Review: Here Lives a Corpse by C.L. Matthews

I have been reading a lot of dark, elitist family books lately and I have found that the concept is appealing to my reading tastes and can take on so many different plot twists and character creation.

This particular story is going to take you into the darkest depths of your mind. It’s going to draw you in, chew you up, and spit you back out a different person. Colton, our main character in this story, is a teenage girl who is an heir to a well-known diamond trader. Her life is incredibly unconventional. Firstly, she is from an elite family with tons of money, she is the daughter of two moms and she had a brother. This was a controversial topic because no one will discuss how these two kids were conceived. But the brother, Cassidy, died not too long before the point of where this book begins and that is the catalyst for everything you’re about to read.

Darkness surrounds Colton after losing her brother and she nearly starves herself to death as well as partakes in some significant self-inflicted pain through tattoos, piercings and some cutting that is referenced. She was the most popular girl in school when the previous school year ended – blonde hair and blue eyes, all of the elite men at the school wanted a piece of her and they in fact enjoyed sharing her amongst themselves. Now she is returning to school with green hair, a gothic wardrobe and a morose outlook on life. Hoping to find a way to survive her emotional turmoil while finishing school, she didn’t expect to be roped back under the dangerous wing of these men.

Feeling abandoned by the men that had seemed to care for her, she expects to be exiled and left alone for the year. But the boys of Arcadia have something else very sinister in mind for her and themselves. Read along and watch the story unfold as you dive deep into dark themes, the depths that elite families will go to secure their positions, and the darkness that lives within one brave and confused young woman, Colt Hudson. I believe she is their worst nightmare, their savior and their redeemer. But time will tell and many will die before we reach the conclusion of this adventure.