Monthly Archives: November 2024

Lock the Doors – Vincent Ralph

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Sixteen-year-old Tom’s mother has had a string of bad luck with men, but now she is married to Jay, who is exactly who he says he is – a nice guy – and they have recently moved into a brand new house. Not everything is perfect. Jay’s daughter, Nia, is also living with them. She’s a year older and clearly hates Tom. And although the house is Tom’s mom’s dream come true, Tom soon makes an odd discovery. It looks like someone had installed locks on the outside of two of the bedroom doors. Weird, right?

At school, Tom is tagged to show new girl, Amy, around and although Tom is slightly awkward and not all that good with the ladies, he and Amy sort of hit it off. Then Tom discovers that Amy used to live in his old house. As bits and pieces of Amy’s life are revealed Tom starts to think that things just don’t add up. But the more he pushes Amy, the stranger things get. When Tom meets Amy’s family, June and Chris and Amy’s younger brother, Will, and makes some new discoveries in his new home, well – it all makes for page-turning fun.

Tom is a clever and likeable character who suffers from OCD.

I’m worse when I’m worried. On good days, I can touch everything once and sleep like a baby. On the worst days, I check everything twenty or thirty times and only make it halfway up the stairs before doing it all again. I know it’s silly, I know it’s irrational. But it’s part of me, and it’s not going anywhere.

It is perhaps partly his OCD that makes Tom so dogged when it comes to figuring out the truth. It might also be, in part, because of the horrors his mother faced prior to meeting Jay. What if Amy is in trouble? Tom can’t imagine not helping her even if it means getting himself into some scrapes.

Of course, it all comes together perhaps a tad too easily in the end, but I had a good time reading and I think teens who like mysteries will really enjoy this one.

Blackwater – Jeannette Arroyo & Ren Graham

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Blackwater, a YA graphic novel, by Jeannette Arroyo and Ren Graham has a lot going for it. First of all, lots of representation including POC, trans, teens with health issues, werewolves, ghosts. Yes, you read that last part right.

Tony is a high school track star with a side of delinquent. Eli is the new kid who misses a lot of time because of an autoimmune disorder. Neither of these boys has the world’s best home life (Tony’s father works a lot and doesn’t seem all that invested in Tony’s life and Eli’s mother just seems completely checked out, perhaps worn down by her son’s health issues.)

A tentative friendship begins to develop between the two boys. Eventually, Tony has to admit that his feelings towards Eli might be something more than “friends.” Then, there’s an incident in the woods and suddenly Tony is dealing with a lot more than just his feelings.

Blackwater is part ghost-story, part high school drama, part m/m romance. I did feel that it was a little top heavy-so the end felt rushed. That said, it’s an hour of your time and it delivers on themes of acceptance, family and friendship.

Everything We Never Said – Sloan Harlow

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Ella’s senior year of high school is complicated. For one thing, she has to make her way through the days without her bestie, Hayley, by her side. Hayley died in a car accident and Ella is still trying to process her grief and her guilt -she was at the wheel when the car crashed, although she remembers virtually nothing about the accident.

Then there’s the problem of Sawyer, Hayley’s over-the-top hot boyfriend. The three had always been together, but since Hayley’s death she can feel the waves of anger and hate coming off Sawyer and she knows it’s all directed at her. And yet – there’s something else smoldering underneath and pretty soon Ella and Sawyer can’t keep their hands off each other. Of course, they are both aware of the optics of this development, and the fact that they are meeting secretly only heightens their feelings for each other.

But then, plot twist, Hayley’s mother asks Ella to come clean out Hayley’s room – a task she can’t bear to do. It is there she finds Hayley’s diary and although she does deliberate about whether or not she is doing the right thing, Ella gives in to her curiosity and starts to read. What she discovers throws another wrench into her growing feelings for Sawyer and also puts her in danger.

Sloan Harlow’s debut novel Everything We Never Said attempts a lot and succeeds on many levels. I thought I had it figured out early on; there are plenty of red herrings. The book does make some attempt at tackling the topic of domestic violence. It also looks at grief and friendship. Sometimes the characters seem a bit shrill and other times way too passive. I found the sex scenes a bit much – not that I don’t believe that seventeen-year-olds are intimate, but I found some of the dialogue a little cringe-y. The last third moves at a quick pace, with one or two surprises in store.

It’s a solid debut.

Hell Followed With Us – Andrew Joseph White

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Andrew Joseph White claims his debut novel Hell Followed With Us was written because he was angry. On his website, we’re told “His work focuses on the intersection of transgender and autistic identity through the lens of horror, monstrosity, violence, and rage.” Got that right.

Benji is on the run. His father has just been killed and the Angels and their Graces are hunting him down, except that there is not really any place to go. That’s because these people – part of the cult that raised Benji – have unleased Armageddon via The Flood, decimating the world’s population.

The hellscape of the world White imagines is unlike anything I have ever read before. This is a world devoid of humanity, where goods are bartered with the exchange of human ears, where the monsters are

made of corpses and the Flood – sharpened ribs lining its back in a row of spines, eyeballs blinking between sinew, muscles so swollen they split the skin

At the beginning of the novel, when Benji is recaptured by the Angels, it is not so they can kill him: he’s important to the cult because he is a Seraph, or about to become one anyway. He has the power to control the Graces and The Flood and also, his mother is kind of a big deal at New Nazareth. Before they can get Benji back to New Nazareth, though, he is rescued by a ragtag group of teen resistors from the local Acheson LGBTQ+ Centre (ALC). It is his relationship with these people, specifically the handsome sharp-shooter, Nick, that propels Benji on a dangerous mission to take down New Nazareth once and for all.

Hell Followed With Us is an allegorical tale. Before Benji was Benji, he was Esther, betrothed to Theo. At their engagement ceremony, Benji’s mother tries to find a passage about marriage, something that would “hammer home” Benji’s role as a wife, something that could “beat the boy” out of him. Throughout the novel, Benji struggles to find acceptance and while the monsters might be dreamt from Whites very scary imagination, the big ideas- of acceptance, or personal autonomy, of the dangers of blindly following are anything but fiction.

Great read.

Midnight on Beacon Street – Emily Ruth Verona

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Despite suffering from crippling panic attacks, Amy is a much sought after babysitter. Tonight, she is looking after siblings Ben, 6, and his older sister Mira, 12, while their single mother, Eleanor, is out on a date. Amy likes Eleanor, and she likes babysitting there because her boyfriend, Miles, is not only welcome to visit, Eleanor “encourages it.” For someone who hasn’t had the best luck with relationships, she’s relatively smitten with the idea of Amy and Miles and their young love.”

Amy orders pizza and waits on the arrival of Miles. She’s brought a couple horror movies, her favourite genre. There’s something about them that calms her down, strange as she knows that sounds.

Emily Ruth Verona’s debut Midnight on Beacon Street begins at the end.

The blood beneath Ben’s bare feet is too fresh to be sticky. It’s hard not to slip. And so, the little boy holds still – so very still. Stiller than he has ever held before.

This is six minutes after midnight. The novel is non-linear, jumping back and forth to various points earlier in the night, but also to a time six years before, when Amy is being sat by Sadie, “a bright-eyed, fresh-faced fifteen-year-old girl.”

Amy’s night does not go as planned. There are several unexpected visitors; Mira is sullen; Ben is withdrawn. And the whole thing culminates with Ben standing in a pool of blood in the kitchen. Although not particularly swift moving (the novel clocks in just under 200 pages, but it isn’t a fast read), I found it entertaining. Amy is a terrific character and the novel nods and winks at all your favourite horror movies and tropes.