Mud Vein

This is a Dark Hard Hitting Mystery Suspense. I will say there is a lot in this book that could trigger someone, and I also want to add this is not a romance. This book will stay with me for a long time. This book kept me guessing what was going on, and who was behind it. The characters grow on me, but they are not characters you will love from the beginning. The ending was not a happy ever after, but it was a great close from this book.

Okay, so here we go. This is my first official declaration regarding any written work ever. Bear with me, please.SynopsisWhen reclusive novelist Senna Richards wakes up on her thirty-third birthday, everything has changed. Caged behind an electrical fence, locked in a house in the middle of the snow, Senna is left to decode the clues to find out why she was taken. If she wants her freedom, she has to take a close look at her past. But, her past has a heartbeat…and her kidnapper is nowhere to be found.With her survival hanging by a thread, Senna soon realizes this is a game. A dangerous one. Only the truth can set her free.I couldn't decide whether or not I wanted to let the thoughts and emotions rampaging through me, run their course and settle, or just write through those feelings. Seeing as though I honestly can't see an end to what I feel regarding this book, I decided to just go for it."Because simplicity speaks the loudest." - MUD VEINNot to sure that there is anything simple about the words, character(s), taste, texture, feel, mood, or pace of this book for me.Quite simply, I'm lost inside of this story and finding it very difficult to pull myself out.Tarryn Fisher has made me love and loathe someone because of the likeness I share with this person. It is no revelation that we're our own worst enemy, which in my eyes Senna most definitely is.Senna Richards is a dark soul. Real. Flawed and broken. Closed off from her own heart by circumstance and choice. She isn't looking to be fixed. She is comfortable in her disrepair. I'm comfortable with her lack of sense. It makes her human. Relatable. Because yes, some of us are equally as broken and muddied by our past. Most people spend their lives looking to be saved; waiting for a hero to come and rescue them. Some of us are happy to remain broken. To live with the remaining pieces of ourselves until we fall apart completely; so we can stop fighting.People are drawn to darkness. Without darkness, there would be no light. There would be no need for light. Those of us who live in the light, search for those who have too much darkness. All in an effort to expose the flaws and cracks in our framework. Gives us purpose, or so we like to believe. We feed our egos by focusing our hero complexes on one another and deciding, "I can fix you," "I can make this all better and right." Because in the end this little patchwork job I've taken on suits my bottom line. I feel better about me because I made you better.Very rarely do you come across a person in your life that exist solely to focus on you. To give you a breath of life that you didn't know you needed. Didn't even realize you wanted. To allow you the space and time to understand that you're good either way. Light or dark. Whole are broken. I'm going to walk with you no matter what, because that's what I was made for.Dr. Isaac Asterholder comes forth fully aware (in a way that I'm still having trouble reconciling) and prepared to serve his purpose. What intrigues me about his character, is his honesty. People aren't honest. Not really. We lie, deceive, omit, misdirect and manipulate one another. Honesty leaves you vulnerable; open.How does someone decide to be that honest with another person? I'd like to believe the connection; the invisible thread that held Senna and Isaac together, explains that. Even though it was very one-sided for most of the story, his awareness of that connection exposed a world of possibilities for me.The possibility that love, a true and unconditional love can exist between two people. Not just a trumped up version of what we think love is. What we like to dress love up in to make it appear truer than it is. Because let's be honest, most love is conditional. Parental, familial, romantic. We give and take love depending on what it does for us. But the idea that we're connected to someone, loved by someone simply because we exist. You can't take that away. You can't alter it. It lives with you, in you, from the moment you discover it, until you are no longer in this life. Even then I'd like to hope it endures.Isaac gives to Senna something far more valuable than anything I've ever experienced. Truth in love. Despite the bad, he pushes forward and shows that the ugliness inside of us can be touched. It can be altered and shaped into something beautiful, just through the sheer will of someone who thinks you're worth more than you believe yourself to be.I'm thankful for that. I'd like to think that authors speak from experiences, whether their own or others. It gives me hope.I've buried two mothers in this life, respectively at 5 and 29. Both suffered through cancer. My biological, cancer of the lymph nodes, leading to a hysterectomy, which inevitably led to her suicide. My stepmother, from breast cancer that metastasized into her brain and lungs, which she eventually succumbed to. The first woman left of her own volition, leaving me with a father who was ill-equipped to deal, which in turn pretty much left me on my own, to be easily preyed upon by the world. The second was an ever present light on the harbor, which I could always return to, only to be snuffed out, leaving me blind and floating along. The abandonment that shapes Senna, I identify with it so much it hurts my heart. I wish it didn't exist, but I know it to be all too true.As I sit here, tears streaming down my face, I can't decide whether I'd like to go back and read through Senna and Isaac's story again. I know I'll uncover more layers, more truths, but I'm scared. Fearful that I'll recognize more of myself; fearful that I won't. I might be a different kind of ugly. A whole different kind of dark. Who knows.What I do know, is that I pray there is an Isaac out there for everyone. Someone who'll reach into you and hold on for dear life. All because a force greater than fear, hurt, pain, loss or ego, decided long ago that this is your person and you don't have a choice. That you don't get a chance to regret their presence because you know that without them, good or bad, you'll miss out on something; anything; everything. Leaving you floating helplessly along until nothing is left of you. I pray that whoever your person(s) is, they're strong enough, aware enough, and selfless enough to recognize the tie that binds."And when I die, I know there will be an invisible red thread connecting me to my soulmate. It can tangle, and it can stretch, but it can never break. When I die, I’ll be in the light. And someday Isaac will find me, because that’s what he is."(2014-04-05). Mud Vein (Kindle Locations 3486-3488). . Kindle Edition.

