Search This Blog
April Reviews Link-Up
May Reviews Link-Up
June Reviews Link-Up
July Reviews Link-Up
August Reviews Link-Up
September Reviews Link-Up
October Reviews Link-Up
November Reviews Link-Up
December Reviews Link-Up
2024 Literary Escapes Challenge
- Alabama
- Alaska
- Arizona
- Arkansas
- California (3)
- Colorado (1)
- Connecticut
- Delaware
- Florida
- Georgia
- Hawaii
- Idaho (2)
- Illinois
- Indiana
- Iowa
- Kansas
- Kentucky
- Louisiana (1)
- Maine (1)
- Maryland
- Massachusetts (1)
- Michigan
- Minnesota
- Mississippi
- Missouri
- Montana
- Nebraska
- Nevada
- New Hampshire
- New Jersey
- New Mexico
- New York (1)
- North Carolina (1)
- North Dakota
- Ohio
- Oklahoma
- Oregon (2)
- Pennsylvania
- Rhode Island
- South Carolina
- South Dakota
- Tennessee (1)
- Texas (1)
- Utah
- Vermont
- Virginia (1)
- Washington
- West Virginia
- Wisconsin
- Wyoming
- Washington, D.C.*
International:
- Australia (1)
- Canada (1)
- England (5)
- France (1)
- Ireland (1)
- Scotland (1)
- The Netherlands (1)
2024 Build Your Library Reading Challenge
Monday, October 04, 2010
The Devouring A Deliciously Creepy Halloween Treat
1:00 AM
(Image from Barnes & Noble)
With Halloween fast approaching, everyone's got monsters on the brain, making it the perfect time to pose this question: What kind of creatures stalk your nightmares? Ghosts? Zombies? Psychotic circus clowns? Or something more mundane like spiders, snakes or wolves? Are your personal horrors, perhaps, of a more practical nature: fire, drowning, hospitals, abandonment, the death of a loved one? Whatever it is you fear, you'll likely find it between the pages of Simon Holt's teenage creepfest, The Devouring. It's like Stephen King with training wheels. But don't let that fool you - I've still got goosebumps.
The book opens with 15-year-old Reggie Holloway reading her 8-year-old brother, Henry, a bedtime story. Their mother (had she not recently walked out the door and not bothered to come back) would no doubt disapprove of sending a young boy off to slumber with such a dark tale, but Reggie's a horror buff whose tastes tend toward the macabre. So, she picks a spooky vignette from a handwritten diary she recently discovered at work. It's about creatures called Vours who steal human souls and inhabit their bodies, something so outlandish even Henry will recognize it as fiction. When Henry starts freaking out, Reggie realizes her mistake. What was she thinking reading him something like that before bedtime? She's so exhausted from playing mom she can barely think straight. And she's gone and spooked herself as well.
In the light of the morning, the whole story seems ridiculous. Except that Henry's changing before her eyes from her sweet little brother into something ... else. He's overdue for a reaction to their mother's swift departure, but his sudden rage seems extreme. Not to mention terrifying. Henry's acting strangely, muttering to himself, and becoming increasingly violent. When a death in their home elicits no reaction whatsoever from her once hypersensitive brother, Reggie's convinced - Henry isn't Henry anymore. He doesn't need a psychiatric evaluation, he needs an exorcism.
Reggie and her best friend, Aaron, will do anything to save Henry. It may already be too late, but they have to try. As they research the origins of the journal, they learn the chilling truth about the Vours. The creatures feed off human fear and Reggie's already terrified. Can she step into her worst nightmares to bring her little brother back? Is saving him even possible or has his soul been ripped from his body forever? The journal says nothing can stop the Vours, but what if it's wrong? And what if it's right? It's up to Reggie to find out.
The Devouring sucked me in so completely that I burned through it in a few short hours. Each page is creepier than the last, with an intense, unrelenting montage of nightmarish horror lurking inside its every paragraph. The heroes are a perfect blend of unique and relatable, frightened and fearless, vulnerable and valiant. Their courage made my heart pound, keeping my eyes seared to the page even when all I really wanted to do was burrow under my blankets, clamp my hands over my eyes, and chant, "It's not real. It's not real." The Devouring's perfect ending made me smile through my shivers. I may be jumping at every single creak the house makes, but I'm also clicking over to my library's website to get my trembling hands on the next installment in this deliciously spooky series.
Book trailers don't usually do much for me. This one, though, just might be creepy enough to do the book justice. Take a look:
Grade: B+
If this were a movie, it would be rated: PG-13 for language (no F-bombs), violence and gore
To the FTC, with love: Another library fine find
1 comment:
Comments make me feel special, so go crazy! Just keep it clean and civil. Feel free to speak your mind (I always do), but be aware that I will delete any offensive comments.
P.S.: Don't panic if your comment doesn't show up right away. I have to approve each one before it posts to prevent spam. It's annoying, but it works!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments
(Atom)
Reading
Listening
Followin' with Bloglovin'
-
Love on Camera1 hour ago
-
-
-
-
The Highgate Cemetery Murder by Irina Shapiro4 hours ago
-
Mistimed Meal: A Review of Vampire Fly5 hours ago
-
Daily Prompt 27 March Wednesday8 hours ago
-
The Silver Swan: Benjamin Black10 hours ago
-
A Death in Denmark - Amulya Malladi11 hours ago
-
Review: Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera12 hours ago
-
-
36. The Luminous Life of Lucy Landry18 hours ago
-
The Spellshop19 hours ago
-
-
Thank you1 day ago
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Top 5 Tuesday ~ Female Authors2 days ago
-
What's up?2 days ago
-
-
-
-
-
-
Review: Beartown1 week ago
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
What Happened to Summer?5 months ago
-
6/25/23 Extra Ezra9 months ago
-
-
-
Sundays with Sam – The Sunday Post11 months ago
-
-
Are you looking for Pretty Books?1 year ago
-
-
-
-
-
Grab my Button!
Blog Archive
- ► 2021 (159)
- ► 2020 (205)
- ► 2019 (197)
- ► 2018 (223)
- ► 2017 (157)
- ► 2016 (157)
- ► 2015 (188)
- ► 2014 (133)
- ► 2013 (183)
- ► 2012 (193)
- ► 2011 (232)
- ▼ 2010 (257)
- ► 2009 (211)
- ► 2008 (192)
i work at a book store and its book like this one that are popular for teens right now. everything seems to be about the dark side.
ReplyDeleteYou write lovely reviews.