We have seven books in our latest round-up, four of which are YA level, and the three others are Middle Grade. Actually, this is a very strong collection of titles, all of which would be worthy additions to any school library or gift for your favourite niece or nephew. This cool mix features highly recommended Middle Grade novels, Daka Hermon’s debut Hide and Seeker and Kate Alice Marshall’s Thirteen, which is an impressive change of direction from her excellent YA novel Rules for Vanishing which we have previously recommended. All four YA novels featured are top notch, however, The River has Teeth, the second novel by Erica Waters is particularly terrific and she is an author to watch and a powerful new voice in YA fiction. If you have not read her debut Ghost Wood Song, it is unmissable and was deservedly shortlisted for the YA Bram Stoker Award. Over the last couple of years, we have regularly commented on the disappearance of the male narrative from modern YA horror fiction. How many do we have in the four YA novels featured today? A bit fat zero. This worrying trend continues. Publishers take note: teenage boys also need to see themselves reflected within horror fiction. If you have any Middle Grade or YA fiction you would like reviewed on the site, then please get in touch, (details can be found here). Elley Cooper – The Taker (Two Original Creepshow Novels)In an interesting development, with the Creepshow adult horror brand which has been reenergised by the Shudder TV channel, dipping its toes into horror fiction for children. This was a good read if it finds the right hands, first up, it is not YA and definitely Middle Grade. Amazon lists this as age 12-18 which is incorrect and not a true reflection on the book I read, which I would categorise as 9-12 and even if pegged at that age range it lacked scares. Each of the two stories The Taker and Pretty Polly are solid one-hundred-page novellas, which are perfect for kids who are looking for gateway horror and a few chills. They also have a cool retro feel to them, respecting the style of the original 1982 Creepshow, with both stories beginning in comic format. If you are looking for way of comparison, the stories are slightly more advanced than Goosebumps, but not as challenging as the legendary Point Horror series. The Taker kicks the duology off, with Bea moving into a new house which she quickly realises is haunted. However, she befriends the ghost and soon the supernatural being interlopes on the rest of her life when it gets jealous of her attempts to get onto the school dance team. The paranormal story is balanced by Bea’s attempts to fit in at school and takes in bullying and peer pressure. It was a solid page-turner, but an adult reader will see the ending coming from a mile away. Pretty Polly concerns an animal loving boy who lives with his mum, with his loser dad in the background continually letting him down. Answering an advert in the newspaper Casey rehouses a parrot called Dorien. This is no normal bird and soon the boy tracks Dorien’s previous owners and starts answering questions about his suspicions. Elley Cooper, who has also written for the Five Nights at Freddys franchise, returns with a second Creepshow collection The Cursed soon and I look forward to this next instalment. But if Shudder is looking to get into the YA book market, they need to up both the scares with meatier plots and more challenging characters. AGE 9-12. Daka Hermon - Hide and SeekerI thoroughly enjoyed Daka Hermon’s debut Hide and Seeker, it was also refreshing to read a book with a boy as the main character, as they seem to be in short supply these days! This was a Middle Grade book which kids aged around 10-12 will have a lot of fun with, as it adds a strange twist to the traditional game of hide and seek which results in a rash of disappearances in the close-knit neighbourhood where the story is set. It has some good chills, nice character developments and solid pace which will have kids turning the pages quickly. Those who like a spooky story are going to speed through Hide and Seeker in no time at all. Hide and Seeker has an outstanding opening, main character Justin has not seen his best friend Zee for over a year. He disappeared, but now upon his return Justin and other local kids have been invited to Zee’s house for a welcome home party. Nobody knows where he has been. However, things do not go as planned as Zee is not the same boy who vanished and soon a harmless game of hide and seek is followed by the abduction of another child. Could they be connected? Before long, the disappearances are traced to what happened to Zee and Justin and his motley band of friends find themselves going up against a boogieman type creature called ‘The Seeker’. The ten-year-old version of myself would have loved this book and I hope Daka Hermon sticks with horror. AGE 10-12 Kate Alice Marshall – ThirteenWhen a book is plugged as “Coraline meets Stranger Things” I would normally think “yeah, yeah, no chance” but Kate Alice Marshall’s Middle Grade debut Thirteen just about pulls it off and works hard to justify that cool quote. I was greatly impressed by Marshall’s YA novel Rules For Vanishing (2019) which was nominated for the YA Bram Stoker Award and if this author keeps up this incredibly high standard, she is surely a star in the making. Thirteen is such an engaging gateway supernatural novel I would happily recommend it to strong readers from the age of ten and up. The story involves a sleepy town which has a dark secret, every thirteen years in Eden Eld three thirteen-year-olds disappear, which is part of an ancient pact going back to the 1850s. This is a really peculiar place and the way in which the supernatural