This book is broken into three parts. Part one opens up with Senna and Issac in a cabin, having no memory of how they got there. They're locked inside, unable to get out and only have enough food for a few months. Part two is in the past, telling how Senna and Issac met and part three jumps back to them in the present. The writing was fabulous, if not a little full of itself. (I like that) The author did a fabulous job weaving words and forming vibrant pictures. I felt for these characters and wanted a nice little HEA. I didn't get it and I'm a little torn about that. I realize things don't always work out in books, but there was just so much depression and self-loathing that I drowned in it. There was no balance of happy and sad. It was just a constant beating on your emotions. I did not understand why Senna was so self-loathing. She is a rape victim so I thought maybe this was the reason behind her dark mind, but when we read the past chapters, you learn that she was that way before it happened. There is no explanation for it and I seriously wanted to punch her in the face and scream for her to snap out of it. I'm sure Issac felt the same way. It was just TOO much. Her mother left when she was young and she was left to be raised by her father. The author never goes into details about her childhood, and I was hoping for that, hoping the answer as to why Senna was the way she was lay there. Then again, maybe she was broken because of a fail relationship mentioned in the book, though that only ticks me off. If this was the reason, then I would have liked more on that relationship to help me understand what was so bad that it ruined her so much. Again, in the past chapters when Senna meets this man she's eventually gets into a relationship with, she's still strange so I'm thinking it wasn't him at all. UGH!When "mud vein" is mentioned in this book, describing how it refers to the darkness and ugly inside of her, all I could think about was how in real life, a mud vein in a shrimp is where feces is. It has to be taken out because who wants to eat shrimp feces. I did not find the metaphor poetic at all. It just grossed me out.Back on point, the book wraps up in part three and takes whatever little hope you had and squashes it flat. I was surprised by who kidnapped them and ticked off that after being rescued she and Issac don't speak for three months. After spending a year in the cabin and fighting for their lives, they just go their separate ways. Senna lack of fight ticked me off. Even when she's being raped, she just lays there and doesn't fight back. When they're in the cabin, Senna learns Issac got married and his wife is pregnant, but Senna and Issac still love each other. It was definitely a tough situation, one that obviously led to no happily ever after. Then when I learned what was going to happen to Senna, I wanted to throw my ipad across the room. SERIOUSLY? After everything? Was it too much to ask that Issac live a happy life with his wife and child,while Senna finally lived a happy life, even if by herself, in the revelation that Issac gave her? Like I said before, it was all just TOO much. I need to read a happy book to wash away all the depression this one gave me.Despite everything I wrote, this book was good. The writing itself saved this book. It was so beautiful that it tricked me into liking the dark story it was telling. Part three had quite a few typos, but that didn't bother me so much.

I just finished the book. I don't know how to write about a book that has a character so strong and so frail at the same time. I think that Tarryn totally outdone herself. I had much sympathy for Senna because i understand why she thought the way she thought, what made her that way, what life show to her was difficulty and sadness and she survived in that life the way she could. I think she very selfish in certain times but that was the she knew. Tarryn, the way you talk about rape and how Senna feel it was incredible. I'm not a rape victim but i think that i almost could feel what is that to sa person, I know that is impossible but your to put it in words was intense. This book made something that i'm not a fan but in the i had tears in my eyes. The last frase was brilliant. The Senna perceive that Nick was a bastard is wonderful too, she is beautiful she is discovering herself again. I really was sad when she knew the cancer was back but i guess that this is life, and with Florence and Machine of soundtrack is better. It was wonderful of you to write this books. I'm sorry for not have reading this book sooner but i'm so happy that i finally have the courage to. It's sad and it's rough and it's troubling and made me think too much in my actions but it's so well writed and it's very incredible!

Páginas brancas, não recomendo.

Eu não tinha expectativa nenhuma quando iniciei a leitura deste livro....Foi simplesmente incrível!!! Uma história muito diferente mesmo, só a Tarryn consegue escrever livros assim!! É um livro que te faz pensar, te faz sentir, basicamente até quando ela faz algo que normalmente me desagradaria em um livro eu amo, parece bruxaria!!! Super recomendo pra quem quer ler um romance não convencional.

