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    Deception
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    Deception
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    Deception
    Ebook309 pages4 hours

    Deception

    By Lee Nichols

    4/5

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    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    When Emma Vaile's parents go missing while away on a mysterious business trip, she's left all alone in her creepy old house. But her brother's very cute best friend, Bennett Stern-Emma's knight in J. Crew armor-arrives unexpectedly to whisk her away to New England. There, Emma settles into his family's museum-like mansion and enrolls at an old-fashioned private school. She quickly finds friends in the popular legacy crowd at Thatcher and spends her free time crushing on Bennett. But the eerie visions she's been hiding from everyone have gotten worse. Emma has memories of Thatcher that she can't explain-it's as if she's returning home to a place she's never been. Finally, Emma confides in Bennett and learns she is a ghostkeeper, a person who can communicate with ghosts. Bennett brought Emma to Thatcher to protect her, but now he needs her help tracking an other-worldly murderer.

    A rich New England setting filled with mystery, tradition, and prep-school intrigue make Deception the perfect choice for fans of series like Kate Brian's Private, as well as all those paranormal fans. The shocking ending will leave readers desperate for book two.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBloomsbury Publishing
    Release dateJun 1, 2010
    ISBN9781599905624
    Unavailable
    Deception
    Author

    Lee Nichols

    Lee Nichols is the author of the first two Haunting Emma novels, Deception and Betrayal, as well as five books for adults. She lives in Maine, USA, and is married to novelist Joel N. Ross.

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    Reviews for Deception

    4/5

    95 ratings22 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Quick, easy read.
    • 5/5
      So awesome!
    • 5/5
      Emma's parents go missing then her legal guardian, Bennett, shows up and takes her to Boston where she sees ghosts and other things that go bump in the night. She does not quite trust Bennett nor he her. How will she discover what is going on?Wow! I really liked this story. It took me a little while to get into it but when I did I was wide eyed with wonder about what was going to happen. There are a lot of questions I want answered so I will read the rest of the trilogy. The world building is good. The storytelling is good. I liked the characters and I like that Emma can communicate with the ghosts. I also like that she has a line she does not want to cross. I hope the rest of the story will be as good.
    • 5/5
      I love this take on mediums and "ghost whisperers". I couldn't stop reading!
    • 5/5
      I read the whole series and thought it was great.
    • 3/5
      When Emma Vaile's parents leave on mysterious business trip, it gives her the perfect excuse to be a rebellious teen. Throw some parties, get a tattoo (or maybe just a piercing), and enjoy the first few weeks of her junior year. Then her best friend stops talking to her, the cops crash her party, and Emma finds herself in the hands of a new guardian—her college-age "knight in J.Crew armor," Bennett Stern—and on a plane to his museum-like mansion in New England.After enrolling at Thatcher Academy, Emma settles in by making friends with the popular legacy crowd. But she can't shake the strange visions that are haunting her. She has memories of Thatcher she can't explain, as if she's returning home to a place she's never been. Emma doesn't trust anyone anymore—except maybe Bennett. But he's about to reveal a ghostly secret to Emma. One that will explain the visions . . . and make Emma fear for her life. From Amazon.I've put off writing this review because I wasn't impressed with this book even though I really wanted to be because I know it's going to be a series. Then I remembered who this book is written for, a young adult, meaning a teenager and not a middle aged woman. So, I took another look at the book from that perspective. I liked it a lot more as a teenager.Emma, is deserted by her parents to go on a shopping trip for their antiques shop. Emma seems fine with it, after all, Susan, who runs the store for them will look in on her. She'll be fine. Then, Susan quits. And Emma is left to run the shop and go to school. Susan's daughter, Abby is her best friend, or was, but she went off to school and stopped talking to Emma after Emma's brother Max dumped her. Countless calls, emails and texts go unanswered. But Emma holds it together until she starts to see smoke figures rise out of the funeral urns in front of the door to her father's study. She's seriously spooked. At the same time she finally gets a social life thanks to a new girl named Natalie. And thanks to Natalie, she's talked into having a party. The police come, Natalie tells them she's living alone and Emma feeling very betrayed ends up spending the night in a halfway house. She can't reach her parents by cell phone so the social worker wants to put her in the foster care system until Bennett arrives with forged guardianship papers. She takes that option.Bennett's home is a museum in the summer, but it's winter so he leaves Emma there and tells her Martha will take care of her. Someone takes care of her, but it isn't Martha she later learns. It's the ghosts she can see. The house has it's share of them and Emma can interact with them. They aren't the only ghosts she sees. Thatcher Academy has it's share of ghosts as does the town of Echo Point. And Emma can see them all. Emma makes friends easily with the quarterback of the football team, Sara, smart, pretty and popular, and Harry, strange, witty and friendly. They all welcome her quickly and Coby, the football quarterback and all around perfect guy asks her out. Emma has a hard time setting aside her feelings for Bennett versus Coby. But who can resist the perfect guy??? And Bennett is always MIA anyway.The climax of the books happens in the last fifty pages or so but you can feel it building. The ending is almost predictable, but there are a few curveballs. As a teenager it's not a happy ending. But, I did love the fact that the first Chapter of the next book in the series Betrayal is in the back of the book. It starts out very interesting.
