Review: Hunting Lila by Sarah Alderson

Hunting Lila by Sarah Alderson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Source: Borrowed from library

Synopsis from Goodreads:

17-year-old Lila has two secrets she’s prepared to take to the grave. The first is that she can move things just by looking at them. The second is that she’s been in love with her brother’s best friend, Alex, since forever.

After a mugging exposes her unique ability, Lila decides to run to the only people she can trust—her brother and Alex. They live in Southern California where they work for a secret organisation called The Unit, and Lila discovers that the two of them are hunting down the men who murdered her mother five years before. And that they’ve found them.

In a world where nothing and no one is quite as they seem, Lila quickly realises that she is not alone—there are others out there just like her—people with special powers—and her mother’s killer is one of them…

This book was so much better than I was expecting! It was so addictive as there was always some new new twist or revelation. It is constantly exciting and as all these different stories and allegiances come out, it is impossible for Lila to know who to trust.

What I love the most about this book is Lila's crush on her brother's best friend Alex. She has been in love with him since they were children, and it is not hard to see why! But he is older and more worldly, and seems to look on her as an endearing little sister. Lila's crush on Alex is all consuming and so sweet! I loved that she kept remembering instances from when they were growing up together, as it gave them a real history together, and shows why she has fallen for him so hard.

It always feels like a contemporary novel, because the focus is on the characters and their trials and the drama of their lives. I adore books that focus of the emotional upheaval of the characters, and this book has it in spades. But there is also a strong paranormal aspect to it as well.

We find out on the first page that Lila has a power which terrifies her, and needing to get away for a while she travels to the other side of the world to stay with her soldier brother  Jack on his military base. But it turns out that her brother's unit are hunting down dangerous people with special powers- people who killed Lila and Jack's mother, anyone with a superpower like tele-kinesis, mind reading or memory manipulation- people like Lila.

Lila is very funny and incredibly likable as a character. I loved her relationship with her protective older brother Jack, and of course swoon-worthy Alex! But as well as the characters, the exciting story line and the love story, I also love that the book is never what you expect. There are so many new plot twists, and always something different happening, some new relation or dark secret or betrayal.

This book is dramatic, heart-wrenching, lovable and totally gripping. I've fallen for Alex in a big way, and I'm rooting for a happy ending for all the main characters.