Flashes of creepiness enhance this island-set YA thriller.
Novelist and nonfiction writer Pohler (The Calibans, 2015, etc.) kicks off a new YA series with the story of Daphne, a girl who can’t wait to die—until it becomes a very real possibility.
One slip of her mother’s tongue was all it took for teenage Daphne to shoulder the blame for her sister Kara’s death. When she attempts a guilt-fueled suicide on New Year’s Eve, her parents send her on a “vacation” to an island where she sees ghosts, hears her name whispered in the darkness, and encounters a string of people who don’t seem quite right. Daphne gets the feeling that “everyone around her [is] acting.” It turns out her parents dumped her in an extreme experimental program run by the questionable Dr. Hortense Gray, who claims to “give hope to family members with depressed and suicidal loved ones when no one else can.” Pohler lets Daphne enjoy a few beats of trust here and there as her closest friends and family join her on the island, but Daphne slowly begins to wonder if they’re really there to help her or to hurt her. The author ably balances the teenager’s suffering with her slowly growing will to live. But everything comes crashing down when one of Dr. Gray’s therapeutic “games” goes terribly wrong and Daphne is left to fend for herself on the most remote part of the island. Ultimately, the real experiment may not be about Daphne’s healing as it is whether she’s willing to inflict the same confusion and pain she received on others. Spooky touches like the whispering voices in the woods and Daphne’s likeness appearing in a painting in Dr. Gray’s office steadily build tension and supply chills. Readers must wait for the sequel to learn whether Daphne emerges triumphant or falls into a spiraling cycle of revenge and retribution.
Flashes of creepiness enhance this island-set YA thriller.Pub Date: Dec. 16, 2013
ISBN: 978-0615774107
Page Count: 296
Publisher: Green Press
Review Posted Online: April 22, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The seemingly ageless Seeger brings back his renowned giant for another go in a tuneful tale that, like the art, is a bit sketchy, but chockful of worthy messages. Faced with yearly floods and droughts since they’ve cut down all their trees, the townsfolk decide to build a dam—but the project is stymied by a boulder that is too huge to move. Call on Abiyoyo, suggests the granddaughter of the man with the magic wand, then just “Zoop Zoop” him away again. But the rock that Abiyoyo obligingly flings aside smashes the wand. How to avoid Abiyoyo’s destruction now? Sing the monster to sleep, then make it a peaceful, tree-planting member of the community, of course. Seeger sums it up in a postscript: “every community must learn to manage its giants.” Hays, who illustrated the original (1986), creates colorful, if unfinished-looking, scenes featuring a notably multicultural human cast and a towering Cubist fantasy of a giant. The song, based on a Xhosa lullaby, still has that hard-to-resist sing-along potential, and the themes of waging peace, collective action, and the benefits of sound ecological practices are presented in ways that children will both appreciate and enjoy. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-83271-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2001
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
