The Unnatural in the Natural

Aleah Kearsley

Jackaby

By William Ritter

What if you could never escape the gaze of preying eyes? Every corner you take, every street you go down, every place you will ever go a pair of eyes are burning into the back of your head. Jackaby can never escape this gaze. This gaze is from something other than a human though. These eyes are coming from the unnatural.

One cold day in January a young lady by the name of Abigail Rook stepped off a ship into New England. Ms. Rook needed a money and jumped at any job lead she could get. Taking after her father, she wants adventure and excitement and that’s what led her to Jackaby. Jackaby is a detective that investigates the paranormal who is in need of an assistant. Ms. Rook is determined to become his assistant. He sees things other people can’t and isn’t afraid to speak out against it. Together Jackaby and Rook investigate a complicated murder that isn’t limited to just our realm.

I would recommend this book but not whole heartedly. The reason being for that is because the first part of this book is pretty slow. You get some history on the characters and get to see what they are like but other then that there isn’t much action. For the most part it is Rook following Jackaby from place to place in hopes to get some leads. After awhile though it starts to get more interesting. I would recommend this book mostly because of the characters. Each character has their own personality that is different from the rest. Rarely does two characters act alike. These characters connect with me because their personalities are so diverse that they remind me of people around me and myself. One character represents me by standing up for herself and friends and not caring about what other people think of me. I also relate because my friends and I are all a little crazy inside. The characters ideas and personalities are so diverse yet they can still represent one identity that is very apparent in the book and in my life. It’s also interesting the characters relationships with each other. Every person has a relationship with each other whether the characters have just met or they have known them forever. Once again no two pairs of people have the same relationship. This connects with me because I really like the idea of the all these different relationships co-existing in harmony.

I would rate this book a 4.25/5 stars. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in mysteries and the paranormal. This book will appeal to your sense of curiosity and transport you to another world.