriller to curl feet on bed and sink into? This would be a perfect fit! The mindboggling plot unravels fast and steady releasing more shattering and shaky pieces to put the puzzle together.  I have never come to hate or fear a fictional character so much .. that's how good the character of Amy is developed. If there is a gauge to warn us of such disturbed/destructive people as Amy in our vicinity/life .. it would be so much better! Flynn has managed to create Nick and Amy so good they become personal - take Nick's side or Amy's side but not both. Husband and wife play at a zero sum game .. Amy framing and proving him to be her murderer while Nick trying and struggling hard to prove otherwise. It is fun until it is not. An innocent man could have lost his life for the vic...

Solaris (1961) By Stanislaw Lem  Genres : scifi, horror, suspense, classics  207 pages (Kindle Digital Edition) Rating 4/5 😀 . I have enjoyed this book the way I had enjoyed very few books. This has some of the most horrific and memorable scenes I have ever read. Paging through it is an immersive experience  .. where the cause of mystery is revealed to the reader and the main character at the start but it nevertheless doesn't stop being suspenseful. I picked it from the list of best scifi novels of all time. And it definitely makes for some super cool, horror and romantic science fiction ever written! 🤗 Kelvin arrives on planet Solaris as a psychologist researcher and docks himself to the space station. The surface of the planet is covered with ocean and there is no other visible life on the planet. Since the planet has been discovered, there has been much speculation and theoretical expostulation about the nature of the ocean .. eventually they realize it t...