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3.44 AVERAGE
3.44 AVERAGE
This book contains two major plot arcs, which seem to be equally important as far as the main character, Stella, is concerned.
1) Whoever murdered her childhood best friend is back, killing again, and Stella's probably next on the list.
2) So, like, she's dating this hot guy she doesn't like much because he's dumb, but he's super hot, and her bestie insists that she has to date a hottie because popular girls date hot jocks. But her ex from her tween years is so dreamy, and her tummy gets all fluttery when he's nearby! Will her bestie forgive her for dating an unpopular guy? zOMG, the pressure!
Not only is Plot 2 dumb, and predicating on the utterly abusive relationship Stella has with her best friend (that's totally ok, because really, her friend only insults her and controls every aspect of her life because she cares so deeply!), but it causes Stella The Straight-A Student to do some spectacularly stupid things. Like ditch the cops who are making sure she doesn't get murdered to go hang out with her Dreamboy in the woods where people get murdered. Because boys!
The mood whiplash caused by snapping back and forth between the dead-kids-and-Stella-is-next plot and the OMG-he's-so-dreamy plot defuses any tension the first manages to build, over and over until i just wanted to reach into the pages of this book and slap Stella until she stopped being a suicidal idiot.
1) Whoever murdered her childhood best friend is back, killing again, and Stella's probably next on the list.
2) So, like, she's dating this hot guy she doesn't like much because he's dumb, but he's super hot, and her bestie insists that she has to date a hottie because popular girls date hot jocks. But her ex from her tween years is so dreamy, and her tummy gets all fluttery when he's nearby! Will her bestie forgive her for dating an unpopular guy? zOMG, the pressure!
Not only is Plot 2 dumb, and predicating on the utterly abusive relationship Stella has with her best friend (that's totally ok, because really, her friend only insults her and controls every aspect of her life because she cares so deeply!), but it causes Stella The Straight-A Student to do some spectacularly stupid things. Like ditch the cops who are making sure she doesn't get murdered to go hang out with her Dreamboy in the woods where people get murdered. Because boys!
The mood whiplash caused by snapping back and forth between the dead-kids-and-Stella-is-next plot and the OMG-he's-so-dreamy plot defuses any tension the first manages to build, over and over until i just wanted to reach into the pages of this book and slap Stella until she stopped being a suicidal idiot.
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
4.5 Stars bc there were SLIGHT things I would change (like teen talk), but mostly just a big giant YES to this book. Equal parts creepy and swoony.
When Stella was 6, she went into the woods with Jeanie... she came back, but Jeanie was never found. The mystery of Jeanie has haunted the town of Savage for 11 years, but Stella can't remember anything that happened that day.
Now Stella is celebrating her summer before Senior year by partying with her friends and crushing on cute lacrosse boys. She's doesn't want to remember her past, she wants to move on. Then a body of a young girl surfaces on the anniversary of Jeanie's disappearance, and Stella knows that the key to stopping the madness is her blocked out memory.
The path she goes down leads her to legends, myths, monsters, and murderers.
My Thoughts:
I totally loved this book. It was not perfect by any means-- There was "teen talk" (the phrase -tastic is tacked onto WAY too many words for my liking), Stella wasn't the strongest female lead in the world (and she definitely had some thoughts in her head that enraged me), and the main friendship between Zoey and Stella was definitely NOT the healthiest-- and I didn't care in the least!! Sure, I would have changed a few of those things if I had my way, but the things I loved about this book COMPLETELY outweighed the things I didn't.
Stella is in a popular girl clique that didn't want to get involved in the mystery of the town and what happened to Jeanie. This leads Stella to turn to a former friend (someone that her BFF Zoey doesn't approve of)-- Sam, King of the Dorks. Sam and Stella have a history and some pretty serious chemistry-- and the boy just cares so damn much! Every scene he was in I was just like-- SWOON!! I couldn't think straight... so basically 70% of this book could suck and I wouldn't know it because when Sam was around, I was in a love haze. Okay, seriously 70% of this book DOES NOT SUCK. I made that up :)
For real though-- I was wishing that the Zoey/Stella friendship was a TAD healthier. I'm kind of sick of "frenemy" relationships in YA. These characters care about each other a lot more than typical "frenemies", but Zoey is so mean and controlling that I had trouble understanding Stella's love for her. Even though this book is 400 pages, I still felt like the ending felt rushed. Like it just crept (LOL) up on me all of a sudden and played out so quickly, I could hardly wrap my brain around it.
What this book has in A+ quantities is ATMOSPHERE. I don't think this was a scary, horror-type book, but it definitely lived up to it's title- CREEPY. I was reading it at night after everyone in my house was asleep and I had a few moments where I thought I heard noises and had to go check. That doesn't happen too often to me with books. I was super intrigued whether the monsters in this book were real. I would be 99% sure they weren't, but one chapter later, I'd be thinking that YES they totally are.
The other A+ thing was the Sam/Stella relationship. Stella treated Sam like crap again and again after Zoey exiled him, but it didn't deter his love for Stella. While maybe people like that don't exist in real life, I wish that they would. And extra points that Sam was not described as this mega-hot guy living in a nerd disguise. He was just an okay looking boy who Stella knew she could count on.
OVERALL: I was addicted to the mystery and the romance in this book. I'm not the biggest fan of romance, but the relationship in this book was beyond adorable. I couldn't NOT like... and it basically made the book for me. I totally recommend this!!
My Blog:
When Stella was 6, she went into the woods with Jeanie... she came back, but Jeanie was never found. The mystery of Jeanie has haunted the town of Savage for 11 years, but Stella can't remember anything that happened that day.
