Lead Me Not by A. Meredith Walters

Narrated by Shayna Thibodeaux & Sebastian York

Lead Me Not left me at kind of a loss of words. I went in expecting one thing, and I came away with a totally different experience, and not necessarily one that I would have signed up for had I known in advance. Specifically, I came away with a feeling that this story was really more about addiction than romance. Perhaps that will be remedied in Book 2, Follow Me Back, which is scheduled to be released in June 2015. As I generally only read romance titles, however, I was a little taken aback by the more general fiction feel and somewhat hopeless overlay. Additionally, I was not expecting a cliffhanger, and while I wouldn’t render it a crazy, completely unexpected twist at the end, I did find it to be the antithesis of what I typically expect in a romance novel.

Aubrey Duncan fully accepts blame for her sister’s drug overdose as she failed to see the warning signs and now she is completely immersed in saving others. At Longwood University she not only majors in psychology, but she also volunteers at an addiction support group. Other than her schoolwork and volunteer activities, however, her life is fairly uneventful. She has a roommate, and a former love interest – now turned best friend, who tend to keep her company, but she rarely ventures out of her apartment or interacts on a social level with others.

Then she meets Maxx Demelo. Their relationship is a forbidden one, as he is a participant in her addiction support group and Aubrey tries her best to resist him. Like a moth pulled to a flame, however, little by little Aubrey gets further and further drawn to Maxx’s darkness. Knowing that he is tied to Compulsion, an underground club where sex and drugs run rampant, and which rotates locales (all abandoned locations) on a routine basis to evade the police, she knows in her heart that Maxx must be up to no good. Yet she still can’t distance herself or, perhaps, it is his need for salvation that attracts her to him.

Maxx knows how to put on a good show, as he has been doing it for years. Financially responsible for his younger teen brother who lives with his uncle – a guardian who prefers to pilfer the money for his own selfish needs rather than actually provide for his brother – Maxx commits to a life of illicit gain which he feels is his only way to both provide for his brother and pay for his tuition. As the stress mounts though, so does the temptation and need to lessen the strain by artificially dulling the pain with drugs.  Moreover, the powerlessness he normally feels in the real world, is easily forgotten at Club Compulsion at night, where he becomes the king of what all the patrons seek to buy. When he goes from primarily dealing to also abusing, however, his cleverly constructed ruse begins to fall like a house of cards. Will Aubrey’s fascination with Maxx be the one force that can save him, or will she too be ruined when the cards have fallen?

The narration is split into the typical New Adult romance fashion between  the narrators based on gender. Shayna Thibodeaux narrates the chapters from Aubrey’s point of view and Sebastian York narrates those from Maxx’s. While Sebastian York delivers his typical above average performance, I was unfortunately not as delighted with Ms. Thibodeaux’s.

Although I should have known better, as I have had similar issues with Ms. Thibodeaux’s narrations in the past (see my review of Sweet Filthy Boy), I decided to try another one of her narrations to see if her style had changed. I am sad to say that it has not. As with my prior experience, Ms. Thibodeaux’s rendition of the narrative paragraphs is nearly entirely characterized by a repetitive cadence that tends to start slowly, speeds up to a feverish pitch, and then slows back down again towards the end. Previously, I found that this style not only sounded unnatural, when there was nothing particularly exciting or time sensitive happening in the scene to justify it, but it was actually quite distracting as it caused me to focus on the style, rather than the meaning of the words. If this were the only issue I had with the narration, then perhaps I may have been able to find a way to let it blend into the background. But, nearly every such passage is then followed by one of my biggest pet peeves – audible breathing.  However, in Ms. Thibodeaux’s case, it is not just audible, but actually sounds like large gulps of air are being taken in between narrative passages. I imagine this is in preparation for the long narratives (that are characterized by the previously mentioned cadence) where no doubt Ms Thibodeaux does not takes breaths (an effect which I can only characterize as similar to a swimmer taking a huge breath before jumping in a pool of water).

Putting that aside, Ms. Thibodeaux’s enactment of the dialogue does not contain this effect and therefore is much more enjoyable. In that regard, Ms. Thibodeaux delivers both genuine and distinguishable characters. She also imparts her dialogue with appropriate emotion that aids in telling the story.

Sebastian York, as always, renders a great performance when it comes to the male characters and the narrative. He appropriately adjusts his intonation to the particular role and personality traits, giving each their own unique sound, thereby doing away with the need to rely on dialogue tags. This was perhaps the darkest title I have heard him perform and I was impressed with his adeptness to adapt to the more serious, and somewhat desperate, feel of this story. His female characterizations, however, while distinguishable, do not sound feminine enough to make me believe that a woman is talking which reduced my grade to a B+.

All in all, Lead Me Not is well written and flows well. I just wish that the romance had been a bigger focus.

BJ

Narration:  Shayna Thibodeaux: C-  Sebastian York: B+

Book Content:  C+

Steam Factor:  Glad I had my earbuds in

Violence:  Minimal – Drug Abuse

Genre:  New Adult, Contemporary Romance

Publisher:  Simon & Schuster

Lead Me Not was provided to AudioGals by Simon and Schuster for review.