    • 5/5
      People are getting killed, and Emma’s family may be involved. If she doesn’t tell what she knows, more lives will be endangered – including her own. This page turning, romantic mystery is full of adventure. Its cliffhanger ending will leave readers eagerly awaiting the sequel “Betrayal.”
    • 4/5
      Another book I wasn’t sure about but ended up enjoying. Emma’s a fun character and I wasn’t annoyed by her or the writing, which is always nice. (And I mean that with real sincerity: my most common complaint about books I’ve read in the past couple of years is that they are annoying–the writing is either grandiose or clunks horribly.) [Aug. 2011]
    • 5/5
      I love reading 'young adult' novels, which are marketed at teen readers but well written and creative enough to appeal to all ages. Yes, the characters and storylines can become slightly formulaic, as with most genres - Emma and her ghosts in Lee Nichols' novel could easily be switched with Rose in Richelle Mead's Vampire Academy series, for instance - but I can almost guarantee a fast-paced, entertaining read whatever the subject.Deception is exactly that - an imaginative introduction to the 'Haunting Emma' series, about a sixteen year old girl who discovers that she is a 'ghostkeeper' when she moves to the New England town of Echo Point. Told in the first person, Emma is a quirky, witty and youthful narrator, who has to come to terms with her supernatural role - and the fact that her parents have been lying to her all these years. The two love interests are both appealing, although Coby is too good to be true, and the ending pulls no punches. I did find the 'community' of ghostkeepers, controlled by an organisation called The Knell, to be slightly convoluted - nearly everyone in Emma's life turns out to be just like she is - but I'm sure that these unlikely coincidences will start to make sense in the sequels.Nichols' world-building is typically imaginative for this genre, from the ghostkeepers' abilities to summon, compel, communicate with and dispel ghosts, to the varied types of spirits - ghosts, ghasts, ghouls and wraiths - and I can't wait to read more of this series.
    • 4/5
      DECEPTION has reminded me that it has been entirely too long since I’ve read a good ghostly mystery. When I picked up the novel I thought it looked good, but I wasn’t prepared for how much I would end up enjoying it! I found myself furiously flipping pages and, when I found myself on the last page, lamenting my wait until the next installment.At first, I wasn’t sure how well I was going to like the author’s treatment of the dialogue. It seemed almost inconsistent: casual one moment and formal the next. Eventually, I either stopped noticing or started to like it, I’m not sure which. As I read, it started to flow very realistically and it was easy to imagine that Emma was sitting next to me narrating the story. I really enjoyed Nichols’ portrayal of ghosts and Emma’s powers. I’m impressed that each YA ghost novel that I’ve read brings something new to the table. It seems almost easy to differentiate paranormal creatures like vampires and weres, but ghosts require a bit more creativity. Now that the scene has been set, I’m excited to discover what Emma will face in the next book and to see a greater exploration of her powers. I have mixed feelings about DECEPTION’s romantic plot line. At the beginning of the novel, Emma was extremely immature, which had me worried. I thought that her relationship with Bennett would turn out to be only a school girl crush on her older brother’s friend. Thankfully, Emma morphed throughout the novel. By the end, I could definitely see how a relationship between the two could develop. Nichols throws readers for a bit of a loop at the end of the novel, so I’m desperate to see how Emma and Bennett will find a way around the complication presented. And holy cliffhanger! I raced to that last page, only to find a cliffhanger of epic proportions! I adore cliffhangers.