I'm not sure how to review this one - as although I was very intrigued by the premise and blurb, I definitely did not feel that the story followed through quite as promisingly. But, Mud Vein was the first of Tarryn Fisher for me, I think, so I also don't want to claim judgement without reading more of her writings.Mud Vein is an interesting novel though - avoiding as such the cliche love story boy meets girl, and promising something far darker - however I found the main female, Senna, very unlikeable for various reasons and think that that affected my attachment to the book as I was reading it - rather than holding my breath waiting to find out her ending, I was anticipating the finale which is unusual for me in itself.Senna wakes up in a cabin, in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by cliffs of snow and can't even get out. She is alone - but not alone - there is someone from her past there, but why? And how? What does it all mean?They have provisions; enough food and heat for a certain length of time, but who has put them there - and who knows the story of their past? What has the 'carousel room' got to do with it....I don't really know what else to say. I would recommend reading just out of interest - and intend to go through all the other reviews now to see what has been said; am I alone in my reactions, or do other readers feel the same way. I just felt, I don't know ... Senna's reactions to what had happened should have been far more mentally disturbing (how would you react?) and then the ending - the reveal of the Zookeeper.... it just, left me feeling a little lacking.but, as I said above, I will definitely be checking out more of Tarryn's books to see if those catch my attention better.

Mud Vein by Tarryn Fisher5 stars!!“It’s your darkness that pulls me in. Your mud vein. But sometimes having a mud vein will kill you.”I really do not know where to start with this review. This is one book that was hard to read and is going to be extremely hard to review. With Tarryn Fisher you always know to expect the unexpected and this book is no different. While personally I didn’t like the ending it is what I have come to expect and I can see why Tarryn chose to end it that way, you know that with Tarryn at the other end of the keyboard it will never be what you think or want. One thing that you cannot deny though is that this book is flawlessly written, it will have you captivated from the start and will have you second guessing, third guessing and eternally guessing who the captor is, but such is the genius in the way it is written I bet you will be wrong time and time again. I for one never guessed and I watch a lot of crime type programmes and thought I would have seen through the plot, but alas no, I was wrong, each and every time.If you are going into this thinking that this is a dark and erotic book then think again, I would say more of a dark, psychological thriller…more like a horror film and definitely not a romance. Actually, I think that this would make a great film, one that I would definitely watch. You are kept on the edge of your seat at all times, never knowing what is around the corner and it is that constant state of suspense that keeps you hanging and turning the pages. The words truly draw you in and you feel their fear, you feel their hunger, you feel their mental torture, you just FEEL and I love a book that makes me FEEL.The blurb gives nothing away, only the beginning of the book. Senna wakes one morning with what she thinks is the mother of all hangovers, after all she was out celebrating her birthday. She soon realises she has no idea where she is and automatically thinks she has woken up in a strangers bed. She soon realises that she wishes that is what had happened but in reality her nightmare was truly beginning. She was caged in a totally desolate house surrounded by snow and an electrified fence, there was some food but there was also someone else…someone from her past…but why were they here? Why were they together? Where were they? Who had done this to them? And more importantly how were they going to escape this hell hole?Totally and utterly isolated and while not knowing who to trust, these two have to work together to survive. It is obvious they have history but we are not let in on why or how until the book flashes back to the past. Slowly but surely their back story is seeped out and you begin to understand, their pasts are painful, can that all be put aside in the name of survival?Senna is a novelist, so in a way she is used to her own company but she really has had a s*** life. She has never conformed, never fit in, she can come across as aggressive and this has led to a solitary, lonely existence. She is dealt blow after blow and you begin to wonder if any sane person would be able to cope. There are people that are willing to help, friendships to be made, but Senna keeps them all at arm’s length, she refuses to let anyone in no matter how hard they try or persevere. Sometimes I just wanted to jump into the kindle and slap her about a bit, I wanted her to believe in herself, believe in the intentions of others, see people for who they were and what they wanted to be, but she was so damn stubborn. She would rather have been a recluse than believe that there was a happy ever after for her, waiting for her, she wouldn’t let anyone penetrate her broken mind or heart and it broke my heart, badly!!“The more people you let in, the more bad you let in.”“You’ve been silent your whole life. You were silent when we met, silent when you suffered. Silent when life kept hitting you. I was like that too, a little. But not like you. You are a stillness…Your silence, Senna, I hear it so loudly.”Flitting from past to present this book puts you through the wringer both mentally and emotionally. I was so absorbed, I felt their isolation, I lived through it and it does end up haunting you. I was thinking about this book for days. You find yourself imagining it was you in their predicament, I was forever thinking, and what would I do? The monotony, the quiet, the hunger, the lack of trust, the constant state of being scared and frightened, it has you on the edge and as much as I wanted to read about the past I couldn’t wait for the book to switch back to the present.This is definitely a book you know you have read, but I do feel it is what I call a “marmite” book; you will either love it or hate it. If you love that suspenseful, thriller type book, you will LOVE this book. If you appreciate flawless, genius writing, you will LOVE this book. If you want your head screwed with, you will LOVE this book.“The truth is for the mind”“Lies are for the heart. So let’s just keep lying.”Once again, I have to admit that Tarryn is a genius; she obviously has a “dark side” that has been put out there for all to see. I hope, like me you appreciate this book for what it is…a masterfully written, total and utter mind ****. It is highly addictive and once again I will say this needs to be made into a film. I can totally see this on the big screen.“Every time you want to remember what love feels like, you look for me.”Amazing job Tarryn![...]