A strange but enrapturing read that may leave teenagers (and some adults) anticipating the next installment.
In Winn’s debut paranormal YA romance, a demonic force haunts a 16-year-old and threatens to destroy everyone she loves.
In the story’s opening scene, Mason “May” Krieg; her boyfriend, Cay; and the school heartthrob, Jack, are attempting to fulfill a school assignment by verifying local legends of graveyard hauntings and satanic rituals. The trio’s ghost hunt becomes real when Mason falls down a mine shaft, and an indistinguishable dark force knocks her unconscious. After she returns home from the nightmarish ordeal, the shadowy presence, which turns out to be a demon, continues to haunt her. To add insult to Mason’s injury, Cay confesses a secret that ends their relationship. However, Mason, like most heroines of this genre, is still desired by nearly every young man she meets. She’s a self-described “drama-dance nerd,” and what she lacks in conventional popularity and designer clothes, she makes up for with her sassy intelligence. As a result, she not only has to contend with a demon, but also with the leering advances of every male classmate. Several plot twists come Mason’s way, and she weathers the challenges with remarkable, if sometimes unbelievable, maturity. Like Stephenie Meyer’s Bella Swan, she’s unwittingly thrown into a paranormal conflict, and like Stephen King’s Carrie, she possesses frightening supernatural power within herself. Things become truly bizarre, though, when the demon, a Fabio-like being with leather pants and luxurious long hair, begins haunting her with sexually charged dreams. Readers may find the love-hate romance between Mason and sensitive jock Jack to be a guilty pleasure, even if it’s sometimes a little clichéd. That said, this novel isn’t recommended for younger teens, as it contains scenes of rape and violence. Other readers, however, will eagerly accept this fast-paced story of biblical demons and teenage lust.
A strange but enrapturing read that may leave teenagers (and some adults) anticipating the next installment.Pub Date: Oct. 12, 2014
ISBN: 978-1502827869
Page Count: 244
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
This fresh reworking of a Greek myth will resonate.
An otherworldly Latinx retelling of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth set in the South Bronx.
Pheus visits his father in the Bronx every summer. The Afro-Dominican teen is known for his mesmerizing bachata music, love of history, and smooth way with the ladies. Eury, a young Puerto Rican woman and Hurricane Maria survivor, is staying with her cousin for the summer because of a recent, unspecified traumatic event. Her family doesn’t know that she’s been plagued since childhood by the demonlike Ato. Pheus and Eury bond over music and quickly fall in love. Attacked at a dance club by Sileno, its salacious and satyrlike owner, Eury falls into a coma and is taken to el Inframundo by Ato. Pheus, despite his atheism, follows the advice of his father and a local bruja to journey to find his love in the Underworld. Rivera skillfully captures the sounds and feels of the Bronx—its unique, diverse culture and the creeping gentrification of its neighborhoods. Through an amalgamation of Greek, Roman, and Taíno mythology and religious beliefs, gaslighting, the colonization of Puerto Rico, Afro-Latinidad identity, and female empowerment are woven into the narrative. While the pacing lags in the middle, secondary characters aren’t fully developed, and the couple’s relationship borders on instalove, the rush of a summertime romance feels realistic. Rivera’s complex world is well realized, and the dialogue rings true. All protagonists are Latinx.
This fresh reworking of a Greek myth will resonate. (Fabulism. 14-adult)Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5476-0373-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
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