    • 5/5
      When I saw for first time this book on Goodreads, I fell in love with it. I love stories about ghosts so I was really exited about reading this one. And the best part is; I just loved this book!Before I started reading it, I was worried about reading a a bad fanfic of The Mediator Series by Meg Cabot, which I love, but "Deception" surprised me a lot. It's a completely different story. Emma is a girl who is spending a bad time, her family left her without any info, and she is alone, by herself. Until her "guardian" comes... But there is a lot of secrets, and she wants to know what is happening with her and with her family... The plot is, like I said before, amazing and different. Even though, she starts in a new school, something that is usual in all YA books, which BTW I hate it, I didn't find too many cliches. There is a lot of mystery and some spooky scenes. The characters are really nice, including Emma, who is not an annoying girl. I really like her. And I just loved Celeste, Nicholas and Anatole. Bennett was OK. You need to read the book to understand why.Of course, there is romance. Not so much, something I like it, because sometimes I got bored with so much kisses and that stuff. But I think it's going to be more in the next books. BTW Deception sometimes made me remember The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare, so if you liked it, reading this one is a good idea. I also recommend The Mediator series by Meg Cabot. What can I say? I loved Deception by Lee Nichols, I just can't put it down, (I read it in one day) and I'm really happy I have the second book here next to me, waiting to be read. 5/5 stars
    • 4/5
      I thought that this book was ok. I'm curious to see what will happen to her in the next book as well as who she can trust. After reading the book I was expecting something a little different, but it was fine. I found myself skimming through the book instead of reading the book word from word. I often skipped any interactions with Emma and her new friends. I really just wanted to get to the mystery of her parents disappearance and her strange visions even her feelings for Bennett didn't excite me. I hope that since it is the first book in a series that the next one will be better. However, I would say give it a try.
    • 4/5
      I ended up really liking this book! And why am I excited about that? Well, for the first hundred pages or so, I wasn’t really sure I was GOING to like it. Don’t get me wrong, it was very readable and I found myself tearing through the pages BUT I had a couple of issues. First of all, the story is told in first person point of view which amounted to a whole lot of “I did this and then he did and then I did this and then he did that.” And the sentences were very short. You know how in elementary school you are taught that a sentence needs a noun and a verb? That’s all a lot of these sentences amounted to so it took me a while to get used to the writing style.Secondly, the way Emma ended up “in the hands of a new guardian” seemed a little bit forced to me. It was a a big convoluted mess of a way for her to get there that could have been handled a heckuva lot easier and a lot more believably by the characters involved. I’m asking for believability in paranormal fiction? Well, yeah! If I’m gonna get into a story involving ghosts or anything else supenatural, I wanna believe in the world that’s being created. And if the characters are doing stuff that just doesn’t make sense then it’s kind of hard.Anyway…on to the good stuff…like I said, once I got past those first hundred or so pages, I found myself really hooked in the story! I was dying to know what was gonna happen! The cool thing about this book is that it didn’t give itself away…I couldn’t predict what was gonna happen and was surprised several times! Deception is the PERFECT name for this book, because you get the sense while reading that you can never be sure exactly who Emma should trust. Almost everyone is suspect at times, even her missing parents.Deception has a great ending (one of my favorites of late actually) that leaves you wanting more and I definitely can’t wait for the next book in the series!
