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A review by kimiloughlin
The Bone Weaver's Orchard by Sarah Read
3.0
This was my first foray into horror... maybe not ever but definitely in a long time. While this was a great spooky October read, I often felt let down by the direction and depth of the plot. Charley Winslow is sent to school for the sons of military fathers after his mother dies and his father is busy in Cairo. When his new friend disappears, only to be brushed off as a runaway, Charley starts snooping around the mysterious school with it's crumbled East Wing and many secret doors and passageways. Turns out, boys have gone missing for years and nobody's done anything about it.
I was very enticed by the prospect of a haunted school and definitely got excited to read and find out what was happening. I sympathized with Charley and his forays with school bullies and unsympathetic masters. There were definitely elements of creepy crawlies that had my spine tingling as well as a who-can-he-trust feeling that had you on the edge of your seat. However, I couldn't really suspend my disbelief for the plot. The novel was very much grounded in a horrible reality which meant that these various missing boys and crumbling wing that somehow held the key to the whole mystery was left unmonitored and undiscovered for years (aka nothing magical or unexplainable). I can kind of understand the townspeople not doing anything because of their close relation to the school, either as workers, family/friends of workers, or relationship to the Headmaster and former family of the Earl, but I found it kind of crazy that the families of the boys who disappeared never raised any red flags. I don't want to spoil anything but it seems that at least one boy has disappeared every year for decades and through lies to the family feigning illness or truancy of the boys, somehow no one was the wiser. Sure, all these families are military families so they might be busy elsewhere or might not want to question authorities but with the sheer level of destruction in the end, I was unconvinced this could have been hidden for so long.
I really liked the creepy setup of the one-time Abbey. The school was previously the residence of an Earl and his family for generations and previous to that (or contemporaneous, I wasn't sure), an Abbey for the town. When it was converted to a school, all the gravestones were removed and put in the crypt but no bodies were moved. It seems that bones often turn up when graves get upended which is spectacularly creepy. I do wish that tied into the plot a bit more but it definitely set the tone up well for me.
All in all, it was a fine read though I wanted a little bit more from it. This definitely would make a great spooky mini-series as well.
I was very enticed by the prospect of a haunted school and definitely got excited to read and find out what was happening. I sympathized with Charley and his forays with school bullies and unsympathetic masters. There were definitely elements of creepy crawlies that had my spine tingling as well as a who-can-he-trust feeling that had you on the edge of your seat. However, I couldn't really suspend my disbelief for the plot. The novel was very much grounded in a horrible reality which meant that these various missing boys and crumbling wing that somehow held the key to the whole mystery was left unmonitored and undiscovered for years (aka nothing magical or unexplainable). I can kind of understand the townspeople not doing anything because of their close relation to the school, either as workers, family/friends of workers, or relationship to the Headmaster and former family of the Earl, but I found it kind of crazy that the families of the boys who disappeared never raised any red flags. I don't want to spoil anything but it seems that at least one boy has disappeared every year for decades and through lies to the family feigning illness or truancy of the boys, somehow no one was the wiser. Sure, all these families are military families so they might be busy elsewhere or might not want to question authorities but with the sheer level of destruction in the end, I was unconvinced this could have been hidden for so long.
I really liked the creepy setup of the one-time Abbey. The school was previously the residence of an Earl and his family for generations and previous to that (or contemporaneous, I wasn't sure), an Abbey for the town. When it was converted to a school, all the gravestones were removed and put in the crypt but no bodies were moved. It seems that bones often turn up when graves get upended which is spectacularly creepy. I do wish that tied into the plot a bit more but it definitely set the tone up well for me.
All in all, it was a fine read though I wanted a little bit more from it. This definitely would make a great spooky mini-series as well.