Genre: Horror

Wait Till Helen Comes

Molly and her brother, Michael, agree that their new stepsister, Heather, is a spoiled brat. Mom wants Molly to watch out for Heather, since she’s only seven. But Heather only wants to make trouble for Molly and Michael. She lies and tattles and misbehaves, and somehow they get the blame. They know she’s trying to drive a wedge between her father and their mother, who recently married, so she can have her father all to herself—and it seems to be working. To top it off, Heather starts talking to a ghost named Helen, and Heather warns Molly and Michael that Helen is going to come for them. 

It appears that things can’t get any worse—but they do when Helen comes. 

The story focuses on Molly, the only person other than Heather who can see the ghost of Helen. No one believes Heather has made friends with a ghost—not even after Heather almost dies. Death is often mentioned and at one point, Molly worries what will happen after she dies. She’s afraid that when she dies, “My skeleton. My bones. Someday they would be all that was left of me. They would lie all alone in the dark and the cold while the years spun past, years I would never see. . . All my memories would die with me, all my thoughts and ideas.” The morbid thoughts about death may terrify some readers. 

Wait Till Helen Comes has plenty of scare factors that could give readers nightmares. The ghost of Helen is truly frightening, especially because she has led several children to their deaths. It turns out that Heather has been alone for a century, and the lonely ghost longs to have a friend in the spirit world. While Heather’s situation is understandable, the idea that a person can get stuck in the spirit world is frightening. When Helen tries to lead Heather to her death, Molly jumps in to save her bratty stepsister.  

A scary ghost, a near-death experience, and a spooky graveyard combine to create a chilling ghost story that readers will devour. While the story focuses on the ghost of Helen, many will relate to Molly’s struggles to get along with her stepsister. To make matters worse, no one believes Molly when she tries to warn them about Helen. One negative aspect of the book is the dysfunctional family dynamics. Molly’s brother, Michael, is allowed to roam the wilderness unaccompanied, the parents only appear when they are scolding the kids, and Molly is tasked with the responsibility of watching Heather, who is a pro at disappearing. Readers will empathize with Molly, who struggles with the conflicts that her dysfunctional family cause. 

Wait Till Helen Comes is a scary tale that will leave readers contemplating what happens when someone dies. Readers will find a lot to like about Wait Till Helen Comes, including plenty of heart-thumping scenes, a fast-paced plot, and an unexpectedly happy ending. Readers who love a good scare will enjoy Wait Till Helen Comes. For more frightening tales, check out the Small Spaces Quartet by Katherine Arden.  

Sexual Content  

  • None 

Violence  

  • When Heather was three, she saw “her mother die in a fire.”  
  • Helen destroys Michael, Molly, and their mom’s belongings. “Everything that Michael cherished lay in a heap of rubble in the middle of the floor. His books, his specimen cases, his fossils and rocks, his microscope, his aquarium—all were smashed, ruined.” The adults think a robber broke in and ransacked everything. 
  • After finding his room destroyed, Michael grabs Heather and “shook her.” He also calls her a little creep. 
  • Helen leads Heather into the pond, in the hopes that Heather would join her in death. When Molly jumps into the pond to save Heather, Helen is “sobbing and moaning, clutching at Heather with icy fingers, she begged me to give her back. . . I felt a terrible chill as her fingers seized my ankles.” Molly drags Heather out of the pond. 
  • After nearly drowning, Heather wakes up and runs back toward the pond. Molly describes, “Catching up with her at the water’s edge, I tackled her and threw her flat on her face in the weeds. She fought me, her wet clothes and skin making it hard to hold on to her.” Heather stops fighting Molly, who takes her into an abandoned house to warm up.

Drugs and Alcohol  

  • None 

Language    

  • Michael tells Molly, “Don’t let that brat [Heather] scare you with make-believe, Molly. You’re acting like a real dope.” 
  • Molly calls Michael an idiot. Later, she calls Heather a little monster. 
  • Heather tells Molly, “Your mother is a witch. . . I wish she were dead, and you and Michael, too!” 
  • Heather’s father calls Molly a little monster. 
  • Heather’s father says “good God” once. 
  • Molly’s mother says, “Oh, my God.” 

Supernatural 

  • A ghost befriends Heather. When Heather calls to Helen, Molly sees “the glimmer of blue light shape itself into the figure of a girl . . . She wore a white dress, and her hair, dark as Heather’s, tumbled in waves down her back.” 
  • Molly and Michael go to the library to research ghosts. Michael reads about poltergeists who “throw furniture and destroy stuff, and scientists don’t have an explanation for them.” 
  • The man who cares for the graveyard is the only person who believes Molly has seen a ghost. The man tells her, “But my own sister was convinced that our cousin Rose was led to her death in Harper Pond by the very spirit you’ve described to me. . . my sister went to her grave convinced that Rose was possessed by Helen Harper.” 
  • Heather and Molly fall through the rotting floor of an abandoned house. In the old cellar, they see the skeletons of Helen’s parents. Helen kneels by the skeletons. “Another figure appeared in the cellar. From mist it seemed to form itself into a woman. . . smiling, she drew Helen to her feet and embraced her, comforting her, stroking her hair, rocking her gently.” The ghosts shimmer and then disappear.  

Spiritual Content  

  • None 

Dark Waters

Until next time. That was the chilling promise the smiling man made to Ollie, Coco, and Brian after they last outsmarted him. And as the trio knows, the smiling man always keeps his promises. So when the lights flicker and a knock sounds at the door, there can only be one explanation: he’s back and a frightening new game is afoot.

But before the three friends can unravel the smiling man’s latest nightmarish scheme, they set sail on Lake Champlain, where it’s said Vermont’s very own Loch Ness monster lives. Brian is thrilled. He hasn’t sailed since visiting family in Jamaica, and even the looming threat of the smiling man can’t put a damper on what is guaranteed to finally be a day of fun—even if it is awkward being stuck on a boat with his former best friend, Phil, and his new best friends, Coco and Ollie. But when the crew finds themselves shipwrecked on a deserted island and hunted by a monster on both land and sea, fun becomes the last thing on their minds. The smiling man has at long last set the stage for a perilous rematch. But this time, Brian is ready to play.

Unlike the first two installments of the Small Spaces Quartet, Dark Waters’ worldbuilding isn’t as believable. When the kids go through a rain squall, they are transported behind the veil. However, at first, the kids refuse to believe they are in danger. While the story implies that the smiling man is responsible for the kids’ plight, he never makes an appearance. Instead, the ghost of a man who died hundreds of years before is one of the central figures. While the ghost’s story thread explains the mysterious island, the man’s appearance does little to advance the plot. Likewise, Brian’s friend Phil is added to the cast of characters. However, he does not add any depth to the story.

Readers will also miss Ollie, who quickly fades from the story because she refuses to leave her sick father’s side. This allows Brian to take center stage. Unfortunately, Brian doesn’t use his knowledge to beat the smiling man. Instead, Brian and his friends do little more than run from both the ax man and the snakes. Brian never interacts with the smiling man. Even though Brian keeps his friends safe, but he doesn’t discover a way to get off the island.

Through Phil’s character, the story hints that honesty is important. This is reinforced when “Brian belatedly realized that if you told a lot of lies, even if it was for a good reason, like trying to keep people safe, it started to get hard to trust that other people were telling the truth.” Despite this, Brian and the other kids never tell the adults the true reason they are on the island. Another negative aspect of the story is that Ollie makes a bargain with smiling man in order to save her father’s life. However, she makes this decision without consulting anyone else, she hides her actions until the last moment, and the conversation between Ollie and the smiling man is not described. The conflicting message is confusing and leaves the reader wondering what would have happened if the kids had been honest.

In the end, Dark Waters is disappointing because the kids do little to solve the problems that arise. Plus, the characters’ behaviors are not consistent. Readers who loved the first two books in the story may have a difficult time wading through Dark Waters, especially because the dynamic between Ollie, Coco, and Brian changes which is one of the main appeals of the series.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • A giant water snake jumps out of the water. “The silver thing lunged, mouth wide, going for Phil’s hand. Would have gotten it too. If Mr. Adler hadn’t put his whole arm in front of Phil, shoved him unceremoniously to the deck, and gotten bit himself instead. . .”
  • The water snake attacks the boat, causing it to begin to sink. “A groaning of metal as though—as though something big was trying to get into the boat. Or get farther into the boat. Metal shrieked. . . Rising out of the murky, swirling water. A giant pink mouth, wide open packed with teeth as long as his forearm.”
  • When the water snake attacks the boat, it is implied that it killed Phil’s uncle, Mr. Dimmonds. “Their bags, full of all their gear, were floating already in the surge. And . . .and there was Mr. Dimmonds’s blue-striped beanie, floating too. . . the beanie sank. It had tooth marks in it.”
  • The kids put a decoy life raft into the water and “then there was a sudden boiling froth of water under the decoy raft, and the whole thing went flying into the air. A snapping mouth attached to a glittering silver body came flying up after it.”
  • The kids and two adults board a life raft and float toward an island. When they near the island, they see “a dripping silver head, a mouth crowded with teeth, rearing up out of the water. The head was bulging and barnacles, the eyes huge and filmy and blank. The mouth opened wide.” Everyone makes it safely onto the island.
  • Phil realizes that Brian remembered what happened with the scarecrows (in book one). Upset, Phil “punched him. It wasn’t a very good punch, more a shove, but it took Brian by surprise and dropped him.”
  • While exploring the island, the kids find a cabin with a skeleton in it. “The rest of the skeleton was covered by a blanket, except for one arm. The skull lay on a moldy pillow, fallen sideways, turned toward them.”
  • The “ax” man, who turns out to be a ghost, offers to “ax” the kids. He says, “Better the ax than what’s coming for you.”
  • While the kids are in the forest, they hear the chime of metal. Then, Brian sees “ten feet of snake had unwound itself from a branch overhead. Its open cotton-pink mouth was four feet away, jammed with teeth.” The kids run and climb a tree.
  • The snake starts to climb the tree so Brian tried to “break off a pine cone, and hurl it down. . . the pine cone bounced off the snake’s nose.”
  • The kids, who are still stuck in the tree, need to get the snake to leave, so Phil “grabbed the last flaming pine cone, and pitched it down with a lot of force and accuracy right into the thing’s eye. . . Now the snake was really enraged . . . it lunged higher yet, wrapping its body around the trunk of the tree, jaws going wide. . . Phil pitched the log straight into the snake’s open mouth. . . Then the jaws slammed shut and the snake recoiled, all the way back down to the ground.” The kids finally escape.
  • The kids find a captain’s log that talks about a sailor who was “lost while attempting to cast a fishing line just offshore. The monstrous snake reared up out of the water and snatched him.”
  • The captain’s log tells about some of the men who tried to leave the island in a boat. “Grieved to report the destruction of the lifeboat Emily, with all hands. . . then a smashing sound as the boat was flung into the air. The men came down into the water, and they had not chance even to drown, for the serpent plucked them out like so many fish and swallowed them down.”
  • The ghost tells the story of how his men died. “They hadn’t made it to the boat at all, they were just gone—swallowed whole, like rabbits.”

 Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • In total oh God, oh my God, and Jesus are used as exclamations six times.
  • Freaking is used twice.
  • Brian calls the snake a jerk.

Supernatural

  • Ollie’s watch helped the kids in the last two books, but this time, “after a second, as though the watch—the ghost of Ollie’s mom—whatever animated the watch—was reluctant, the screen shifted and became a compass.”
  • In each book, the kids go into a different world. “. . . Mist and water and through mirrors, that was how you went from world to world.”