is integrated into the story is cleverly done, doubling up with a terrifically well-paced plot which is guaranteed to have young readers turning the pages at speed. This novel also has a great villain, kids are going to love the dastardly ‘Mr January’ and the powerful hold he has over the place they call home. Another major strength of Thirteen are the lovely engaging three main characters, Eleanor, Pip and Otto. These terrific children show the difference between Middle Grade and YA as the three youngsters become fast friends, without teen stuff or love interests getting in the way of their friendship or the plot. Eleanor is returning to the town after many years away and has a difficult relationship with her mother, who also comes from Eden Eld. On her first day at school Eleanor meets Pip and Otto and together they get sucked into a supernatural mystery which was very cleverly structured and top loaded with great ideas, such as the colour being sucked out of the town or pretending not to see ghosts. Thirteen was a winner from start to finish and is going straight onto my school reading lists. AGE 10-13 Mindy McGinnis – The Initial InsultSince Mindy McGinnis’s debut back in 2013 she has authored a further ten novels, but I think this might be her debut on Ginger Nuts of Horror. I am a big fan of this author who I would not classify her as a horror author, she however has an impressively wide range of fiction which began with the superb duology Not a Drop to Drink (2013) and In a Handful of Dust (2014). I still regularly recommend this pair in my library and they are one of my favourite environmental themed dystopian series. I notice also that she has a co-author credit for City of the Dead with James Patterson, which is out later this year, continuing the spin-off series of Maximum Ride, which we have featured in the past. Considering Mindy writes varied YA fiction her latest, The Initial Insult, is perhaps the closest she has come to writing a traditional horror novel, top heavy with a slice of spiky modern America teen drama. And in the background lurks a major nod to Edgar Allan Poe which is threaded through the novel via names, locations, being buried alive and even a cat (kind of). This is the first part of a duology which one of the blurb notes is “Perfect for fans of One of Us Is Lying and Truly Devious!” I’m not sure about that, this was significantly darker than both those books, but for those who enjoy pitch black thrillers, cynical teenagers, twists and moody atmosphere this book delivers in spades. This very dark mystery is told in alternating points of view which is built around a friendship which unravelled a few years earlier. Tress Montor’s family disappeared seven years previously whilst driving her best friend, Felicity Turnado, home and now lives with her drunken grandfather at what locals refer to as the “White Trash Zoo”, which is where one of the big Poe references come into play. The second narrative is seen from Felicity’s point of view, who is one of the most popular girls in the school but has her own secrets and complex issues regarding Tress. Much of the interaction between the two girls is normal feuding teen stuff, before it begins to hot up and Tress forces the issue, believing her ex-best friend really does know what happened to her parents all those years ago, and uses another Poe favourite to seek out the truth, or at least revenge. This was a great read and will be too bleak for many teen tastes, but McGinnis nails the Poe inspired teen angst perfectly. AGE 14+ Goldy Moldavsky - The Last GirlIf Riley Sager were to write a YA novel it might turn out something like The Last Girl, the latest release from Goldy Moldavsky, who has several other entertaining YA thrillers, including the entertaining Kill the Boy Band (2016). The blurb sells the book story as “Scream meets Gossip Girl with a dash of One of Us is Lying” which is an eye-catching way of selling what is a very clever, twisting thriller which has an author who is surely a massive horror film fan. Who knows whether the average teen reader of today will pick up on the multiple horror film references which populate this novel, but I certainly had fun with them. Whether any seventeen-year-old girl would truly go to the cinema (on her own) to watch Evil Dead 2 I’m not sure, but if true she would be a dream date for most male horror fans! The novel kicks off a year after Rachel Chavez survives a knife attack in her own home and in the aftermath has emotional problems which result in her changing schools for a fresh start. Once in the new school she struggles to make friends and becomes an easy target for the cool school bullies. However, whilst trying to start a new life she never quite escapes her past, which is a key part of the story. For much of the story The Last Girl reads like a teen drama with Rachel doing her best to negotiate high school, which is populated with unlikable, spoilt and unpleasant teenager characters which just get worse as the story progresses. At a certain point she gets recruited into the Mary Shelley Club, who are fanatics obsessed with horror films and ultimately scaring people. Membership is very select, and they do not fraternise with each other whist at school and carry out Fear Tests, which are comparable to complex dares or pranks which aim to scare the living daylights out of whichever sucker is the target. However, as things escalate Rachel begins to be reminded of her assault the previous year. Although the novel has considerable fun with familiar horror tropes the various Fear Tests tested my patience and I cared little for these spoilt posh rich kids, with Rachel even letting her best friend down. It was not a deep book, was a