Creep by Jennifer Hillier

I’ve always liked thrillers. It’s a go to genre if you just want to read something with no reason at all.  Most of the good thrillers are brilliantly written that always keep you on your toes that you don’t have to do anything, only analyze at a minimum, and the series of twisted and savvy events will just take you through. Thrillers and suspense, being that kind of genre, should always have the reader’s attention, which means it shouldn’t bore. The scenes have to build up, make some sense and efficiently merge all that make a good novelL character, setting with twists. That’s why if I want to read something quick, fast, interesting and devoid of so much emotional heaviness, thrillers are always the way to go.

There are already self-made bankable authors in this genre and are considered to be anyone’s easy default authors. I have Robin Cook for medically charged thrillers, Stephen King of course who I am slowly reacquainting myself with. I love Jeffrey Deaver, John Grisham and Connelly. We all have our own favorites. And the stories, twists and characters are so intensely real and delightful that the movie industry adapts more of these novels into films. Because let’s face it, a good suspense is as fun to watch as it is to read.

So Creep by Jennifer Hiller…

Creep is from a budding younger author. I usually buy thriller paperback books in book sales, but since I have the inclination to support new writers which received considerable accolades and noise like Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl (Which I liked except for the ending), I decided to try Creep. Reading the synopsis, I knew this is to be a love-gone wrong thriller. Here’s the usual accomplished woman, Dr. Shiela Tao who serves as a respective psychology professor in a university in a brink of moral guilt and about to lose everything good in her life. Only because of engaging in a passionate and illicit love and charged sexual affair with her student aid, the brooding Ethan Wolfe. Realizing that she will be left with nothing, not even her reputation and fiancé that was sent form the heavens, she breaks the relationship off at the first chapter choosing to lead guilt-free life. Early on the reader would know the antagonist and the trigger for psychotic events. It was a jilted lover gone psychotic. Throughout the story, it’s a series of power tripping, blackmails, threats and a little bit of stupidity, which thrillers thrive on. The book also showcases the degradation of a good relationship and the emergence of well liked characters that ultimately makes sacrifices and saves the day.

An also interesting aspect of the story is that the protagonist, Shiela Tao, isn’t really something you’d cheer for either. Sure she is respected and a powerful modern woman who happens to have everything, an affair and an amazing fiancé, really?! Most of the times I thought she deserved whatever that was coming to her. What I especially liked was Morris, her fiancé…her blind fiancé for that matter.

Speaking of violence and twists, I find this book very amateur especially if you’ve read a couple of good action packed-twisted-thrillers. Probably the reason why I latched on this is to arrive at the conclusion if there were other participants in the story, the reason behind why the debunked lover is the way he is and how the likable character, Morris, would end up making decisions.

Well it’s a good start. A for effort. It’s okay to pass the time, but it’s not exceptional and endearing. If you’re looking for high action, criminal minds type of story with rich setting and complex characters, this would be a bit bland for your taste. It’s about a failed relationship and a jaded past, two people got together in an illicit affair and by the time it wears off one goes psychotic while the other one cracks from all the pressure. You’ll read how lives disintegrate on a superficial level and how minor characters make the story a bit more interesting.

Sure, the element of thrill is there, but I wouldn’t put it with the greats just yet. I finished the book in two days, which is an average liking to a passable thriller. But if you ask me, I like Gone Girl better despite of it’s ending. The plot, though more refined, is already something you’ve seen and read somewhere. I’d probably read the sequel Freak if I have the time, and if I can get it from booksale. I’m not in a rush. 

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