Spiritual Content

  • None

Zombie Dog

Becky’s family has moved right next door to the creepy, abandoned McNally house. Rumors fly around school about the ghosts and monsters that live there, and Becky isn’t sure what to believe. Even her mischievous dog, Bear, stays away from that house. When Becky starts hearing mysterious howls coming from next door, paired with an awful smell, she starts to wonder if the rumors might be true. Snarls and glowing eyes confirm it—something is over there, and it’s not happy. Worse, Becky’s parents are blaming Bear for all the unexplained damage around their property. Can Becky stop this creature before it’s too late? 

While the zombie dog plays a prominent role in Becky’s story, Zombie Dog is also a story about friendship. Two significant events happen to Becky—moving to a new neighborhood and starting junior high. Because of this, Becky spends less time with her best friend, Charlotte. Readers will relate to Becky and Charlotte’s changing relationship as they learn how to keep their friendship alive while also adding new friends to their life. Both girls learn that they can be friends even if they have different interests and don’t spend all their free time together. 

Zombie Dog will appeal to middle-grade readers who want a spooky story with suspense, without being overly scary. Becky discovers the zombie dog was a neighbor’s pet that was brought back to life. However, the dog is confused and in pain. In the end, Becky is able to send the dog back to its grave, where it will be at peace. The neighbor eventually realizes that bringing the dog back to life wasn’t the right choice. Anyone who has ever dealt with a loss will empathize with the neighbor and understand her motives.  

Zombie Dog is a perfect read for a dark and stormy night. With plenty of suspense, a relatable protagonist, and a positive message, Zombie Dog will entertain readers. While the book is part of the Rotten Apple Series, each book has different characters and many are written by different authors, so each book can be read separately. If you enjoy Zombie Dog but haven’t read Mean Ghouls, you will definitely want to grab a copy. The easy-to-read Rotten Apple Series introduces readers to the horror genre but won’t leave readers with nightmares. 

Sexual Content  

  • None 

Violence  

  • A zombie dog chases Becky. “Despite its limp, the strange little dog was moving fast. . . Its snarl was steady, without it seeming to have to pause for breath. The smell kept getting worse and worse, too. . . Becky was panting and shaking, tears coming down her face, and the little dog was still snarling, its lips drawn back from its teeth, looking ready to bite.” 
  • When the dog tried to bite Becky, she put out a stick. “The Chihuahua’s teeth fastened onto the stick and it held on as she tried to jerk it away. . .the Chihuahua’s eerie green eyes were fixed steadily on her with what seemed like cold anger. Pulling hard, Becky managed to yank the stick from the Chihuahua’s mouth. A slow trickle of what seemed to be black blood ran from the creature’s lip as it crouched down, ready to leap at her.” Becky gets away. The scene is described over four pages. 
  • Becky goes to the zombie dog’s house in order to give her a ball that has been filled with a potion to put the dog to sleep. When the dog appears, “its teeth were bared in a growl, and its eyes were glowing savagely at her. . . Her eyes met the zombie’s, and she saw how angry and confused it was, saw its eyes shift to her neck and imagined it leaping at her throat.” The zombie dog takes the ball and leaves. 

Drugs and Alcohol  

  • While researching zombies, Becky finds out that “voodoo practitioners would first poison their victims with a paralyzing nerve poison that came from blowfish, which they would secretly put in their targets’ shoes to be absorbed by the sweat glands in their feet.” 
  • Becky reads about how “a paste made out of poppy seeds and cloves can help put a zombie to rest.” 
  • In order to put the zombie dog to sleep, Becky and her friend make an herbal paste that can “put the undead to rest.” The herbal paste has angel’s trumpet flower, poppy seeds, and cloves. The potion is “poisonous.” 

Language    

  • Becky calls her brother a dummy. 

Supernatural 

  • While researching zombies, Becky learns “the kind of zombie that wants something before it goes away, it can’t be put to rest until it gets what it’s looking for. Like, if it lost something important to it.”  
  • Becky sees a zombie dog for the first time. The dog’s “green eyes shining unnaturally in the glow from the streetlights. She realized that it was dragging its left hind leg behind it, moving painfully. . . Becky saw that its fur was matted and full of dirt. One ear hung off at a funny angle, seeming to be attached only by a long strip of ragged flesh.”  
  • Becky’s dog brings her a ball. Later, Becky realizes that the ball belonged to the zombie dog and is the reason the dog is bothering her. Becky finds out that “certain objects important to the walking dead in life can on occasion be buried with them and bring them peace; if these are removed from the dead’s final resting place, they will walk again.” 
  • Becky finds out that the zombie dog was brought back to life by its owner. Her owner was, “horrified at what [the dog] became, and we manage to put her back to rest.” 

Spiritual Content  

  • None 

The Screaming Staircase

In London, ghosts haunt the living and only children have the ability to sense these otherworldly beings and remove them from our world. Lucy Carlyle and her co-workers, Anthony Lockwood and George Cubbins, are agents working for Lockwood & Co., an independent agency without adult supervisors. After an assignment goes wrong and the agency burns a client’s property down, the trio are forced to investigate the most haunted house in England: Combe Carey Hall.

The suspicious circumstances behind Combe Carey Hall might place Lockwood & Co. in even more danger than they realize, especially as they attempt to solve the mystery behind a decades-old murder. Will Lucy and her co-workers make it out of Combe Carey Hall alive? Can they help a restless spirit pass on? Or will they become just another one of the property’s victims? And what is the mysterious owner of the hall hiding?

The novel is written from Lucy’s point of view and, while she comes off as far more mature than the average teenager, her insecurities and snarky personality make her relatable without compromising her likability. The banter and trust between Lucy, Anthony, and George make each of the characters shine. Every character has strengths and weaknesses that complement each other, and this elevates their teamwork skills. In addition, the dynamic between the trio helps emphasize the importance of relying on others while also trusting in one’s own abilities. After the group escapes Combe Carey Hall alive, Lockwood even says, “I trust your talent and your judgment, and I’m proud to have you on my team.”

Stroud’s worldbuilding around the supernatural elements of this alternate London is extremely interesting and intricate. A variety of different ghosts are introduced, plus several government and private agencies that investigate the paranormal. Stroud deftly addresses how the appearance of ghosts would impact London on a wider scale. To help readers understand this complicated world, a glossary of new terms is used, which includes specific agencies and specters’ abilities.

The Screaming Staircase is an excellent introduction to more macabre horror stories, especially for tweenagers who love longer novels. The book’s grim atmosphere is more intense than most novels geared toward young children, with consistent descriptions of death and its central mystery being related to murder. However, the descriptions of violence never breach into anything too graphic, and Stroud’s light-hearted dialogue ensures that the book is never too grueling. Nevertheless, the horror elements, while toned down for a younger audience, are still present. Younger readers could easily get nightmares, so consider avoiding this book if your child is easily frightened.

A double-edged facet of the book is its lack of a true moral. The Screaming Staircase is not trying to convey any deep messages or complex ideas, but that lack of intention helps ensure the novel is a fun and down-to-earth read. The fun dynamic between Lucy and her co-workers, interesting ideas presented in a haunted London, and macabre elements make Lockwood and Co.: The Screaming Staircase an excellent introduction to YA horror.

Sexual Content

  • When George goes looking through Lucy’s armoire, he says, “Well, there’s nothing in here but some charming tops and skirts and. . . Ooh, Lucy-I’ve never seen you wearing that.”

Violence

  • When discussing the potential cause of a ghost’s manifestation, Lucy discusses how a man, “Fell down the stairs and broke his neck. . . He must’ve fallen with tremendous f-[orce].”
  • Lucy thinks about what happens to agents who forget to properly stock equipment. “A girl at Rotwell’s had died the previous week after forgetting to restock her magnesium flares.”
  • Lucy reveals that decomposed human remains are often the source of a ghost’s manifestation, “Most often. . . 73% of the time . . . it’s associated with what the Fittes Manual calls ‘personal organic remains.’ You can guess what that means.”
  • During an investigation, Lucy sees a corpse. She describes it as “a thing of bones, bared teeth, and shrunken skin, dark and twisted as burnt wood . . .”
  • Both of Lucy’s parents were abusive. Her father’s “hands were hard and swift in punishing any of his children who disturbed his usual taciturn indifference.” Lucy’s mother also “beat [her] sore.”
  • Lucy’s mother tells the story of a girl who committed suicide. The girl “waded out into the reeds, lain down in the stream, and drowned herself.”
  • Lucy and Lockwood discuss a variety of serial killers, including “the coin-in-the-slot killer” and the “one who kept heads in the fridge.”
  • When investigating the history of a house, George finds out that “in May 1926, the owner, a Mr. Henry Kitchener, had hung himself somewhere on the premises.”
  • The caretaker of Combe Carey Hall describes how a previous owner was a serial killer who decorated the hall with the skulls of his victims. “When he’d finished off each one, he set their skulls on the steps of the central staircase with candles burning behind the eye sockets.”
  • Lucy ponders the importance of securing a point of retreat while within Combe Carey Hall. She remembers, “two Grimble agents had been separated from their colleagues when the bathroom door blew shut on them . . . the two agents had been battered to death by whirling ceramics.”
  • While they’re in Combe Carey Hall, a thick, goopy substance called ectoplasm surrounds Lucy, Lockwood, and George. Lucy says, “It looks like blood, it smells like it. It’ll do as blood for me.”
  • Lucy finds the body of an agent who previously died in the house. “The neck was twisted at an odd, unnatural angle. One hollowed jacketed arm reached towards the hole as if it wished to drag itself forward and slip down into the dark.”
  • In an attempt to escape the torturous screaming of Combe Carey Hall’s staircase, Lucy nearly throws herself into the well. “Just a couple more strides and the screaming would stop. I’d be part of that silence too.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Lucy describes her alcoholic father. “His breath smelled of strong, brown beer.”
  • Lucy’s old mentor “chain-smoked cigarettes.”

Language

  • As Lucy tries to get someone’s attention, “he didn’t bloody respond.”
  • As she tries to follow Lockwood’s plans, Lucy thinks, “What the devil was Plan E?”
  • When Lucy collapses, George bursts into her room and says, “What the hell’s going on?”
  • Lucy calls the initial investigators behind a woman’s disappearance “idiots.”
  • George discusses how suspicious their assignment is by saying, “This whole thing is screwy.”

Supernatural

  • The premise of the novel is centered around the existence of ghosts and how to destroy them.

Spiritual Content

  • When London first got infested by ghosts, people visited various places of worship. “Churches and mosques did excellent business as people sought to save their souls . . . ”
  • Combe Carey Hall was initially “a priory, founded by a breakaway group of monks from one of the local abbeys.”
  • The monks who took up residence in Combe Carey Hall eventually, “turned away from God to the worship of darker things.

by Mia Stryker

 

Vampire Myths

Whether they are characters in movies, books, or nightmares, vampires are among the most recognizable monsters in the world. Today, vampires are characterized by fangs and an unshakable lust for human blood, but some vampire myths differ from these notions. Vampire Myths begins by explaining why stories about blood-sucking vampires began, as well as different cultures’ vampire beliefs. Some of the vampire explanations are scary and cringe-worthy, such as in old Malaysian tales that describe vampires as “a floating head with entrails hanging to the ground.”

