Three plantations. Two wishes. One ancient curse.

All her life, Barrie Watson has been a virtual prisoner in the house where she lives with her shut-in mother. When her mother dies, Barrie promises to put some mileage on her stiletto heels. But she finds a new kind of prison at her aunt’s South Carolina plantation instead–a prison guarded by an ancient spirit who long ago cursed one of the three founding families of Watson Island and gave the others magical gifts that became compulsions.

Stuck with the ghosts of a generations-old feud and hunted by forces she cannot see, Barrie must find a way to break free of the family legacy. With the help of sun-kissed Eight Beaufort, who knows what Barrie wants before she knows herself, the last Watson heir starts to unravel her family’s twisted secrets. What she finds is dangerous: a love she never expected, a river that turns to fire at midnight, a gorgeous cousin who isn’t what she seems, and very real enemies who want both Eight and Barrie dead. (Cover and synopsis from Goodreads.)

A Bit of Confusion…

At some point after I first heard about this book, I began confusing it with the book Conversion, by Katherine Howe, which has to do with the Salem Witch Trials.  I LOVE anything to do with the Salem Witch Trials and so when Simon Pulse sent me Compulsion I was all excited to read this book that had to deal with the Salem Witch Trials.  But then I quickly realized that this was not the book I thought it to be, and that made me sad.  But I saw on Goodreads that a few of my blogger friends had loved Compulsion, and I was excited to read it anyway, even though it had nothing to do with the Salem Witch Trials.

But It Just Never Quite Worked For Me…

I just ended up having a lot of issues with Compulsion and all of those things piled up on top of one another caused me to stop reading at the 1/4 mark (108 pages).  Some of the little things that bothered me were: extra, unnecessary details and narration; several inconsistencies; the fact that we met the love interest on page 18 (this just seemed very quick to me and made me worried that the majority of this book was going to be about the romance and that’s not my kind of book); the fact that Barrie and Eight got really friendly really quickly (he’s hugging and comforting her on THE DAY HE MET HER. That’s just weird.); and Barrie being a really inconsistent character.  For example, she was actually quite rude to Eight at one point when he doesn’t answer her question, and she gets very defensive and says, “You don’t get to ignore me when I ask a question.”  I understand why she got upset, but she could have said it in a much nicer way, plus, Eight was doing her a favor at the time, and they barely knew each other, and he really didn’t owe her anything.  And then later, when they go to a restaurant, Eight orders for her (WHICH IS A HUGE NO-NO FOR ME. I CAN PICK OUT MY OWN MEAL, THANK YOU) and she thinks to herself that it bothers her, but she lets it slide.  I just don’t understand that kind of inconsistency.

There were also a lot of random sentences in the narration that seemed to come from nowhere.  At one point she says that the house must be out to get her, but she’s simply tripped on the stairs a couple times.  Sorry, tripping twice is not going to make me think a house is out to get me. It’s going to make me think the stairs suck or that I’m really being clumsy, but not that the house is out to get me.  And Barrie thinks about how Eight must be too good to be true, yet she spends most of her time before that talking about how irritating he was.  I also really didn’t understand their attraction, either.  Sure, he was good looking and they had some kind of spark when they touched, and he was kind of nice to her,  but I wouldn’t think those things = too good to be true.

Anyway, all these little things added up to me just not being able to continue on with the story.  I wasn’t connecting with the characters, I didn’t understand the romance, and all those inconsistencies were really annoying.  But if this kind of story sounds like something you’d enjoy, be sure to check out the other reviews I’ve listed below.  They all loved Compulsion!