Slow boil, flat finish.
Fingers are pointed and chaos ensues when a group of high-achieving high school seniors begin exhibiting bizarre behaviors in an all-girls private school located in Danvers, Massachusetts—formerly known as Salem Village.
After queen bee Clara Rutherford falls into a seizure at St. Joan’s, and her best friends are similarly afflicted, fellow student Colleen Rowley receives anonymous texts that urge her to study Arthur Miller’s The Crucible for clues. More girls fall victim to the seizures, and reporters and environmental crusaders descend on Danvers. The Massachusetts Department of Public Health finally declares that the girls are suffering from “conversion disorder,” an illness in which the body “converts” stress into physical symptoms. But after seeing how one of her friends seemed to disperse her sadness over a doomed love affair into other people, Colleen wonders if supernatural powers may be at play. In parallel chapters, Ann Putnam, a primary figure in the actual Salem witch trials, confesses to her local minister that she and the other accusers were lying when they named people as witches. The richly drawn characters and period language of the familiar Salem story are far more compelling than the stereotypically rendered Danvers teens. After a deliberate buildup of escalating tension and suspense in the contemporary narrative, Howe hastily wraps up the story based on actual events that took place in La Roy, New York, in 2012 with a series of unsatisfactory solutions that are dropped on the reader with little or no ceremony.
Slow boil, flat finish. (author’s note) (Fiction. 13-18)Pub Date: July 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-399-16777-5
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2014
An entertaining and atmospheric, though sometimes clumsy, exploration of the true cost of beauty.
In this retelling of a classic, a drama student’s obsession with beauty leads her down a dark—and possibly deadly—path.
Eighteen-year-old Penny Paxton is beginning her first year at Dorian Drama Academy in Edinburgh, Scotland, where she hopes to follow in her starlet mother’s footsteps—and earn the love that her mother has never seemed to offer. At Dorian, Penny is mentored by Royal Shakespeare Company legend Orlagh Camran, who makes her the compelling offer of a portrait by the Masked Painter, a mysterious artist with the ability to gift his subjects everlasting youth and beauty. But shortly after Penny’s portrait is complete, several of the Masked Painter’s subjects are found murdered. Fearing that she’s made a terrible mistake and may become the next victim, Penny, who’s gay, begins to investigate the murders with the help of an unlikely ally. As she attempts to uncover the truth surrounding the Masked Painter and the murders, she’s forced to reckon with her own toxic obsession with beauty. This chilling, atmospheric novel, inspired by The Picture of Dorian Gray, is entertaining and full of twists, though some of the reveals feel contrived and some questions are left unanswered. The plot unravels at a leisurely pace but eventually builds to an action-packed (if somewhat convoluted) conclusion. Most characters are cued white.
An entertaining and atmospheric, though sometimes clumsy, exploration of the true cost of beauty. (content note, author’s note, bonus scene) (Fantasy thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: May 26, 2026
ISBN: 9781250346797
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Wednesday Books
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter.
After a Nigerian British girl goes off to an exclusive boarding school that seems to prey on less-privileged students, she discovers there might be some truth behind an urban legend.
Ife Adebola joins the Urban Achievers scholarship program at pricey, high-pressure Nithercott School, arriving shortly after a student called Leon mysteriously disappeared. Gossip says he’s a victim of the glowing-eyed Changing Man who targets the lonely, leaving them changed. Ife doesn’t believe in the myth, but amid the stresses of Nithercott’s competitive, privileged, majority-white environment, where she is constantly reminded of her state school background, she does miss her friends and family. When Malika, a fellow Black scholarship student, disappears and then returns, acting strangely devoid of personality, Ife worries the Changing Man is real—and that she’s next. Ife joins forces with classmate Bijal and Benny, Leon’s younger brother, to uncover the truth about who the Changing Man is and what he wants. Culminating in a detailed, gory, and extended climactic battle, this verbose thriller tempts readers with a nefarious mystery involving racial and class-based violence but never quite lives up to its potential and peters out thematically by its explosive finale. However, this debut offers highly visually evocative and eerie descriptions of characters and events and will appeal to fans of creature horror, social commentary, and dark academia.
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter. (Thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9781250868138
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: June 8, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
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