Vampire Myths is visually appealing. Each page has large illustrations that include short captions. In addition, each section is broken into smaller sections that have fun headlines such as “Bloody Feast” and “Buried Secrets.” Another appealing aspect of the story is the fun facts that appear in a graphic that looks like a scroll. Throughout the book, readers will encounter bolded words that may be unfamiliar; however, the words are defined within the text making the passage easy to understand.

Vampire Myths is not meant for the faint of heart. The graphic descriptions of vampire behavior and the different ways people killed the undead may be disturbing to younger readers. The vampire facts are interesting and include historical people connected with vampire lore. None of the myths are covered in detail which allows the book to cover many interesting topics including vampire movies, books, and people from history. Full of colorful pictures, interesting facts, and historical information, Vampire Myths will entertain readers who want to understand vampires and aren’t afraid of a little bit of horror.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • The Grim brothers wanted to rid a European village of a vampire. “First, the brothers dug up the grave and found the corpse with red-stained mouth and lips, proof that it must have been biting victims. . . The brothers decided to rip out the corpse’s accursed heart. . . They went on to whack the body with a blunt spade and remove the heart. Then they burned the corpse to a crisp.”
  • The ancient Greeks mutilated cadavers “to prevent the dead from returning to life. Vital organs including the brain, heart, and liver were removed.” Similarly, the Slavic people of Eastern Europe “bound the corpse, slit the muscles and tendons, cut off limbs, and drove a stake or cross through the heart.”
  • A buso is a tall, thin demon who prefers “to feast on rotting carcasses, but that has never stopped it from occasionally luring live victims to a very unpleasant death.”
  • To kill a vampire, someone would drive a stake through the heart. . . According to most African folklore, “vampires required two stakes: one through the heart and one to nail the tongue to the chin. This would prevent the undead from uttering spells and curses.”
  • The man who was the real Dracula “liked to sit and watch his victims die while he ate. Although he didn’t suck blood as the fictitious count did, some sources say he dipped his bread in his victim’s blood.” Dracula was rumored to have killed 40,000 people. “He impaled most victims on tall stakes. . . He would impale them by carefully sliding a wooden stick through the body without hitting any vital organs. That would ensure that the victim would die a slow and painful death.”
  • Some people joined vampire societies. Teenager Rob Ferrell joined a society and “committed a heinous double murder in 1996.”

 Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • In Asia, some people smeared garlic over their bodies “to shield against spells cast by witches or wizards.”

Spiritual Content

  • Some cultures wondered if people became ill because a demon spirit was bullying their body. “Call upon the wisest shaman or healer, and they might successfully drive the demon out.”
  • The Mayans “worshipped a bat deity known as Camazotz, the god of caves.”
  • Some people thought fire could “permanently snuff out” a vampire because “the Hebrew god once appeared in the form of a burning bush and often used fire to punish people, destroy cities, and cleanse the Earth.”

The Girl in the Locked Room

A girl is locked in a room in an old, abandoned house. She has been hiding there for more than a hundred years. Another girl, Jules, arrives at the ruined house and sees a pale face in an upstairs window. Who is up there, she wonders, behind a locked door? 

Jules finds out that a young girl, Lily, has been watching her from the window. Jules is fearful, then fascinated, then eager to befriend—and help—the captive, who is burdened by a chilling secret from the distant past. 

Even though The Girl in the Locked Room is a ghost story that revolves around murder, the story won’t give readers shivery chills. From the start, readers know that Lily’s family was murdered. Since the family’s demise is not described in detail and leaves out any gore, the circumstances surrounding their death add suspense. The mystery of what happened will fill readers with curiosity.  

The story jumps back and forth between Lily and Jules’ perspectives, which allows readers to understand both girls’ feelings. Much of the suspense comes from the characters’ questioning themselves and wondering about each other. At times, the long string of questioning becomes overwhelming as they slow down the pacing.  

While the girls’ feelings are clear, the cause of some of the events is confusing. For example, portions of the family’s murder are played out each night and only Lily and Jules hear the raucous. The idea of multiple dimensions is introduced, which muddies the plot and makes the ending confusing. As far as ghost stories go, The Girl in the Locked Room is an uninspiring story with lackluster characters that will easily be forgotten. If you’re looking for a book that revolves around the supernatural, you should grab a copy of Ghost Squad by Claribel A. Ortega and Ophie’s Ghosts by Justina Ireland.  

Sexual Content  

  • None 

Violence  

  • When Jules moves into an old house, she learns that the family who used to live there was murdered and the house is haunted. Jules’ friend says, “Lots of kids have seen their ghosts, my brother included—he says if you go inside that house, you never come out.” 
  • At night, ghosts from the past reappear, playing out the past. In one viewing, a group of men finds the murdered bodies of the family. Their bodies are not described.  
  • Jules and her friend, Maisie, go into the old house. Jules thinks, “I knew people had been murdered in these rooms. Blood had stained its floor. Silent screams hung in the air.” 
  • Through multiple scenes, Jules learns what happened to the family. Mr. Bennett fired an employee who had stolen from him. Lily hears “the men’s voices rise. Mama screams and screams again. Lily hears explosions, two, three, maybe more. She recognizes the sound of gunfire. There’s more cursing, more thuds and bangs.” 
  • In the past, one of the women’s husbands was known to hit her and leave bruises “all over her arms.” When the man breaks into the Bennett’s house and his wife tries to stop him, “there’s a loud smacking sound, and Aunt Nellie cries out in pain.” 
  • In a plan to change the past, Lily doesn’t hide in the closet. Instead, when the men arrive, she goes downstairs and a man “grabs Lily and lifts her off her feet. He holds her under her arms as if she’s a dog. His breath smokes with whisky and his eyes are wicked, like the eyes of the old bull Papa keeps in the pasture.” 
  • When Lily breaks free, the man’s gun falls to the ground, and his wife, Aunt Nellie, grabs it. She says, “Stop right now, Charlie or I’ll shoot you dead. Don’t think I won’t.” Charlie’s friend shoots and accidentally hits Charlie. He “falls to the floor. His head is bleeding. A red stain spreads across the carpet.” The scene between Lily’s family and the bad men is described over ten pages.

Drugs and Alcohol  

  • The men who killed Lily’s family were drunk. 

Language    

  • When men threaten Mr. Bennett, he calls them “drunken fools.” 
  • Oh Lord, for the Lord’s sake, and Lord God Almighty are used several times. 
  • Someone asks, “What the devil’s going on?” 
  • Lily’s mom calls her husband an idiot. 

Supernatural 

  • When Lily’s ghost appears to Jules and her friend, “Jules and Maisie see her as she once was, not as she is now.” 

Spiritual Content  

  • Lily’s pastor “told us the world would end in the year two thousand. Judgement Day would come, and the dead would rise from their graves, and we’d be sent to heaven or hell.”  

Red Rover

On a car ride back from the beach, sixth grader Amy Tanner notices something strange by the side of the road. It’s a blindfolded dog, muzzled with duct tape. He’s tied to a post with a rusty chain. Concerned for the dog’s safety, Amy quickly convinces her parents to pull over, and the family frees this mystery dog, who they suddenly feel compelled to name Rover. Before long, Rover has charmed his way into the Tanner family home. He especially bonds with Amy’s younger sister, Katie, who seems to hear Rover’s thoughts in her head. 

Despite the Tanners’ excitement about having a new dog, Amy begins to notice unusual things happening around Rover. Electronics malfunction. Pets and humans that he dislikes freeze, wide-eyed, as if possessed. And, when Rover is forced to attend the school science fair against his will, a gory “accident” occurs, leaving the rats of a rival project dead. It slowly becomes clear that Rover has strange psychic abilities. Even Amy’s ever-logical parents begin to see that something is wrong.  

The Tanners attempt to tame their dog and, when that doesn’t work, to drop him off at a shelter, but they are unsuccessful. Eventually, Amy is left with no choice but to track down Rover’s previous owners and figure out how they were able to free themselves from this creature. This journey is how Amy meets the grizzled diva Miss Dola, who helps Amy and her family perform a ritual to weaken Rover. After a dramatic confrontation, they are able to drop him into the sea. He sinks to the bottom, gone for good. Or is he? 

A key theme in Red Rover is dealing with bullies. A girl from school named Valerie Starr frequently makes fun of Amy, and Amy draws a direct comparison between this rival and Rover. In the latter half of the book, Amy is willing to do almost anything in her power to spend less time around her dog. She relishes her hours at school. She goes on walks. She spends extra time in the bathroom. “Anything that took time out of her morning, she was good at. Anything to keep her up here, on the second floor, away from him.” Amy, for her part, dislikes the person that she’s become. Once a dog-lover, she now catches herself hoping for Rover’s downfall, a relatable struggle for anyone who’s endured bullying. She just wants to be free.  

Because Red Rover is told entirely from Amy’s perspective, frustration and fear are also key elements of the plot. While Katie blindly adores Rover and their science-minded parents don’t even consider psychic powers a possibility, Amy picks up on Rover’s sinister energy almost from the beginning. As the novel progresses, Amy becomes more and more frightened of Rover. This fear is what drives the plot forward and initially puts Amy at odds with her family. Readers will share Amy’s terror as suspense slowly builds, until the final confrontation at the end of the book where Amy’s “sharp, unspeakable terror curdle[s] into rage” and she must defend her younger sister from Rover’s attack. 

Although Red Rover is a bit slow at times, the story of a girl who lives in fear in her own home will resonate to any child who has had to deal with a bully, especially one that they seemingly can’t escape. With believable characters and a strong final act, Red Rover presents a powerful narrative about standing up for yourself, protecting the people you care about, and following your gut even when no one else believes you.  

Sexual Content  

  • None 

Violence  

  • When Amy and her family first encounter Rover, he is tied to a fence by the side of the road and has visibly been mistreated. A rusty chain is “looped tightly around [Rover’s] neck and clasped with a padlock,” and a dirty rag is “tied tight over the dog’s eyes.” Additionally, a “thick loop of duct tape” is “wrapped around [his] muzzle, holding [his] mouth shut.” 
  • A tall girl confronts Amy and demands that she hand over her ice cream money. Amy wishes she had the courage to “shove” the girl aside or “[throw] a punch.” The confrontation ends nonviolently when the tall girl looks Rover in the eyes and suddenly “lurche[s] forward” and “vomit[s] across the concrete.” 
  • When Amy brings Rover to the science fair, he becomes agitated and launches a telekinetic attack against the rats from a different project’s terrarium. The rats begin “slamming their bodies against the sides of their plastic cage, shrieking as they [throttle] themselves back and forth, back and forth.” The inside of the plastic terrarium rapidly becomes “smeared with blood.” 
  • Amy has a dream of Rover’s face “rotting away, revealing a skull.” 
  • While at a sleepover, Amy learns that her father just “fell and hit his head on the kitchen floor” and that there was “blood everywhere.” It is implied that Rover is responsible for the accident. 
  • Rover lures the family’s other dog, Stormy, into the street, and Amy jumps in front of a car trying to save him. Amy gets Stormy safely to the curb, but the car bumper “punche[s]” Amy in the side. She then “[flies] to the asphalt, rolling over twice and feeling the grit of the road beneath her scrape her elbows and knuckles raw.” 
  • While on a drive, Amy sticks her head out of the window and Rover tries to roll up the window “like a slow guillotine.” Amy is able to pull her head back inside just in time. 
  • Amy and her family attempt to drop Rover off at a shelter, but he escapes and returns home. Upon calling the shelter, they learn that the animals there “all just died at once.” It is implied that Rover used his powers to kill them. 
  • Rover attacks a professional dog whisperer by psychically throwing him through an exploded window. The dog whisperer lands in glass and sustains “dozens of cuts on his exposed arms and face.” 
  • Rover uses an “invisible force” to choke Amy, but he is distracted when Amy’s younger sister offers to feed him Greek honey cake. 
  • Amy burns out one of Rover’s eyes with a stick of sage, and the wound is described as “oozing a thick black liquid that sizzled as it hit the floor.” 
  • During a final confrontation, Rover throws furniture, pets, and family members around the house with his mind. He corners Amy and her sister in the attic, but before he is able to attack, Miss Dola appears and “stab[s] all three syringes down into the back of the dog’s neck.” This immobilizes Rover and they are able to lock the creature in a cage, which they eventually push into the sea.

