First Visions by Heather Topham Wood

Title: First Visions

Author: Heather Topham Wood

Series: Second Sight (Book #1)

Format- epub

Publisher- Createspace

Published- April 27th, 2012

Pages- 202

Source- Xpresso Book Tours

Two years ago, 21-year-old Kate Edwards became deathly ill and slipped into a coma. While unconscious, she crept into the mind of a missing boy and awoke with the knowledge of his location. Friends and family were skeptical and wary of her new ability to see into the minds of others. Their fears prompted Kate to keep her psychic powers a secret. Feeling alienated, she dropped out of college and spent most of her days holed up at her mother’s home. 

Now another child has been abducted. Police detective Jared Corbett seeks out Kate for her help in solving the case. Reluctantly, Kate agrees and they must work together to bring 8-year-old Cori Preston home to her family. Although attracted to one another, Jared has a girlfriend with ties to the abduction case and Kate is sarcastic and guarded since her coma. With visions she can’t control and an uncontrollable attraction to the detective, she wonders if she can leave the past behind and finally stop hiding from the world. Otherwise, Cori may be lost forever.

Kate's felt out of place for a long time. Ever since she came out of a coma two years ago she's been able to see visions of the past. The one that got her in trouble was about a little boy that was missing at the time. She was able to describe where he was which led to his rescue. After that people either thought she was a freak and left her or they thought they could find their missing loved ones with her help and wouldn't leave her alone. The problem is that even if she wanted to help those who asked her she couldn't turn her visions on and off like a switch. The visions just come to her. She has no control over them. She especially had no control of what it did to her life. It left her with an estrangement with her father, one final friend, and a feeling that she is in fact a freak.

It all comes down to the moment when a detective walks in asking for her help. She denies that she is a psychic. She's been denying it ever since that first vision because all it has brought her is pain. But, something about the little girl, Cori, tugs at her heart. It doesn't help that the detective, Jared, has smoldering good looks either. Her decision to help find Cori will be a turning point in her life when everything that she knew about herself and her ability changes.

Wow. I liked this book way more than I expected to. First of all Kate is this incredible character who is unbelievably hilarious. Her sarcastic humor had me laughing all the way through the story and when not laughing I was smiling to myself just so happy that I could read what she has to say. She has such a great personality with a mix of vulnerability to it. She's had to create these walls in front of her to keep her safe from heartbreak which is unfortunate because she really does care about the people who ask her for help. It's really not fair for her to have to feel bad about being who she is. She is more strong than vulnerable. She has this certain power in herself and the way she doesn't take anything from anybody. I envy that about her.

Needless to say Kate did wonders for this book. I was able to connect with her which in turn helped me connect with the story. I would love to hang out with her if I could. I would so defend her against anyone who ever gave her an attitude or dirty look. I mean she's psychic. Why wouldn't you want to be friends with her? I would have been so excited if I was her friend. I would have been jumping up and down saying "Are you serious!?" repeatedly and telling her how cool she is. I guess I could see why people would be so skeptical about her being a psychic but to think she had anything to do with the initial disappearance is ridiculous. She was in a coma. When did she have the time to orchestrate this supposed deception?

Romance in any story when done right makes me happy. It's done right here. Her and the detective's interactions were amusing to read about. She obviously was struck by him while he took a little while to warm up. There is a bit of a love triangle but it's not what you think. Jared's girlfriend is the person whose sister is missing. I said it. Girlfriend. Before you boo Jared he does nothing wrong and the girlfriend is a pain anyways so you don't care what happens to her. I really liked them together. It was obvious they had feelings for each other. It wasn't really slow but it wasn't like it was instalove or anything like that. The author just made it feel right.

Not all of this book was focused on romance. The book did have its slight mystery factor with who kidnapped Cori and where on earth is she. What really got me curious about Cori's kidnapping was Kate's feeling that it was personal. That it had something to do with the family. Then I couldn't shake the feeling that it had to have had something to do with one family member in particular. I was expecting something a little more sinister but everything about the kidnapping and how it went down in the end made me not care about that little if it was sinister enough. Things Go Down. A little too fast for me now that I think about it but otherwise it was a pretty great conclusion.

The visions were adapted well. The different POV's she could have were interesting to explore. It would have been nice to see the villain's point of view but oh well. Kate could see things from inside the mind of Cori. She was also able to have this out of body experience looking in to what was happening with Cori but not emotionally experiencing what Cori was feeling. Now that I'm thinking about this book more I think maybe there could have been even more focus on visions with her and a little less on the romance. Cori was gone for a long time which doesn't seem right. Don't get me wrong there was time spent on finding her but more would have been a little nice.

One last person I must mention is Kate's mother. She made a mistake of not supporting her daughter before but she more than made up for it in my eyes. The scenes with her were always great. She had such a motherly protectiveness for her daughter all the while chastising her for being her overly sarcastic self. I would want her in my corner. There was this moment where the author showed her POV and I simply loved that because you can see her own struggle of keeping her daughter from pain and helping her realize that she is special no matter what. With so many parents in books that are no good it was nice to see a mother that didn't have any flaws for me. She supported her daughter and that's what kids all really need from their parents at that age. All in all I really enjoyed this book and look forward to where the author takes Kate. I see a career in psychic consulting in her future! More than anything I hope to see Kate happy and getting herself into the just right amount of trouble.