    • 4/5
      This reminded me strongly of Kelly Armstrong's Awakening and Summoning novels, which is great because neither book stays on the shelves, and I don't think this one will either. Deception has a perfect blending of mystery (where are Emma's parents and why haven't they contacted her), tension (what trouble happened between Bennet Stern and Emma's brother Max), romance (two very different, very attractive possibilities) and suspense (what are the black shadows that seem to be threatening Emma?). I think the motherly Martha was probably my favourite character, but I also enjoyed the playfulness of Nicholas. I pictured the Rake looking like Antonio Banderas, in Take The Lead, and Bennet to my mind looks like Taylor Lautner or a very young Pierce Brosnan. It's a fast read and fans will be delighted to know that a second book, Betrayal, is on the way. I love a book that leaves me with questions so here are just a few: How did Bennet know to show up at the police station when he did, does he have anything to do with Emma's parents disappearance, what is the power behind the amulet and is the amulet gone for good, and why did Emma's mom send the photo.
    • 4/5
      As part of a June Blog Tour, I won a copy of the book, Deception, by Lee Nichols. It’s the first in a new paranormal adventure romance series, with a teen heroine trying to combine her “new-girl” struggle for acceptance in a New England prep school with the fact that she keeps seeing people who aren’t there. Emma has an unfortunate tendency to faint at inappropriate moments too. And her parents and brother have gone missing.I should warn you, Deception is deceptively addictive, and definitely not a re-run of all the other paranormal teen romances out there. I was slightly disappointed by how the final chapter sets the reader up for a sequel, but the story itself is complete and enjoyable. The characters, living, dead and otherwise, are fascinating. The writing is smooth with an enjoyable first person narrative. The relationships play out well, even the slightly odd one between Emma and her new guardian. And the mythology of ghosts and ghostkeepers interacting with the every-day world of shopping and prep school is very nicely drawn. Revelations slip into the story with perfect timing, turning suspicion to delighted acceptance to guessing the future again.Meanwhile there’s a murderer on the loose, and Emma just might be in his sights. It all combines to make an exciting adventure, grounded with pleasant characters and fun relationships, plausible lives and dialogs, and that longing to be accepted which isn’t only experienced by teens. I really enjoyed the read, a haunting story and a heroine worth watching.
    • 4/5
      I can't recall reading any paranormal book that was focused on ghosts but now Lee has me wanting more. This is Lee's first YA novel, she does have a several adult novels published as well. In this book Emma his haunted by visions, visions that scare her. Her parents are out of town and unreachable and she ends up living with her guardian who is also the guy she loves, Bennett. She starts a new school, has to make new friends, and deal with her visions at the same time she has caught the eye of the quarterback, Coby.The first fifty pages are so really threw me for a loop. What teenager would agree to move across the US with a guy who claims to be her guardian, a guardian her parents never told her she had, without asking more questions or demanding answers? I know she loves the guy but that part really bothered me. If my parents were on a business trip I would definitely get a hold of them before moving and attending a new school, I don't care what the circumstances were. In the end her decision to go with Bennett was expected and made for a great story. I hate that I have to wait till March 2011 for the sequel, the ending was a cliffhanger and I have several unanswered questions. In the end I really enjoyed this book. It was full of mystery, just the right amount of romance, and ghosts. I think Lee really hit the mark with this YA series. Kudos!
    • 5/5
      Emma sees ghosts. After her parents disappear, she is rescued from foster care by Bennett, who was a friend of her brother's, and brought across the country to live in a museum and attend a posh private school. She learns that she is a ghostkeeper. Ghostkeepers usually have one talent. They can summon ghosts, communicate with ghosts, compel ghosts or dispel ghosts. Emma has all those talents. Something is killing ghostkeepers in a really gruesome way and that something is after Emma. Can she dispel it? I didn't talk about the romance aspect. Naturally it is a triangle. Coby -football quarterback and all around nice guy - love Emma; Emma loves Bennett; Bennett -well, we aren't sure who Bennett loves. Great story with lots of thrilling bits.