Drugs and Alcohol  

  • None 

Language    

  • Amy mentally refers to herself as a “weak little idiot” when she hesitates to defend herself against a bully. 
  • In a fit of rage, Amy calls her younger sister a “brat.” 
  • A boy calls his brother a “dingus.” 

 Supernatural  

  • Rover possesses psychic abilities, which are slowly revealed over the course of the book. He is able to control electronics, move things with his mind, and even psychically kill other creatures. 
  • The family employs a supernatural ritual in order to break the bond between Rover and Katie. The ritual involves a string of leaves, three black candles, three medical syringes filled with a clear liquid, a “small black book with a gold triangle on the cover,” and a slice of Greek honey cake. 

Spiritual Content  

  • Miss Dola believes that Rover may be an incarnation of the three-headed canine beast Cerberus, a figure from Greek mythology. 

Gallant

Olivia Prior has grown up in Merilance School for Girls, and all she has of her past is her mother’s journal—which seems to unravel into madness. Then, a letter invites Olivia to come home to Gallant. Yet when Olivia arrives, no one is expecting her. But Olivia is not about to leave the first place that feels like home; it doesn’t matter if her cousin Matthew is hostile, or if she sees half-formed ghouls haunting the hallways.

Olivia knows that Gallant is hiding secrets, and she is determined to uncover them. When she crosses a ruined wall at just the right moment, Olivia finds herself in a place that is Gallant—but not. The manor is crumbling, the ghouls are solid, and a mysterious figure rules over all. Now, Olivia sees what has unraveled generations of her family and where her father may have come from.

Olivia has always wanted to belong somewhere, but will she take her place as a Prior, protecting our world against the Master of the House? Or will she take her place beside him?

As a gothic, ghost story Gallant is surprisingly dull and unexciting. While Olivia can see “ghouls” and communicate with them through her thoughts, none of the ghouls she encounters are developed in detail. Instead of being interesting, the ghouls fade into the background and they evoke little emotion. Even though Olivia learns that she can communicate with ghouls, she doesn’t try to initiate a conversation with her dead uncle, who obviously killed himself. She also doesn’t try to communicate with her dead mother, who could answer many of her questions. Because of this, Olivia’s gift is not fully developed or explored.

Olivia is an interesting and unique protagonist, who is non-verbal and communicates only through sign language. This caused her childhood to be lonely and unpleasant. Not only does she have to struggle with being abandoned at Merilance, but she also has to deal with the other children who are cruel, and the matrons who are indifferent. Because of this, Olivia is willing to go to Gallant, even though her mother has warned her to stay away.

While the story has some interesting story threads—what happened to Olivia’s parents, why should she stay away from Galant, why can she see ghouls—none of them are well developed. Even though Olivia encounters the personification of Death, his soldiers, and other ghouls, the story only evokes mild curiosity, contains little suspense, and little scare factor. In addition, the conclusion is lackluster and depressing. In the end, the reader is left wondering why Olivia would stay at Gallant. Readers who are looking for an exciting paranormal story should read Schwab’s other series, The Archived, or The Breathless by Tara Goedjen.

Sexual Content

  • Sometimes boys would “linger at the edge of the gravel moat,” trying to get the girls’ attention. One day, Olivia goes to talk to a boy and “he kissed her, she waited to feel whatever her mother had felt for her father the day they met, the spark that lit the fire that burned their whole world down. But she only felt his hand on her waist. His mouth on her mouth. A hollow sadness.”

Violence

  • Anabelle, a girl at Merilance, tears pages out of Olivia’s mother’s journal. Olivia “fell on Anabelle, finger wrapped around her throat. Anabelle yelped, and Olivia squeezed until the girl could not speak, could not breathe, and then the matrons were there, pulling them apart.”
  • To get back at Anabelle, Olivia “went down into the cellar. . . she managed to fill the jar with beetles, and spiders, and half a dozen silverfish. She added a handful of ash from the head matron’s hearth.” Olivia dumps the content on Anabelle’s head.
  • Olivia cannot yell and she wonders if pain could free her voice, so she cuts herself. “The cut was deep. Blood welled and spilled onto the counter, and heat screamed up her arm and through her lungs, but only a short, sharp gasp escaped her throat, more emptiness than sound.”
  • In a dream, Olivia witnesses her uncle’s death. “The gun swings up against his temple. . .” then Olivia wakes up.
  • While in Death’s world, a ghoul pushes Olivia away. “And then a blade sings through the ghoul’s back, and it staggers, and Olivia knows the ghoul cannot die, knows it is already dead, but the sight of the metal spilling out of its chest, its knees buckling silently to the dirt, still sends a shock of horror through her bones.”
  • In order to get out from behind the wall, someone killed Matthew’s brother. “The door on the other side was soaked with blood. There was so much of it. Too much. Someone had painted the door with my brother’s life. Covered every iron inch . . . But that thing slaughtered my brother for nothing. Only a Prior’s blood can open the door, but it has to be willingly given.”
  • Olivia goes behind the wall, hoping to find Matthew’s brother. When she sees Death, “Olivia spins, drawing the blade. She doesn’t wait, but twists and drives the knife into his chest.” The knife doesn’t hurt Death.
  • Death tries to subdue Olivia, who “fights like a girl set loose on the world with nothing and everything to lose. But it’s not enough. A gauntlet closes over her wrist, flinging her into a plated chest, and the last thing she sees is the gleam of an armored shoulder as the third shadow looms.”
  • Olivia takes a piece of bone and “the sliver of bone becomes a beak, becomes a skull, becomes a crow, muscle and skin and feathers.” Olivia tells the crow to attack Death. “Olivia is on her feet, racing toward the door, even as she hears him pluck the bird from the air, the brittle snap of its neck. . .”
  • In a multi-chapter conclusion, Olivia and Matthew fight Death. Death captures Olivia. “His embrace tightens until she cannot move, cannot breathe. Her bones groan, and she lets out a stifled gasp.” Matthew comes through the door to help Olivia.
  • One of Death’s soldiers goes after Matthew, who “slashes out with his blade, but the wolfish soldier dodges lithely and kicks him in the chest. He collapses to his hands and knees, gasping for breath . . . The soldier lowers the dagger to his throat.”
  • One of Death’s soldiers grabs Olivia, “she writhes and tries to breathe, tries to think and time slows down. . . She slams her head back into the soldier.” Olivia is able to free herself and grab one of the soldier’s weapons. “The soldier rears back, but Olivia is already swinging, bringing the sword down a third time, carving deep into his shoulder. The collarbone comes free. . . he is already falling back into dust as the bone hits the grass.”
  • In order to save Olivia’s life, Matthew “pushed her out of the way the instant before the sword cut down. Matthew, who leans in the doorway, the blade driven through, the point jutting like a thorn from his back.” Matthew dies.
  • When death finds a way into the living world, Edgar “aims at Death a second time and fires, the bullet melting in the air above his floating cloak.”
  • Olivia calls on the ghouls, who “close over [Death] like ivy, their edges dissolving into one teeming mass of shadow as they force him back through the garden, back through the open door, back beyond the wall.” Then Olivia seals the door with her blood.

 Drugs and Alcohol

  • One of the matrons at Merilance hides a bottle of brandy in a drawer.
  • In order to help Matthew sleep, Edgar drugs him.

Language

  • Damn is used once.

Supernatural

  • Olivia can see “ghouls.”
  • There is a stone wall at the back of Gallant’s garden. At night, a person can walk around the wall, but they end up in a different world—a world where Death lives. Olivia’s mother once went around the wall and saw Death “with his four shadows and his dozen shades, all silent in the bones of the ruined house.”
  • When Olivia crosses the wall, she sees “the shriveled remains of a garden. Withered limbs and wilting blooms, their petals, pale, their leaves devoid of color. . . And there, at the top of the ruined garden, sits another Gallant.”
  • In Death’s world, Olivia has the ability to give life. When Olivia picks up a tooth, it “jumps. Shudders like a bee against her palm. . . by the time it hits the ground, it is not a writhing bit of bone, but a mouse.”
  • Olivia meets Death. “His skin is not creased, yet here and there it peels away, the polished bone beneath showing through like stone under thinning ivy. And that is how she sees that there are pieces of him missing. . . The joint of one finger. The edge of one cheek. . .”
  • Death watches a group of people dancing. Death dances with a woman. And then, “the dancer crumbles against him, her body sagging into ash and he sighs. . . A pale white fragment shines on the wooden floor where the dancer stood . . . then it rises and tucks itself against the tear along his jaw, and she realizes it was a shard of bone.” Then other bones return to Death’s body and flesh regrows over the bones.
  • Matthew explains how his family, the Priors made the demon go back beyond the wall. The Priors “put the wall back up. And this time, they soaked it edge to edge in their blood and swore that nothing would ever cross that gate without their blessing.”

Spiritual Content

  • At Merilance, Olivia “was told to kneel and knit her fingers and speak to a God she couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, couldn’t touch. . . She never believed in higher powers.” But when she meets death, she prays to the ghouls for help and they come.

Small Spaces Quartet #1

At night they will come for the rest of you. It’s with this ominous warning that eleven-year-old Ollie and her two friends, Coco and Brian, set out on a chilling adventure in the woods with nightfall fast descending and the ever-watchful eyes of scarecrows on their backs.

What began as an unremarkable school trip to a nearby farm soon becomes a frightening journey into the world behind the mist. In order to survive and not remain trapped there forever, Ollie and her friends need to be quick on their feet as they work to unravel a hundred-year-old mystery, save their classmates, and beat the villainous smiling man at his own game.

When night falls, Ollie and her friends must find small spaces to hide from the scarecrows, who follow the smiling man’s commands. During the daylight hours, the three friends search for a way back into their world. Along the way, they meet several ghosts, who were unwilling to leave their loved ones who the smiling man turned into scarecrows. However, before Ollie meets the ghosts, she finds Beth Webster’s book where she chronicled the story of her family and explains how the smiling man was able to turn her husband into a scarecrow.

Beth Webster’s story connects to Ollie’s own story. In Beth’s story, her mother-in-law was distraught over her son’s disappearance. In order to appease his grieving mother, Beth’s husband Johnathan makes a deal with the smiling man. The smiling man brings Johnathan’s brother back to life, but Johnathan then becomes the smiling man’s servant. Similar to Beth, Ollie is also grieving the loss of a loved one—her mother. However, Ollie doesn’t let her grief overshadow her life. When the smiling man offers to bring Ollie’s mom back to life, Ollie doesn’t accept the deal. Instead, she gives up the deepest desire of her heart in order to break the curse and restore her classmates.

While Small Spaces is predominantly a ghost story, it also touches on the theme of grief. Through her experiences, Ollie learns that her mother’s words and advice will continue to help her navigate life. Even though Ollie still grieves her mother’s loss, she is learning to find joy in life again.

