Book Review - Credence by Penelope Douglas

Credence by Penelope Douglas

I had seen this book all over TikTok and Instagram before finally deciding to read it. As soon as I opened the book, I realized that I had no idea what I was in for. This book has a ton of trigger warnings. If you decide to read it, heed them. This book is definitely not for everyone. But I found it to be a sweet story, despite the weird aspects. The way I look at books like this is that I would never tolerate this kind of situation happening in real life. But this is fiction, and I can appreciate a story if I like how it's written.

Credence follows Tiernan de Haas. Tiernan has never felt loved by her parents who wanted nothing to do with her. Suddenly, a few months before her eighteenth birthday, Tiernan is orphaned. Shortly after her parent's death, she gets a call from an uncle she's never met, her father's step-brother, Jake, and he tells her that her parents have left him in charge of her until she turns eighteen. So she travels from her home in Los Angeles to his cabin on a remote mountain in Colorado. While there she realizes that she has two step-cousins around her age. Noah is older, and is charming flirt. Kaleb, on the other hand, is mute and mysteriously brutish. Tiernan spends several months with the three men. During this time, Jake, Noah, and Kaleb help teach Tiernan how to survive a remote life. But the more time she spends with them, their relationships start to cross boundaries. 

Tiernan is one of those rare female main characters that I don't immediately get annoyed by. From the beginning, I felt so bad for her because of everything she's gone through in her childhood. I will admit though, it was a little weird that she was immediately attracted to and flirting with her "uncle" right after meeting him. Also, once again, I feel the need to say that I would never condone the behaviors or actions that occurred in this book. Jake, Noah, and Kaleb were all major red-flags. But I liked them as fictional characters. I thought it was sweet how they each grew and changed as Tiernan helped them become a family. 

Like I said earlier, this story and plot is not everyone's cup of tea. There's a lot of triggering stuff that happens in this book. But I thought the story was overall nice. It's basically a found family type of sitation, where a girl who's biological family never loved her, but she found people who did love her (in their own, questionable ways). 

Overall, I'd never recommend this book to anyone without the disclaimer that it's a little disturbing. But I loved it.