Book Review- Dead to You

I finished reading Dead to You by Lisa McMann for an Around the World ARC Tour on Sunday, but haven't had time to review it yet.

From Goodreads:

Ethan was abducted from his front yard when he was just seven years old. Now, at sixteen, he has returned to his family. It's a miracle... at first. Then the tensions start to build. His reintroduction to his old life isn't going smoothly, and his family is tearing apart all over again. If only Ethan could remember something, anything, about his life before, he'd be able to put the pieces back together. But there's something that's keeping his memory blocked. Something unspeakable...

This book had such an interesting premise.  For some reason the idea of a child being kidnapped and then later reintroduced to his family just fascinated me. 

And I actually liked Ethan (usually when the main character is male, I don't care for him).  I felt so bad for him and wanted him to be able to feel comfortable with his family again.  And I really liked Cami.  She didn't treat him like he was either a freak nor a hero.  Just a regular boy.  But my favorite was Gracie.  I teach Kindergarten so I could totally imagine her every move and saying.  Too cute!

The end though.  Man, I just didn't like it.  I want to say something about without giving away spoilers, so highlight the text if you want to read it.  'Ethan' not really being 'Ethan' was interesting but I didn't like it.  The boy made himself believe he was Ethan so much that he was willing to take a DNA test?  I don't buy it!  I get that people put tragic things out of their mind without realizing it, but throughout the book he says that he loves Ellen and he remembered going to look at pictures of kidnapped children so I think he'd remember to decided faking being kidnapped.  And what happened to the real Ethan?  We don't get any of those questions resolved at all.   Ok, spoiler done.  So the ending dropped the rating down to a 3.  But up until then, I enjoyed it!

I gave this book a rating of 3/5.

Dead to You will be released on February 7, 2012.

This book fulfills items in the following challenges:
2011 100+ Reading Challenge: 114
2011 ARC Reading Challenge: 92
2011 Young Adult Reading Challenge: 92
2011 YA Contemporary Challenge: 19

*FTC Disclosure: I was given this book for free for an honest review as part of the Around the World Tours.