Small Spaces will appeal to readers who want a creepy, scary story without bloodshed and gore. The easy-to-read story keeps readers on edge as the smiling man’s secrets are revealed. The story’s conclusion is a little confusing as it tries to piece together the stories of the past with the stories of the present.

While Ollie and her friends are not well-developed, they are an interesting group that learns to appreciate each other’s differences. If you’re looking for a fast-paced ghost story that will keep you guessing, then grab a copy of Small Spaces. Beware: when you get to the end, you will want to find out what happens in the next book, Dead Voices, in which Ollie and her friends get trapped in a haunted snow lodge.

 Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • After school, Mike takes Coco’s notebook and begins taunting her. When Brian does nothing to help Coco, Ollie threw a rock that “caught Brian squarely in the back of the head, dropped him thump onto the grass, and turned everyone’s attention from Coco Zinter to her.” Then Ollie gets on her bike and races home.
  • At the farm, the kids were going to learn about “slaughtering hogs (cut the throat and then hang it up to drain).”
  • Before the book begins, Ollie’s mother died in an airplane crash. “Ollie dreamed of the crash, even though she hadn’t seen it. She hadn’t seen the firs afterward, or the bits of broken plane stuck in a tree, the things that haunted her nightmare.”

 Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • God is used as an exclamation twice.
  • The first time the scarecrows come for the kids, Brian asks, “What in hell was that?”

Supernatural

  • Ollie reads a book about a brother who makes a deal with the smiling man to bring his brother, Caleb, back to life. Caleb “came back. He was pale and blue-lipped; his eyes were strange and distant. . . It was his voice, his smile. Only the look in his eyes had changed, and he would not say where he was.”
  • Ollie’s teacher tells the class a story about the farm that the class will be visiting. The farm is rumored to be haunted because two brothers wanted to marry the same girl. The teacher says, “The younger brother disappeared. No one ever found traces of either of them. Eventually, the sheriff decided that the younger brother had killed the elder and then been overcome with remorse and thrown himself into the creek. That was when the rumors of hauntings started.”
  • In the past, there was a school at the farm. The schoolhouse “was burned to rubble, of course, right down to the foundation stones. . . The weird things is this: they never found any bodies.”
  • After Ollie’s mother dies, her father gives her her mother’s cracked watch. While running from the scarecrows, the watch gives her a countdown until sunset and tells her what to do. For example, “RUN” and “HIDE.” When Ollie whispers, “Mom? Is that you? Can you hear me?” The watch’s screen reads “ALWAYS.”
  • The scarecrows try to grab Ollie and her friends. They crawl into a small space under some rocks. “A nightmare face turned to Ollie: stitched-on snarl, eyes like two finger sized holes. The rake reached out again. . . A huge, straw-smelling arm thrust itself into the hole. . . Then the arm withdrew.” When the scarecrows realize they can’t reach the kids, they leave.
  • While running from the scarecrows, the kids go into a house where Ollie meets a ghost. Ollie discovers that two of the scarecrows are the ghost’s sons. When the kids leave the house, “Two scarecrows stood outside, one at each window. Somehow, they were not looking into the house anymore, but were watching the kids run, still smiling their wide smiles.”
  • Brian recognizes one of the scarecrows as his friend Phil. Brian says, “It’s wearing Phil’s clothes. Because that’s Phil’s hat and Phil’s hair and kind of Phil’s face—if it were sewn on.”
  • Ollie and her friends go into another house and Ollie sees a ghost. “A hand appeared on the doorframe. A thick, yellow-nail hand. Then a face popped around the edge of the doorframe. . . It was a woman. Or had been. Her skin was sunken in beneath the cheekbones, and when she smiled, her lips stretched too wide, the way a skull smiles.” The ghost tells her that the scarecrows are “neither flesh nor spirit” and that they are now the smiling man’s servants. The ghost says, “the cornfield is the doorway” to another world and the scarecrows hold the door between two worlds open.
  • While talking to the smiling man, Ollie figures out how to save her classmates. Ollie flings “a scattering of drops [of water] at the first scarecrow. . . the scarecrow screamed—a human scream.” The scarecrows that were from the past turned into dust but her classmates turned back into themselves.

Spiritual Content

  • After the scarecrows come for the kids, Brian says, “Deliver us from evil” and then did the sign of the cross. When Ollie and Coco look at him, he says, “I’m not a good Catholic but maybe God is listening.”

Help! We Have Strange Powers!

Jillian and Jackson are twins having a normal day at the movies until a fortune teller machine changes their lives by zapping them with superpowers. Now Jillian can read minds and Jackson can make objects levitate. The twins are excited to live their new lives as real-life superheroes, but what if superpowers come with super villains?

Scientist Dr. Cranium kidnaps the twins and takes them to a lab. Dr. Cranium wants to drain the twins not only of their powers but of their minds. The twins escape the lab by lying about their powers, but their troubles are not over. They eventually go to HorrorLand, and become trapped in a creepy theme park run by monsters. Will they be able to escape, or are they trapped in HorrorLand forever?

Help! We Have Strange Powers is the tenth book in the Goosebumps HorrorLand series. The first part of the story is interesting as it focuses on Jillian and Jackson’s new powers. However, once the twins are trapped in HorrorLand, the plot becomes confusing because the twins meet all of the characters from the previous books. This will be confusing for readers who have not read the previous books, as there is no explanation for what HorrorLand is or how Jillian and Jackson get there.

Help! We Have Strange Powers is told in the first person from Jillian’s perspective. In true R.L. Stine fashion, each chapter ends on a cliffhanger, making the reader want to continue with the book. Jillian and Jackson are not admirable, as they only use their powers for selfish reasons and to mess with others. The plot is not cohesive and it uses the typical Goosebumps elements. Even though the story is just average, fans of R.L. Stine will enjoy Help! We Have Strange Powers because it is an easy-to-read thriller.

Sexual Content

  • Jillian reads her classmate’s mind. He thought, “Wow. Jillian is looking totally hot today.”
  • Jillian says the gym teacher is “young and tall and very hot. The girls in school all have crushes on him.”

Violence

  • Angry that Artie, an annoying kid, got butter on his sweater, Jackson “wrapped an arm around Artie’s neck and began wrestling with him…The two of them tumbled into the aisle, wrestling, grabbing at each other, punching.”
  • As Jackson reaches into a fortune-telling booth to grab his fortune, the machine shocks him and Jillian. Jillian’s “whole body shook and danced as a powerful shock stung [her]. Jolted [Jillian] hard. And sent pain shooting out over [her] arms and legs.”
  • During a soccer game, Artie kicked the ball, which “crashed into Jackson’s stomach.” Jackson “opened his mouth in a sick groan. His face turned purple, and his eyes nearly goggled out of his head.”
  • Jackson and Artie are playing Wii boxing when Artie’s “punch went wide – and he slammed his fist into [Jackson’s] jaw.”
  • Jillian and Jackson try to see if they can fly. They break into a run and leap up. Jillian “crashed headfirst into the wire fence . . . and staggered backward, struggling to keep [her] balance. Pain shot through [her] body.” Jackson “hit the fence with a loud clang. He bounded off and tumbled onto his butt.”
  • While Dr. Cranium tries to wipe Jillian and Jackson’s thoughts, Jackson uses his powers to crash a mannequin into him. “The mannequin dropped hard and fast. It landed headfirst on top of Cranium, and he crumpled to the pavement.”
  • Jackson uses his powers to crash a chandelier onto the Purple Rage, a superhero who was trying to hurt the kids. “The chandelier crashed onto the superhero’s head and shoulders. The Rage uttered a weak cry. He toppled facedown onto the floor.”
  • Because the Purple Rage is so angry, he “exploded. His body burst apart with a loud splat . . . his purple guts went flying all over the room.”
  • Jillian, Jackson, and a few other kids try to go through a portal in a mirror that leads to Panic Park. It doesn’t work because the mirror turns back into solid glass, and Jillian runs into it. Jillian “screamed as [her] forehead cracked into solid glass.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • Jackson and Jillian go see a movie called Butt-Kicker II.
  • Jackson used his powers to hurl a soccer ball at Artie. It missed Artie because he bent down to tie his shoe. Jackson said, “I’m sorry I missed that jerk.”

Supernatural

  • Jillian and Jackson obtain telekinesis and mind-reading abilities after getting zapped by a fortune-telling machine. Jillian can read people’s minds and Jackson can make things levitate. They are kidnapped by Inspector Cranium, who tries to erase their memories by “going into their brains.”
  • Jillian and Jackson eventually end up at a theme park called HorrorLand. The workers there are monsters, and they trap the two siblings and other kids in a basement where superheroes try to hurt them.

Spiritual Content

  • None

by Jill Johnson

The New Year’s Party

It’s five minutes to 1965. Beth should be at the party having fun with her boyfriend. Instead, she’s looking for her best friend, Karen. Suddenly, a group of men barge into the house with guns—they’re attempting a robbery. One man grabs Jeremy, Beth’s shy brother, puts a gun to his head and pulls the trigger. However, nothing happens because the gun is fake. The robbery was just a prank pulled by Karen and some seniors. Upset, Jeremy runs off. Beth follows him into his car. They’re driving recklessly in the snow when suddenly they hit a boy. They swerve, then crash.

The story jumps in time to the present day. Reenie, Greta, Archie, and Sean are all friends who enjoy playing pranks on each other. For example, Archie hides in Reenie’s closet pretending to be a corpse. Reenie starts to get the idea that their pranks are going too far, though, when she falls off a cliff and nearly drowns in a frozen lake. She has an uneasy feeling when Archie suggests she throw a house party but ultimately agrees.

Archie and his friend Marc come up with the perfect prank to pull at Reenie’s party. They will get Sandi, the most popular girl in school, to ask P.J., the new quiet kid, to the party. At the party, Sandi will kiss P.J., then pretend to die. This prank goes too far when P.J. actually dies from shock. Reenie and her friends are horrified, but the horror turns to confusion when P.J.’s body disappears. In the next couple of weeks, Marc and Sandi are both murdered. Someone is taking revenge on Reenie and her friends, but they can’t figure out who.

 In addition to the supernatural elements, The New Year’s Party has relatable characters, who are not perfect. Like many typical teens, the characters try to justify their wrongdoings. In addition, the story includes fighting couples, friends who party together, and friends that have trouble with trigonometry. The story jumps back and forth in time, but the time differences are separated by chapters.

In the climax of the story, Liz, P.J.’s sister, invites Reenie and her friends to a New Year’s party. At the party, Liz reveals who killed Marc and Sandi, and chaos ensues. This exciting conclusion that connects the past to the present will shock readers.

The New Year’s Party is a gripping story that will keep readers turning the pages. Every chapter ends on a cliffhanger. The vocabulary is simple, and the plot moves quickly. Reenie’s friends play multiple pranks that always seem real, keeping the readers on the edge of their seats. In true R.L. Stine fashion, the book ends with a twist. The New Year’s Party is a good book for readers of all types who are looking for a quick, enjoyable read.