Now Stella is celebrating her summer before Senior year by partying with her friends and crushing on cute lacrosse boys. She's doesn't want to remember her past, she wants to move on. Then a body of a young girl surfaces on the anniversary of Jeanie's disappearance, and Stella knows that the key to stopping the madness is her blocked out memory.
The path she goes down leads her to legends, myths, monsters, and murderers.
My Thoughts:
I totally loved this book. It was not perfect by any means-- There was "teen talk" (the phrase -tastic is tacked onto WAY too many words for my liking), Stella wasn't the strongest female lead in the world (and she definitely had some thoughts in her head that enraged me), and the main friendship between Zoey and Stella was definitely NOT the healthiest-- and I didn't care in the least!! Sure, I would have changed a few of those things if I had my way, but the things I loved about this book COMPLETELY outweighed the things I didn't.
Stella is in a popular girl clique that didn't want to get involved in the mystery of the town and what happened to Jeanie. This leads Stella to turn to a former friend (someone that her BFF Zoey doesn't approve of)-- Sam, King of the Dorks. Sam and Stella have a history and some pretty serious chemistry-- and the boy just cares so damn much! Every scene he was in I was just like-- SWOON!! I couldn't think straight... so basically 70% of this book could suck and I wouldn't know it because when Sam was around, I was in a love haze. Okay, seriously 70% of this book DOES NOT SUCK. I made that up :)
For real though-- I was wishing that the Zoey/Stella friendship was a TAD healthier. I'm kind of sick of "frenemy" relationships in YA. These characters care about each other a lot more than typical "frenemies", but Zoey is so mean and controlling that I had trouble understanding Stella's love for her. Even though this book is 400 pages, I still felt like the ending felt rushed. Like it just crept (LOL) up on me all of a sudden and played out so quickly, I could hardly wrap my brain around it.
What this book has in A+ quantities is ATMOSPHERE. I don't think this was a scary, horror-type book, but it definitely lived up to it's title- CREEPY. I was reading it at night after everyone in my house was asleep and I had a few moments where I thought I heard noises and had to go check. That doesn't happen too often to me with books. I was super intrigued whether the monsters in this book were real. I would be 99% sure they weren't, but one chapter later, I'd be thinking that YES they totally are.
The other A+ thing was the Sam/Stella relationship. Stella treated Sam like crap again and again after Zoey exiled him, but it didn't deter his love for Stella. While maybe people like that don't exist in real life, I wish that they would. And extra points that Sam was not described as this mega-hot guy living in a nerd disguise. He was just an okay looking boy who Stella knew she could count on.
OVERALL: I was addicted to the mystery and the romance in this book. I'm not the biggest fan of romance, but the relationship in this book was beyond adorable. I couldn't NOT like... and it basically made the book for me. I totally recommend this!!
My Blog:
ugh; I literally skimmed the entire last half just to get it over with - & it still took me the better part of the month to finish it. I don't know... I just wasn't into it. I didn't care about the characters & I thought there was a lot of repeating/unnecessary story fill.
I really enjoyed this book.
This is horror done well. I was a bit disappointed in the ending, a bit too corny for my taste and not so in keeping with the atmosphere of the rest of the book.
Overall however, I recommend this.
This is horror done well. I was a bit disappointed in the ending, a bit too corny for my taste and not so in keeping with the atmosphere of the rest of the book.
Overall however, I recommend this.
I am giving this one a 3.5. I don't know. Like it was a good book, I will give it that. However, I just did not like how slow and anticlimactic it was.
I feel like the author should have picked up the pace with some things in this book because at the end I felt like I wasn't given enough.
I liked the characters a lot, hence the 3.5 instead of just a 3. However, if this book was rewritten I would like the author to add more twist and turns. Stella, the main character, does go through quite a bit of character development which I enjoyed.
I also liked the romance in this novel as well, it wasn't overdone and wasn't a main part of the story so the main plot line didn't have to take a back seat. However again I am giving this book a 3.5 because it was just so so slow...
I feel like the author should have picked up the pace with some things in this book because at the end I felt like I wasn't given enough.
I liked the characters a lot, hence the 3.5 instead of just a 3. However, if this book was rewritten I would like the author to add more twist and turns. Stella, the main character, does go through quite a bit of character development which I enjoyed.
I also liked the romance in this novel as well, it wasn't overdone and wasn't a main part of the story so the main plot line didn't have to take a back seat. However again I am giving this book a 3.5 because it was just so so slow...
I was a little apprehensive before reading this book because I' not a huge fan of horror stories, however I found this book to be deliciously, cleverly creepy. I read it over the course of two days because I just had to see what happened! I've read several other reviews that claim that the characters, especially Stella and Zoey, are very unlikeable, however I found them to be a must more realistic portrayal of teenage girls than many other books I've read. Yes, they have tendencies for melodrama and selfishness, but that actually made me like them more because I could really see myself and my friends having similar fights and interactions.
The writing was entertaining and full of imagery, and the description of the small town could have placed it almost anywhere, inducing even more connection to the creepiness of the story. if you're looking for fantastic literature I'm not sure that this is for you, however if you want a creepy, spooky story that is well-written and entertaining, then this book is worth a try.
Note: there is a lot of talk about sex, drinking and violence so would probably be best for mature teenagers
The writing was entertaining and full of imagery, and the description of the small town could have placed it almost anywhere, inducing even more connection to the creepiness of the story. if you're looking for fantastic literature I'm not sure that this is for you, however if you want a creepy, spooky story that is well-written and entertaining, then this book is worth a try.
Note: there is a lot of talk about sex, drinking and violence so would probably be best for mature teenagers