light read and has a tremendous twist at the end which I am sure teen readers will really enjoy. I would not be surprised at all to see The Last Girl make it to the screens, after all everybody loves a Final Girl. AGE 13+ Gaby Triana – Moon ChildGaby Triana has a number of novels, across different genres, but Moon Child was the first time I had tried her fiction and I look forward to dipping into her back catalogue. This was another novel with a great catch phrase which I thought would be very difficult to live up to, however, Moon Child makes a rock-solid attempt of truly being “The Craft meets The Shining in this slow-burn Florida gothic horror.” Religious conflict lies at the heart of this engaging story as eighteen-year-old Cuban American Valentina Callejas has been brought up very close to the Catholic Church, with both a dominating mother and grandmother in a very close-knit Latin community in which tradition comes first. However, Valentina has a secret interest in tarot cards and the occult which guiltily clashes with her strict Catholic upbringing. After a bust up with her family, and a refusal to stay on a church retreat, she heads to visit her half-sister (whom she has never met) and finds her welcoming, warm, and completely different from her immediate family. There was a lot going on in Valentina’s life, even before we get to the horror. Whilst out exploring, close to where her sister lives, Valentina discovers an abandoned hotel which sits beside a lake and inside the building meets a group of teenagers, who claim to have been waiting for her to complete their magic circle. After getting over her suspicions, Valentina realises the group all have slightly different magical gifts and are trying to open a supernatural entryway to the spirit world. However, although Valentine is delighted to make new friends, she senses a much darker presence in the hotel, connected to its sinister past as a mental hospital. Things quickly hot up and the supernatural element develops in the second half of the story, nicely tying into Valentina’s complex family history. This was a very convincing blend of supernatural and family drama, made even more so by the flashbacks to an unpleasant sexual experience Valentina had with a boy at the church camp the previous year. Readers are going to have a lot of fun with this spunky teenage girl as she goes on her own voyage of discovery and tries to leave her Catholic guilt in the past and be accepted for who she is. AGE 13+ ERICA WATERS – THE RIVER HAS TEETHWe often hear about the second ‘difficult’ album or novel in which the creative juices which fed the debut struggle to flow, however the second release from Erica Waters completely blows this old wife’s tale from the water. The River Has Teeth is a superb second novel and considering that Ghost Wood Song (2020) was a highly accomplished debut, this is an author to watch very closely and if she continues writing dark/horror YA fiction is destined to become a major new voice in the genre. Although the plots of her two novels are completely different, they have some similarities when it comes to themes, music (bluegrass to be precise) dominated Erica’s debut and although it does not do so in her second novel, it does play a role of some significance. Also, both novels feature bi-sexual female teenage characters who financially struggle and might be described as coming from the wrong side of the tracks. Erica convincingly gives these marginalised teens a voice. If you read and enjoyed Ghost Wood Song, you will absolutely adore The River Has Teeth. It hums with its own type of magic, which is so vibrant, believable, and beautifully described you will probably end up totally emersed in it. The action takes place in a small town in Tennessee where teenage girls have been disappearing and seventeen-year-old Della believes her mother to be the culprit. Della’s families are what we would probably term ‘hillbillies’ and live in a ramshackle house outside of town and make ends meet by selling remedies and potions to superstitious locals. Della is the youngest of a long family line of witches whose magic is connected to the area of land where they live and cultivate for the potions they create and make a living from. However, Della believes the magic has gone bad and this has turned her mother into a creature when night comes (don’t worry it’s not a vampire or werewolf) and as the police and others come snooping what can the teenager do to protect her dangerous mother? The story is told via a split first-person narrative, between Della and Natasha, whose sister is one of the disappeared girls. Natasha comes from a rich family but has her own problems from being adopted and accepting she is bisexual. After the police draw a blank Natasha comes to Della for help and after an initial personality clash the novel documents their developing friendship, secrets, and more. The River has Teeth was convincing on several levels and although magic never dominated the novel, it had an earthy type of feel to it and within the constraints of the book and the way the family operated was excellent. The conflict between the two teenagers, and developing friendship, was also a pleasure to read, both having their own problems, issues and clashes. The way in which everything came together was top notch writing, and I enjoyed the fact that the killer was not the most obvious character (or the second most obvious) helping build a very satisfying finish. Both novels by Erica Waters have specialised in giving the reader terrific ‘outsider’ characters to root behind and I cannot wait to see what this she gives us next. AGE 13+ Tony Jones TODAY ON THE GINGER NUTS OF HORROR WEBSITE |
Archives
April 2023
|