Sexual Content

  • Beth is at a party scanning the room for her friend when she sees a couple who “were making out in the corner.”
  • When the clock strikes midnight, Beth’s boyfriend, Todd, “pulled Beth to him and kissed her.”
  • Todd asks Beth if she wants to move to the stairs, where “four couples sat on the carpeted steps, making out.” Beth “didn’t want to make out in front of the entire party.”
  • At Reenie’s house, Artie sat next to Gret, then “leaned forward and gave her a long kiss.”
  • Sandi, a pretty, popular girl, slow dances with P.J. When the song ends, she “pulled P.J.’s face to hers. Kissed him. A long, slow kiss.” Reenie observes Sandi “kissing the helpless P.J. so intensely. . . her mouth moving over his, her arms wrapped tightly around his slender shoulders.”
  • Before he leaves the party, Sean “pulled [Reenie] close and kissed her. Reenie wished the kiss would never end. She didn’t want to think about anything but the way Sean’s lips felt against hers.”
  • Reenie is hiding under the bleachers in the gym so she can listen to Liz and Ty’s conversation. Reenie watches as “Liz gently pulled Ty’s head to hers and kissed him. A long, serious kiss.”

Violence

  • A group of men with pistols crash a house party. One of the men grabbed Jeremy and “pressed the gun barrel against Jeremy’s head. Then he pulled the trigger.” The gun didn’t fire because it was plastic. The whole thing was a prank played by a group of high school seniors.
  • Jeremy is driving recklessly on icy roads with Beth in the car. They saw a “dim figure” in the road before “something bounced on the hood with a heavy thud. A face appeared through the foggy windshield. A boys’ face, his mouth open in a scream of surprise. The boy dropped to the ground. The car rolled over him with a hard bump.” Because they are scared of facing the fact they just killed a boy, they do not stop to help him and keep driving.
  • Jeremy lost control of the car on the icy roads. “The car smashed hard into the snowbank. . . [Beth’s] scream ended in a grunt as she was thrown forward and her head cracked against the dashboard . . . Beth felt warm blood trickle down her forehead.” Beth watches the car break “through the snowbank” and feels “shock after shock of pain.” Beth is able to crawl out of the car, but she later realizes she is just a spirit, and her body is still in the car, dead.
  • As Reenie puts her sweater in her closet, she sees “bulging, blank eyes.” At first she believes it to be a “corpse” with “gooey blood, dark and caked, oozed over his head.” The corpse is actually Sean, and he was pulling a prank on Reenie.
  • Reenie falls off the edge of a drop-off that overlooks a lake. “She was falling, sliding and tumbling, down the snowy hillside. It knocked the breath out of her. She struggled to gasp in air.” She falls onto the frozen lake, and her “hip smashed against the hard surface. She let out a small moan of pain.” As she is walking to the bank, “the ice beneath her gave way with a groan. She slid into the freezing, black water.” Struggling to get out, “she thrashed her arms, trying to pull herself back up to the surface. . . her head hit the underside of the ice. ‘I can’t breathe,’ she realized. She pounded on the ice with her fists. Clawed at it.” Reenie passes out, but Sean rescues her.
  • As Artie speeds into an intersection with Reenie in the car, another car hits them. Reenie heard “metal slam against metal. Shattering glass. The car spun, slamming her into the door. . . She felt the seat belt biting into her stomach, as she was thrown forward. Then she lurched back against the seat.”
  • After Sandi kisses P.J., she shoves him away and “uttered a long, frightening moan. . . She sank to her knees, her eyes wide, her mouth hanging open. . . Sandi crumpled into a heap on the floor.”
  • Artie and Marc are working in the garage when Reenie and Greta come over. Artie leaves Marc alone in the garage. Marc’s friends hear “a high, ragged scream of terror” come from the garage. When they rush to the garage, they see “a body lay sprawled over the shiny red hood. Marc’s body. Blood dripped from his mouth and nose and his head . . . was twisted around on his neck . . . completely backward.” Marc was murdered.
  • Reenie leaves Sandi alone at the Burger Shack. When Reenie comes back, she finds Sandi dead in a trashcan. “Sandi’s eyes stared blankly at the ceiling. But she lay on her chest . . . Her head had been twisted around backward. And her face held the same terrified expression. Her blue eyes wide with horror.”
  • Liz is holding Sean, Greta, Archie, and Reenie captive. Sean holds a knife as he demands that Liz open the door to let them go. Liz “threw herself at Sean,” who “toppled to the floor with Liz on top of him. . . His body twisted and thrashed as he tried to throw Liz off.” Liz “tried to choke” Sean but Reenie “grabbed Liz by the shoulders and struggled to pull her off Sean.” Liz “tore at Sean’s wrist with her teeth,” causing him to drop the knife.
  • Once she regains the knife, Liz “grabbed Sean and pressed the blade against his throat . . . Reenie saw a drop of red blood roll down Sean’s neck.”
  • While Reenie distracts Liz, Sean “grabbed Liz around the waist. He pinned her against him with one arm—and grabbed the knife away with his other hand.” Liz “stumbled into [Sean]. And the knife plunged deep into her chest.” Everyone is frightened, especially when, “No blood poured from the wound.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Reenie has a house party and runs into Marc. “He stood so close she could smell the beer on his breath.”
  • At the party, Reenie notices Artie’s eyes look watery, and thinks, “Great. They’ve both been drinking.”

Language

  • Artie threatens P.J. after P.J. dropped a weight on him. Artie says, “I’m going to get that little creep, P.J.” Artie goes on to call P.J., “You little jerk!”
  • After he describes their “dumb practical jokes” to a police officer, Sean admits he sounded like a “total jerk.”

Supernatural

  • After they crash the car, Beth and Jeremy realize they are dead. They can see their bodies in the car. Jeremy tries to get back inside his body, but he can’t. He cries, “My arms passed right through my body!” Beth realizes Jeremy is starting to fade. Beth feels herself fading too. “Only the darkness remained. Everywhere. Closing on her. Claiming her.”
  • It is revealed that Liz and P.J. are the same people as Beth and Jeremy; they just changed names. Their spirits somehow reappeared solidly enough for them to act like real people. They died in a car crash thirty years ago, and they were trapped for years in a “cold, gray place.” Liz explains, “As the years passed, we grew stronger. And then suddenly we were back. Back in our old bodies. People could see us and hear us again.”
  • Ty confesses he was the boy Beth and Jeremy ran over, and he was also brought back to life to get revenge.
  • As the clock strikes midnight, Beth, Jeremy, and Ty fight with each other. “Liz and Ty and P.J. whirled around, tugging each other as if in a mad dance. Faster and faster. Waves of icy air swept off their bodies. . . A ghostly whirlwind.”
  • Beth, Jeremy, and Ty disappear once the clock strikes midnight. “A high, shrill whistle pieced Reenie’s ears. Louder. Shriller. Until Reenie covered both ears to shut it out. And the three ghosts began to fade. . . They faded to shadows. Then the shadows faded to smoke. A spinning column of smoke . . . The smoke faded. And floated away.”

Spiritual Content

  • None

by Jill Johnson

I Hunt Killers

Jasper Francis Dent, who goes by Jazz, is the son of a famous serial killer who has been imprisoned for four years, but still has lasting effects on the boy’s life. Although Jazz is plagued by memories of the teachings his father gave to him, Jazz was almost adapting to living normally. He took care of his grandmother and had a best friend and girlfriend.

However, a serial killer imitating his father causes Jazz to change his life drastically. Instead of following in his father’s footsteps, he uses the inner workings of a serial killer’s mind to try to find out who is committing the murders. Jazz has to deal with reporters constantly hounding him, a sheriff who won’t let him look into the investigation, and a killer who is always one step ahead of everyone else.

I Hunt Killers has an exciting premise that hooks readers instantly. The story immediately throws Jazz into a crime scene surrounding a dead body. The gore and violence that the book opens up with are present throughout, but so is the thrill Jazz experiences trying to discover who committed the crime. The characters are well developed, unique, and convincing.

Jazz’s character is relatable because of his complexity and his competing desires. The reader is given a glimpse into Jazz’s thought process and is allowed to see his torment. Jazz wants to do good, but also struggles with the darker parts of himself, those parts that might be like this father. The themes in the book seem somewhat forced at times, but also provide messages related to independence, persevering through difficulty, and breaking cycles of abuse.

The book contains a somewhat predictable story, although the characters are unique and compelling. The story is written in a very approachable way, utilizing understandable language that clearly and quickly conveys Lyga’s message. At times, it seems like Jasper almost magically discovers clues to his victim. It is difficult to believe that a thirteen year old would reach the conclusions he does. This results in many of the revelations in the story feeling somewhat forced, and the twists feeling less surprising.

I Hunt Killers is a dark, disturbing, character-focused mystery in which the plot is often overlooked in favor of humor or graphic violence. Its story is predictable, but is otherwise an enticing read. The story shows the horrific nature of brutal crimes. Readers will want to take caution before picking up I Hunt Killers because of the subject matter, the graphic crime scenes, and the mind games that are played throughout the story.

Sexual Content

  • Many of the dead bodies in the book, including the first one, are found naked.
  • Jazz thinks of a time he and his girlfriend spent “tangled up” at their hideout.
  • Jazz says that another character’s reaction “felt like he’d just seen a nun do a striptease.”
  • Jazz mentions having a pistol pointed at his “thirteen-year-old junk” in a memory from when his dad was first apprehended. He is seventeen at the time the book takes place.
  • Howie wonders if the killer was just “having sex and stuff” and suggests that the killer’s girlfriend might have just hit her head and had a heart attack, resulting in him abandoning her at the scene.
  • Howie perks up at the mention of “cleavage” while a dead body is investigated.
  • Howie and Jazz contemplate whether or not the killer “did stuff” to his victim.
  • Jazz and Connie kiss several times. Their kisses range from a “quick kiss on the lips” to “kissing and groping” that includes descriptive visuals such as “the soft insistence of Connie’s plush lips, to the warm of her tongue” and “a long, lingering kiss that warmed him [Jasper] all over.”
  • Connie and Jazz spend the beginning of rehearsal “feverishly kissing and groping back in the wings.”
  • A character is suspected to have “entertained some R-rated fantasies about the girls in his class.”
  • Jazz says that “if you were in a room alone with her [Harriet Klein], you’d feel it.”
  • Gramma Dent accuses Jazz of “Putting [his] thing inside them [whores]!”
  • Jazz explains how serial killers often “jerk off” after revisiting crime scenes, which Howie says “ruined masturbation” for him.
  • Howie calls a toe ring “sexy.”
  • Jazz thinks about how he is obsessed with sex. “He was terrified of sex. Like every teenage boy, he was obsessed with it, of course, and wanted to have as much of it as humanly possible…”
  • When Connie sits on Jazz’s lap, “he felt himself respond to her weight in his lap the only way a teen boy should respond.” Then, Connie adjusts herself in Jazz’s lap and grinds “her butt into his groin in that special pleasant/painful way.”
  • Connie mentions how people dream about “having sex with a supermodel.”
  • A character whose initials are “VD” reminds Howie of “venereal disease.”
  • Jazz remembers how a female character’s breasts had pressed against him when they hugged.
  • When Howie is hospitalized, Jazz asks jokingly if he wants “a hot nurse and a stripper pole.”
  • Jazz recounts that one of Billy Dent’s victims was “sexually assaulted, invaded both vaginally and rectally.”
  • Jazz suspects that the killer used “a sex toy or something” on one of his victims.
  • Jazz says to Connie, “I bet I could warm you up,” implying sex. Connie “shifted, locking her ankles together.”
  • Jazz thinks that “any straight male snuggling with Connie would be desperate to get those jeans off.”
  • Gramma Dent, upon seeing a horde of reporters outside her home, believes they are enemy warriors and yells that “They’re gonna rape mongrel babies into me!”
  • Howie suggests to Jazz that he “stick [his] tongue down her [Connie’s] throat.”
  • Billy Dent asks if Jazz has “a little piece of tail [he] like[s] to bang,” and if “girls. . . line up for a taste of [his] dick.”
  • Billy Dent talks to his son and asks, “are you always the one buyin’ the rubbers? Hmm? Or maybe she’s on that pill? Cause you can’t always trust ‘em, Jasper. You look at them rubbers real close-like, see?”
  • Billy asks Jazz to “Tell Dear Old Dad your little pussy’s name.”
  • Billy describes a victim with “Perfect little titties.”
  • Billy says to Jazz “I’m glad you’re getting’ your dick wet.”
  • Billy is suspected to have left semen and committed rape at a murder scene.
  • G. William searched Jazz and placed a hand “uncomfortably close to the family jewels.”

