Vesper by Jeff Sampson

Emily Webb is a geek. And she’s happy that way. Content hiding under hoodies and curling up to watch old horror flicks, she’s never been the kind of girl who sneaks out for midnight parties. And she’s definitely not the kind of girl who starts fights or flirts with other girls’ boyfriends. Until one night Emily finds herself doing exactly that . . . the same night one of her classmates—also named Emily—is found mysteriously murdered.
The thing is, Emily doesn’t know why she’s doing any of this. By day, she’s the same old boring Emily, but by night, she turns into a thrill seeker. With every nightfall, Emily gets wilder until it’s no longer just her personality that changes. Her body can do things it never could before: Emily is now strong, fast, and utterly fearless. And soon Emily realizes that she’s not just coming out of her shell . . . there’s something much bigger going on. Is she bewitched by the soul of the other, murdered Emily? Or is Emily Webb becoming something else entirely— something not human?
As Emily hunts for answers, she finds out that she’s not the only one this is happening to—some of her classmates are changing as well. Who is turning these teens into monsters—and how many people will they kill to get what they want?

I really had no expectations going into this book. I love the idea of a girl being perfectly happy being a geek (especially since I have geek tendencies and am fine with that), and that’s what really made me pick up this book. I ended up loving it.

I thought the plot was well laid out. There is a mixture of story, plus periodic transcripts from an audio recording between Emily and a man named Mr. Savage. These transcripts give the tiniest hints that there is much more to this story that what we’ve been given so far. It increased my interest, and made me want to keep reading faster so I could find out what was going to happen. Inserts like these can sometimes decrease tension, but not in this case. Sampson did a great job with these transcripts.

The plot of the regular story was well laid out as well. There is a big reveal midway through the story, and I didn’t see it coming. Though, as I thumbed back through the first half, the clues are there. So, I’m not sure if I was so engrossed in the story that I missed the clues, or if I was being a lazy reader, or what. But I was as surprised as Emily when she found out what was happening to her, which I loved.

The only thing I didn’t like was Emily’s best friend, Megan. She’s not the greatest friend, and it bothered me that Emily is still friends with her even though Megan kind of treats her poorly. However, she is definitely worse to other people, so maybe Emily measures the difference that way. Not sure. I do wish that Megan had been a little more likable, at least when it came to Emily. I do wonder if there are things going on with Megan that we haven’t seen yet, though...

The resolution was good, and I love that there wasn’t a huge focus on the romance aspect. It was there, and it was well done, but it didn’t overshadow the rest of the story. I also liked how the current story was resolved, at the same time introducing more questions that will likely be answered in the next book. I thought this was a good start to the series. Definitely recommended.