    • 4/5
      Quick & Dirty: A completely compelling and suspenseful read.Opening Sentence: Six weeks ago, my parents disappeared.The Review:Emma Vaile plans to live it up and break all the rules while her parents are gone on a business trip, but naturally things take a turn for the worse. Emma’s appointed guardian leaves her all alone to be closer to her own daughter. Now, Emma is stuck with running her parents store, as well as maintaining her school duties. To make matters worse, Emma’s best friend is no longer speaking to her and she doesn’t understand why. Alone and feeling isolated, Emma turns to her new friends. Wanting to be accepted into the group, Emma agrees to throw a party at her house. The party comes to an abrupt end when the police arrive. One of Emma’s so called friend’s reports her to Child Protective Services. Betrayed, Emma finds herself facing some pretty bleak options. Become a ward of the state or enter the foster care system. Luckily, Emma is saved in the nick of time by Bennett, her brother’s friend. He takes Emma to New England and enrolls her at Thatcher Academy.Deception is set in a rich, imaginative world that blends mystery, suspense, and romance. Emma is funny, strong and driven. She went from being immature to accepting major responsibilities head on. Some of the scenes are a touch melodramatic, but Emma is a very sympathetic character. Emma is lonely and worried about her family. She’s essentially been abandoned. Emma can’t seem to get a hold of them and she’s battling danger at every turn. Emma discovers that she has powerful abilities, and battling evil ghosts is just the beginning. She’s a Ghostkeeper, which means that she can communicate with ghosts. I’m definitely intrigued by the Ghostkeeper mythology.I’m not really sure how I feel about Bennett. I never established a connection with him and he didn’t come off as a particularly likable character. He’s a bit too mysterious, suspicious, and I’m not sure what his real motivations are.Overall, Deception is a great gothic ghost story. Deception has plenty of twists and a number of intriguing events. Strongly drawn characters and plenty of conflict help draw the reader deep into this genuinely spooky tale. The result is a wonderfully creepy, well-written story. Readers will eagerly await Betrayal, which is the next book in the series.Notable Scene:I smelled and felt the cold salt wind as it rose from the ocean and heard the waves rippling against the rocks below. The soft glow of the house fell into the darkness over the cliffs, as a thread of spectral fog thickened in the air and crept toward us.As we watched, the fog morphed into a shape that looked nothing like other ghosts I’d seen. It had a skeletal, malformed body and wore tattered clothing. Except that it wasn’t clothing. It was skin. Its bones were joined in the wrong places somehow, making it look more insect than human.FTC Advisory: Bloomsbury provided me with an ARC of Deception. No goody bags, sponsorships, “material connections,” or bribes were exchanged for my review. In addition, I don’t receive affiliate fees for anything purchased via links from my site.
    • 4/5
      Deception is one of those books that will have you on the edge of your sit/nail biting mysteries. Its by far one of my favorite ghost(while besides Shade) novels.We meet Emma who has nothing but drama going on through out the book. She is a strong character/normal teen minus the whole powerful ghostkeeper thing, and missing parents. But she handles the drama....well like a teen. She has her questions, still learning about her powers, and her attraction to Bennett. I didn't quite get Bennett...i mean he was charming, but distance. He leaves Emma alone in a BIG house/museum, there relationship is forbidden, full of secrets and you have the age issue. I wanted to know more about him. I liked how some of the ghost were friendly it was funny because Emma would confuse ghost with normal people. She would be like "your alive." Martha was my fave too. She's motherly and caring. I loved when Emma moved to New England! new school with cute British guys. Sara, Harry, Coby are Emma's new friends, she has trouble trusting them after what happened back at home. But like Coby alot! Nichols ghostkeeping world is captivating. I was even a little scared at times. Only when the wraiths would whisper neos and pop up in scary dark places. You'd be surprised at what happens in this book. There are questions to be answered i can't wait to read the next book!