Violence

  • The book opens up with a police scene surrounding a dead body, and it is made clear that this will be a common theme in the novel.
  • There are multiple instances of body bags being opened or used to store/view bodies. “Two cops approached the corpse with a body bag hanging limp between them… he focused on the struggle with the body bag.”
  • Jazz often imagines entering violent scenarios with different characters.
  • The killer’s specialty is to sever his victim’s fingers. Removed fingers are referred to as excised digits.
  • Billy Dent killed over one hundred people, whose deaths are frequently referenced.
  • Jazz experiences memories of his father describing his methods to commit murder. “Good boy. Good boy. (one cut, two cuts) Just like that.”
  • Vivid descriptions of dead bodies are provided. “Dead female Caucasian… Found at least two miles from anywhere in any direction. Naked. No apparent bruising. Missing fingers.”
  • Billy Dent kept trophies from his victims.
  • Jazz has what looks like the “biggest god-damn pistol in the entire universe [pointed] right at [his] thirteen-year-old junk.”
  • The experimentation process of serial killers is described as they try new methods of violence. “And they experiment. Cutting off the fingers…”
  • G. William threatens to shoot Jazz.
  • Jazz “was certain that the next day would have seen G. William dead by his own hand” if Billy Dent had not been found.
  • Jazz imagines cutting a finger off.
  • Jazz says that the death isn’t just “Joe-Bob McHick smacking around his girlfriend and then leaving her to die.”
  • An autopsy is performed on a corpse.
  • Jazz imagines G. William drawing his service revolver and putting “two slugs into his center of mass.”
  • A joke is made about pointing an excised finger.
  • Howie is a “type-A hemophiliac, which meant that he bled if you looked at him too hard,” and experiences large amounts of bleeding in the novel.
  • Jazz beat up Howie’s bullies.
  • Jazz experiences a bloody nose.
  • A reference is made to Hannibal Lecter, the cannibal villain.
  • Jazz thinks a crime would be easier to identify if there had been “some sort of savagery before death—torture, cutting mutilation…”
  • Victims are strangled.
  • During the investigation of a body, eyelids are peeled back.
  • Howie’s face bleeds profusely from a nosebleed.
  • Genocide and famine are referenced.
  • A body is nailed naked to a ceiling in a church. “Her head lolling downward, her limbs bearing the weight of her body. When the reverend who found the body called the police, the skin and muscle were already coming loose.”
  • An angered parent of a victim threatened to kidnap Jazz and perform his father’s crimes on him.
  • Eyes are removed from a corpse and fed to cats.
  • There are multiple references to famous serial killers.
  • Gramma Dent often threatens people with a shotgun.
  • Jazz imagines a character having a “Glock or Magnum” in their purse.
  • Jazz’s grandmother smacks him multiple times.
  • Billy Dent disjointed a corpse.
  • Billy Dent is said to have raped and abused his victims as well as killed them.“He tormented them. Tortured them. Raped them and abused them.” More details are given later on when Billy Dent’s victim is described as “Sexually assaulted, invaded both vaginally and rectally.”
  • Jazz imagines ripping out a character’s larynx.
  • Jazz wonders why Billy has not been shanked in prison, as well as why he hasn’t committed suicide.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • G. William is said to very rarely drink.
  • Jazz gives his grandmother a “poor man’s sedative” so that he can go out without her arguing.
  • Jazz also puts a “powerful tranquilizer” in his grandmother’s breakfast for a similar purpose.
  • Jazz’s grandmother is sedated and held captive by the novel’s antagonist.
  • Jazz “clambered down the fire escape like a monkey on crystal meth.”

Language

  • There is an immense amount of profanity including crap, Christ, God, Devil/Satan, Hell, idiot, moron, badass, douche, goddamn, demon, piss, whores, ho, bastard, ass, hellfire, jackass, smart-ass, butt, buttocks, damn, BS, pussy, titties, dick, bitch.
  • When Jazz tells G. William that he had been spying on the crime scene at the beginning of the book, “G. William slammed a fist on the desk and swore.”
  • A killer leaves behind his victim’s middle finger while taking other digits.
  • Doug Weathers is called a “bottom-feeding moron.”
  • Jazz and Howie say “bros before hos.”
  • Gramma Dent uses the “hellfire o’ Jesus” as an exclamation.
  • Jazz exclaims “Jesus!” at one point.
  • Connie gasps “Oh my God.”
  • Billy Dent is said to have “a real PhD in slinging high-grade horse manure.”

Supernatural

  • Witchcraft and witches are mentioned as a part of the Salem Witch Trials that took place in The Crucible.

Spiritual Content

  • G. William is said to have “catholic guilt.”
  • The Devil/Satan, demons, Heaven, Christ, and God are mentioned as slurs, although not in actual religious contexts.
  • Jazz describes faith as “being certain of something without any kind of evidence.”
  • Howie says that he “deftly avoids the crushing throngs of heathens.”
  • The Crucible is being performed by Jazz’s drama group, and he acts as a reverend in the play during the witch trials that were performed in Salem by the Puritans.
  • A quote from The Crucible says “Theology, sir, is a fortress; no crack in a fortress may be accounted small.”
  • A quote from The Crucible says “Man, remember, until an hour before the Devil fell, God thought him beautiful in Heaven.”
  • Gramma Dent has a collection of “religious dogma.”
  • Billy Dent says that “Cain slew Abel, all under God’s eye” as justification for his murders, specifically of Jasper’s dog Rusty.
  • Jazz asks that “God bless Ginny Davis.”
  • Billy Dent describes the sound of someone dying as “sacred an’ holy.”
  • Gramma Dent cries out “Praise God!”
  • Jasper’s grandmother recalls how she had “said all her Hail Marys” when she shifts into the persona of a young girl.
  • Billy Dent claims he is the god of his victims.
  • Jazz says Billy “had been a god” that he worshiped, although later states that Billy “had been a devil, not a god.”
  • Billy sighs “as if asking the Good Lord.”
  • A serial killer believes that Billy Dent, a serial killer, is a god, and that Jasper is a “child of divinity.”

by Dylan Chilcoat

 

City of Ghosts

A screech of wheels. The grip of freezing water. Death. When Cassidy almost drowns, everything changed. She can now enter the world of the dead. To make things stranger, her best friend, Jacob, is a ghost.

Cassidy didn’t think life could get more complicated. Then her parents agree to film a TV show about the world’s most haunted places and the family heads to Edinburgh, Scotland. Restless ghosts haunt the graveyards, castles, and even the pubs. When Cassidy meets another girl who can see the dead, Cassidy realizes she has a lot to learn. Cassidy soon discovers that in a city of ghosts, danger hides in unexpected places.

Victoria Schwab writes a creepy ghost story that is just the right balance of cuteness, chills, and charm. Scotland’s people and lore come to life as Cassidy visits the historical landmarks including Edinburgh Castle and Mary King’s Close. As Cassidy encounters different ghost stories, Scotland’s history unfolds.

Cassidy’s best friend, Jacob, is a fun addition to the cast of characters. Even though Cassidy has told her parents about Jacob, and Cassidy’s parents research haunted places, they do not believe in ghosts. Cassidy’s caring, quirky parents bring ironic humor to the story that middle school readers will understand.

City of Ghosts is the perfect ghost story for younger readers. The easy-to-read text contains short sentences and is a good blend of action, description, and dialogue. The Harry Potter references will delight readers. Although the plot contains only a few surprises, the story is still solid and engaging. Cassidy’s inquisitive mind and courage will draw the reader into the story. Her relationship with Jacob and her parents are an added bonus. City of Ghosts takes the reader on a spooky adventure that will be hard to forget.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • The narrator almost dies while riding her bike. She is on a bridge when “the truck whipped around the curve and hurtled toward me. I swerved out of the way, and so did the truck, tires screeching as my bike slammed into the railing hard enough to make sparks fly.” She goes into the river, where a boy ghost saves her.
  • A long time ago, a boy died in a school fire. The fire began during a school play. In a panic, the boy “shuffles on his hands and knees until he reaches the trap door (of the stage). . .He pulls the door up and climbs down into the dark just before a piece of burning set collapse on top of the stage, pining the trapdoor shut.”
  • When Cass enters the veil, she sees “a man being hauled toward a platform, where a noose hangs waiting.”
  • Cass’s dad explains how some people would rob graves and take the bodies to medical theaters so medical students could practice on them. Two men, “Decided that instead of digging up corpses, they would simply create their own. . . They murdered sixteen people before they were caught and tried . . .Burke was hanged, and then dissected in an anatomy theater, just as his victims had been.”
  • While in the veil, The Raven, a ghost who steals children, puts Cass under a spell. Then, “her fingers harden like claws. . . she thrust her hand straight into my chest. Cold rushes through me, a bone-chilling cold, worse than the bottom of the river. It feels like icy fingers wrapped around my heart.” She tears Cass’s life’s ribbon out of her chest. In order to come back alive, The Raven must dig up her corpse and place the life’s ribbon in her chest. Cass attempts to get her life’s ribbon back and the struggle is told over several chapters. Cass crawls into a grave, and when The Raven finds her, “The Raven grabs me and throws me out of the grave. . . I land hard on the ground. . . and hit a gravestone, knocking all the air out of my lungs.”
  • While in the veil, Cass sees a ghost who is on a platform, and “a course rope is cinched around his neck.” The execution doesn’t come.
  • Ghosts chase after Cass and Jacob. The ghost children “close in, opening their mouths, and instead of different voices coming out, there’s only one. The Raven’s. Her eerie hypnotic song pours from their lips.” The chase takes place over several chapters.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • One of the characters has two pints of beer—one for himself and one for his friend’s ghost.

Language

  • “Oh god” is used as an exclamation. When Cassidy’s parents want to talk to her, she thinks, “Oh god. I’m going to be a big sister.”

Supernatural

  • Jacob, a ghost who is attached to a living girl, is one of the main characters in the story.
  • Cass can see ghosts and cross the veil between the living and the dead. The narrator explains, “It takes a lot of spirit power for a ghost to reach across the Veil—the curtain between their world and ours. And the ghosts that have that kind of strength, they tend to be really old and not very nice. . . the dead grow strong on darker things. On pain and anger and regret.”
  • Lara casts a spell on a ghost and then reaches in and pulls the ribbon out “. . . The dark thread comes free in her hand, hanging limply from her fingers for a moment before crumbling away to ash. An instant later, the main crumbles, too, just . . . falls apart.” Later Lara explains that she sent him, “To the great unknown? To the silent side? To peace and quiet? Call it what you like. I sent him to the place beyond. Where he’s supposed to be.”
  • The Raven puts two teen boys under a spell. The boys “stand chest-deep in the grave. . . Their expressions are glassy, their breaths fogging as they shovel mound after mound of dirt out of the pit. . . “The boys dig up the Raven’s corpse.

Spiritual Content

  • None

Polaris

During the 1830s, the Polaris sets sail on a scientific mission to the Amazon jungle. The crew is excited to bring back new discoveries, but when the landing party returns, only half are alive. After an argument, the crew loads a chest into the bowels of the ship. After they begin their trip home, a bloody mutiny leaves most of the adult crew dead. Those who live, flee the ship, leaving six children—none of whom are older than twelve. The captain’s 12-year-old nephew Owen, a botanist’s assistant, and other deckhands struggle for survival. Soon they realize that the sea isn’t their only worry. Something else is lurking below deck, and it’s growing.

From the first page, Polaris will capture reader’s attention and they will not want to put the book down. With just the right mix of suspense and action, Polaris makes the fight for survival come to life. Full of realistic detail and nautical facts, readers will be pulled into the frightening atmosphere of Polaris. The story is appropriate for younger readers with tame battle scenes. This fast-paced story has well-developed characters that show the importance of working together despite the fact that they do not like each other. With a diverse cast of characters, an engaging plotline, and an epic battle scene, Polaris will not disappoint those looking for an excellent horror story. But be warned, the creepy creature may make its way into the nightmares of readers.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • A character thinks about a boy, who “had blown up trying to carry two cartridges (of gun powder) at once.”
  • A mutiny begins among the adult crew. The children listen to the fighting through a locked door and hear gunshots as well as someone being thrown into the sea. Then the boys hear, “three shots rang out in quick succession—the officer’s pistols. Shrieks of pain mixed with the shouts of rage, telling Owen that the rest of the work would be done with blades and hands.”
  • Owen shoots the creature. “Owen heard a quick sound behind him—tik-taclik! —like metal on bone.” Then, the boys pour boiling water on him. When the creature flees, someone stabs it with a spear.
  • When the creature snatches one of the boys, someone shoots the creature. “Per-KRACK went the pistol. A flash of flame and a billowing plume of smoke shot forth.”
  • A boy hits Owen over the head with a hatchet. Owen is not seriously injured.
  • When the creature tries to snatch another person, there is a fight that takes place over several pages. When someone shoots it, “the lead ball ricocheted off the thick armor plating of its thorax.” When Owen throws the pistol at it, “the butt of the pistol smacked heavily into what had been Obed’s forehead. The creature staggered backwards. . .” No one is injured.
  • The creature attacks the boys. The battle takes place over several chapters. During the battle, “A dark red rat-like creature emerged from the hatch, then a second, and then they all began to pour out. One dozen, two dozen.” The kids rig a device to blow up the ship after they have jumped off.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Owen thinks about his uncle and father. “His uncle had taken him in after his mother’s death and his father’s descent into sorrow—and the bottle.”

Language

  • When the crewmembers discuss being infected with spores, someone thinks, “Oh God. . . What if it’s me?”

Supernatural

  • The children believe the ghost of Obed Macy is haunting the lower deck of the ship. They discuss if a Bible and cross will ward off the ghost.

Spiritual Content

  • During a storm, a character begins “the Lord’s prayer.”
  • A character prays, “Lord help us all.”

 

The Breathless

Ro’s body was found lifeless on the beach. No one knows what happened. All they know is that Ro’s boyfriend, Cage, disappeared the same day and hasn’t been seen since. The mystery behind her death turned Blue Gate Manor into a house of sadness and secrets.

One year later, Cage shows up looking for Ro with no memory of anything that happened in the last year. His confusion only adds to the mystery of Ro’s death because even though he was the last person to be seen with her, he has no idea how she died or if he caused her death. Ro’s sister, Mae, doesn’t trust him, but she decides that helping Cage is the only way to find out what happened to her sister.

Then Mae finds a little green book that belonged to Ro. She hopes the book will unlock the secrets behind Ro’s death. As she follows clues in the book, she discovers her family is hiding a dark secret about her ancestors. Danger lurks around every corner as Mae hunts for answers that might be better left undiscovered.

The very first sentence of The Breathless grabs the reader’s attention and never lets go. Graphic descriptions bring this creepy Gothic tale to life. Full of magic, love, and loss, The Breathless is a captivating story that will give sensitive readers a fright they will not soon forget. This is not a good book to read for those who are prone to nightmares.

Sexual Content

  • Cage is watching a girl on the beach. The girl, “licks her fingertips before she turns the page and he wants to be that book.”
  • While sleeping, Ro’s boyfriend thinks about a time when she “pulls him down next to her and leans into him, all oil and legs and her red bikini top loose. He holds his breath as she unties her top, lets it fall.” He wraps his arms around her in the dream and then wakes up.
  • One of the characters is in love with a girl and they kiss. “She leans forward and kisses him and his stomach drops and then the world drops way until her lips finally leave his.”
  • When Mae starts to cry, Cage hugs her. Then he thinks about kissing her. “He was going to kiss her, it was all he wanted, and the next thing he knew she was pulling out of his arms, and stepping back.”
  • When Cage is burning with fever, Mae undresses him. When she goes to take off his pants he said, “Mae, we can’t.” She replies, “Cage, that’s not what I’m doing.”

Violence

  • Cage wakes up in a hospital, unsure of why he is there. He climbs out a window to escape. When a security guard tries to stop him, Cage hits the man. “His fist collided with the man’s face. The security guard crumpled to the ground.”
  • Elle points a rifle at Cage. At first, Elle thinks she hit her sister when she fires because “The house was bleeding. Thick, dark red droplets were splattered across the floor.” However, Elle only shot the red polish in Mae’s pocket.
  • Grady’s girlfriend, the “witch’s” daughter, has his child. When Grady’s father discovers Grady’s secret, the father sets the house on fire and Grady’s girlfriend dies. Then Grady kills his father with an ax. “The first thud makes his ears ring, and they’re still ringing as he drags his father’s body from the house . . . He feels like his lungs are going black, his heart too. But there’s no stopping now.”
  • Elle hits a deer with her car. Mae “knelt down beside the deer, taking its head in her hands, watching its lungs going fast as it panted, a shard of glass in its neck. Its heartbeat thudded against her, echoed inside her, fainter and fainter . . . The deer’s blood was slick in her hands and she stared at the shards of glass in its neck.”
  • One of the characters tries to raise Ro from the dead. In order to complete the ritual, he drugged his sister and then put her into a lake to drown. She is saved. Later the character intends to kill her so she can’t tell anyone what he did, but “he realized he couldn’t do it. Not when she was blinking up at him, asking questions.”
  • Mae’s father shoots Cage. “And then came the blast that thundered in his ears and he was falling, the gravel rising up in front of him. . .”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Mae’s father often drinks whiskey.
  • In a flashback, Ro is smoking a cigarette. “It’s slender and smells of cloves.”
  • A character steals pills from his mother’s supply and gives them to his sister.
  • When Cage is on his way to see his mother, he doesn’t want to . . . “meet her new boyfriend but what he really doesn’t want to see are those pill bottles of hers, the way they make her angry. She’s angry that she’s sick, always has been.”

Language

  • “Shit” is used often throughout the book by several different characters. In one scene, Mae’s father said that there are “plenty of pieces of shit around these days.”
  • “Hell” is used several times. When Mae is caught spying on her sister, Elle says, “What the hell, Mae.”
  • Mae’s father says “goddamn” several times. One time he swore when he almost hit a girl with his truck.

Supernatural

  • The story revolves around Mae trying to understand a book that Ro had owned. The book has several spells, including one to bring back the dead. “Besides the raising ritual, there were other spells: some for curses, some for love, so many she hadn’t been able to get through them yet.”
  • Mae finds a room that has jars of animals used for rituals. In one jar “chunks of a hairlike substance were at the bottom. Floating inside the jar was a pale cat skull.” Another jar had a bird claw and a horse’s hoof. “Bits of tissue swirled into the murky water, and long dark hair was layered at the bottom. . . A hank of what looked like the horse’s dark mane fluttered at the bottom, next to bone.”
  • Mae remembers a time when her sister tried a ritual. When her sister turned around, “her dress had been a different color. . . Dark, dark red, steaked with blood.”
  • Mae discovers that the raising ritual requires the payment of a “human life for human life.”
  • A “witch” and her family live nearby. They use a ritual that can bring the dead back to life.

Spiritual Content

  • None

Took

When Daniel and his sister move to rural West Virginia, Daniel doesn’t think things can get any worse.  The students at his new school torment him. The teachers are indifferent. He has no friends. His parents are unhappy. And to make matters worse, his sister spends all of her time talking to her doll.

When Daniel hears stories of Old Auntie, who kidnaps a girl every 50 years, he thinks it’s just an old tale used to frighten children. But then he feels someone watching him. He sees strange shadows. And when his sister suddenly disappears, Daniel is convinced Old Auntie isn’t just a story.

As Daniel’s parents lose themselves in grief, Daniel decides he must face his fears and bring his sister home. With the help of his neighbor and one of Old Auntie’s descendants, Daniel fights for his sister’s freedom.

Right from the start, Took: A Ghost Story will capture the reader’s attention. Young readers will be able to relate to Daniel, who feels as if all of life’s decisions are out of his control. Although Daniel clearly cares for his parents and sister, his frustration with them is understandable. Daniel is a likable character, who faces his fears and in the end, brings his family back together.

The story is primarily told from Daniel’s point of view but has several chapters told from Old Auntie’s point of view. This adds suspense to the story and helps develop the creepy mood. This is not a book to read with the lights out. Because Old Auntie and Bloody Bones are described in such realistic, vivid detail, readers will be entertained and frightened.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • Bloody Bones kills someone. “Tore him clean apart with the panther’s teeth and ate him up. Then he dug his grave with the bear’s claws and brushed the ground smooth with the raccoon’s tail.”
  • The kids at school are mean to Daniel. They “accidentally” hit him and kick the back of his seat on the bus.
  • When Daniel and his sister, Erica, are in the woods, Daniel sees something and forces Erica to leave with him. They get into a fight. “. . . She struggled harder to get away from me, crying and screaming . . . she managed to bite me twice and scratch my face.”
  • Bloody Bones is going to throw Daniel off of a cliff, so Eric throws rocks at him. “Bloody Bones plunged over the edge of the cliff, screaming as he bounced from rock to rock, his bones flying apart and scattering as he went.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Daniel and Erica’s parents are seen drinking wine. When Erica is “took,” their parents drink even more. “There was an empty wine bottle on the table and an ashtray full of cigarette butts and ashes.”
  • When Daniel goes to a friend’s house, his friend’s father smells of beer and cigarette smoke.

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • The story revolves around Old Auntie, a “conjure woman” who takes a girl every 50 years. When she takes a girl, she returns the one that was “took;” however, the girl is the same age as she was when she was first “took” and has no memory of her former life. Auntie weaves spells to influence people’s decisions.
  • One character describes Old Auntie as “a haunt come back from her grave.”
  • Old Auntie takes the form of a girl, so she can talk to Erica without scaring her. Auntie also uses a doll to convince Erica that no one loves her except Auntie.
  • Auntie has a razorback hog, called Bloody Bones, which she called back from the dead. “His bones put themselves together and rose up on their hind feet. His skull jumped on top of the bones, and off he danced.”

Spiritual Content

  • The townspeople are mean to the new family because they do not join the only church in town. “We weren’t only outsiders, we were godless outsiders.”

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