    • 4/5
      Emma Vaile has stopped hearing from everyone she loves—her antiques-collecting parents, her older brother, her best friend—and a supposed friend of hers calls social services on her. To her disbelief, her brother’s best friend, the handsome Bennett Stern, “rescues” her and brings her to his New England mansion, where she enrolls at the elite private school Thatcher.As Emma makes friends and gets into the flow of private school life, life would be great, were it not for three things: Bennett’s elusiveness, her family’s continued silence, and the disturbing return of her childhood visions. Only this time Emma learns that the visions are actually ghosts, and she can see them because she is a ghostkeeper. As if learning the responsibility for her new role isn’t enough, Emma also needs to juggle high school, a romance that could kill her, and an otherworldly being with the terrifying power to possess and even kill humans.There are some book synopses I really, really hate, and this book had one of them. It mentions private schools, absent parents, a hot preppie guy, and the eerie paranormal (insert spooky sounds here). How utterly mundane. Can we get a “hasn’t this setup been done before?”What the synopsis fails to mention, however, is just how smart, interesting, and different DECEPTION is from the rest of the pack. DECEPTION is an entertaining, funny, and touching read that had me caught up in a fictional world I normally don’t take to.After an admittedly bumpy start, DECEPTION brings us Emma Vaile—smart, sassy, strong, romantic—and an equally lively and engaging cast of characters. Perhaps this was just my experience, but Emma is not someone you can really relate to: rather, you just really, really want to be her. She handles her bad luck with an appealing modern sensibility that will have you nodding along in agreement to her reactions, decisions, and quips.Likewise, the other characters are equally strong and memorable. Emma’s school friends don’t feel like hollow shells of what high school students should act and sound like. Instead, they are endearingly flawed, jaded, sweet, irritating—you name the emotion, you’ve probably got it. Bennett, too, is far more than a hot, well-dressed love interest. He has his own deeply rooted passions, insecurities, and worries, too. (And thank goodness, or I might’ve inflicted injury upon the nearest wall.) You could think of reading DECEPTION almost like watching a CW TV show: it’s not exactly realistic, and some of the scenarios are a bit unbelievable, but the dialogue is snappy, the teen actors are top-notch, and you just can’t stop yourself from coming back for more.I thought that the ghost element of DECEPTION was also very well done, familiar enough to attract readers, but original enough to keep the more critical of us on our toes. The paranormal conflict in this story had depth and history. It is a conflict that spans centuries and dimensions, all in a reasonably believable and definitely enthralling way that I can see smoothly carrying over into future installments.DECEPTION is a book that defied my expectations. I was expecting clichéd paranormal-romance-mystery drivel; I got an engaging and snarky read with fantastic characterization. Overall, a paranormal mystery read that is a cut above mere wish-fulfillment fun. I will definitely keep an eye out for the sequel.
    • 4/5
      Deception is a real page turner. I managed to read it in just a few hours. The characters were interesting and well developed. I found protagonist Emma easy to connect with. After spending most of her life feeling like second best she finds herself abandoned by everyone she thought cared. I really felt for her, and could imagine the pain she was feeling.Deception contained an interesting ghost story that kept me reading late into the night. It also has a romance that promises to invoke warm fuzzies, as well as a little love triangle for those that dig that type of thing. I’m a fan of warm fuzzies and love triangles so that was a definite win-win for me. I didn’t find anything about this story predictable. The conclusion was a real shocker, and left my heart feeling a wee bit bruised. It all ended with what I’d consider a cliffhanger as well as several unanswered questions. Frustrating for me yes, but also a guarantee I’ll read the next book. Deception is a promising start to a new young adult trilogy.If you like ghost stories and the paranormal check this one out. Deception does contain some adult language, and sexual predicaments. You may want to keep that in mind when recommending it to the younger teens and tweens.
    • 4/5
      I am a fan of ghost stories, so I was excited to read DECEPTION. I was pleasantly surprised to see how different this one was. The whole new idea of "ghost keepers" was very exciting and suspenseful. The beginning was a little slow, but once the scene moved to New England, I was completely engrossed.Emma was a realistic and likable character. With her parent's disappearance and her best friend abandoning her, I found it easy to feel for her and wish for a better outcome from her. I loved the fact that she had a mysterious past with ghosts. I got excited every time I learned a little more. Ooh, Bennett. He was a great character. I don't blame Emma, I found myself falling for him. It was one of those things that you kept waiting to see if or when these two would get together. I absolutely love the described scenes in this book. The New England setting was beautiful and haunting. It really made the story come to life for me. The idea of ghost keepers and how the "power" worked was awesome. Nichols has a likable writing style that is captivating, but easy to read at the same time. The best part for me by far was the plot. It kept twisting and changing where you had to keep reading to find out what happens. I am a sucker for that kind of suspense.The ending was a surprise to me. A cliffhanger that made me really wish the next book was out already! I can't wait to continue this series and find out the rest of Emma's story, because it is for sure not over yet. DECEPTION was a gripping supernatural story. An awesome start to a very promising series.