The Suffering by Rin Chupeco

Title: The Suffering
Author: Rin Chupeco
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Release Date: Sept 8, 2015
Rating: 5/5

The Gist: It’s been two years since Tark Halloway’s nightmare ended. Free from the evil spirit that haunted him all his life, he now aids the ghostly Okiku and avenges the souls of innocent children by hunting down their murderers. But when Okiku becomes responsible for a death at his high school, Tark begins to wonder if they’re no better than the killers they seek out.

When an old friend disappears in Aokigahara, Japan’s infamous ‘suicide forest’, both must resolve their differences and return to that country of secrets to find her.

Because there is a strange village inside Aokigahara, a village people claim does not exist. A village where strange things lie waiting.

A village with old ghosts and an ancient evil – one that may be stronger than even Okiku…

Review:

We rejoin Tark and Okiku two years after the events of The Girl From The Well.  The pair are still hunting for spirits and chasing down murderers.  Their relationship has grown into something even closer than friendship but that means that Tark doesn't have much of a social life either.  Okiku has agreed to hunt by his rules, until she decides to prevent a murder rather than punishing one.  This leads Tark to question whether they are the good guys after all.

When I saw this title come up for review I clicked right away and didn't even read the synopsis.  As such, I had no idea that it was going to be about Aokigahara - Japan's "Suicide Forest".  That fact alone sets us up for some serious terror.  If you haven't heard of this place go ahead, google.  I'll wait.

Done? Right, so just the name gives me the shivers and I don't think I would ever be one of those brave souls willing to enter.  Of course when their old friend, Kagura, goes missing, Tark has no other choice but to walk into one of the most haunted places on the planet.  To make matter worse, the spirits in the forest are connected with Earth, which has a serious advantage over Okiku's water based ones.  Tark has to take on a much stronger role in order to compensate for the fact that Okiku is often out of commission.  

Inside the forest we find the mysterious lost village.  Something dark and horrifying has happened to the residents of the town and one man's greed has led to some of the most terrifying ghosts that Tark has ever encountered.  The story itself is very fast paced and creepy in a way that will definitely appeal to horror fans, especially those who love the Japanese take on the genre.  There are terrifying ghosts, heart-pounding scenes, and a mystery which all add up to a read that you won't want to put down (unless it gets dark out and you are home alone and you can't take it anymore - I mean, I wouldn't know anything about that......)

The Suffering also holds an underlying thread of love and friendship.  In the years since the events of the first book, Tark and Okiku have grown closer and have built a life together.  Through the ending of this novel, we get to see just how dedicated Tark is to their relationship and just how far he will go to maintain their connection.  It really develops the characters and their relationship and gives me high hopes for their being another book in this series as I am just not ready to let them go yet!    

Bottom Line: I liked it even better than the first.  Give me more!

Teaching/Parental Notes:

Age: 13 and up
Sex: Kissing
Violence: Fist fighting, Ghost attacks - sometimes bloody, 
Inappropriate Language: Asshole, Bitch, Whore, Shit, Bastard, 
Substance Use/Abuse: Underage drinking

Great For Readers Who Loved:

Spelled by Betsy Schow

Title: Spelled
Author: Betsy Schow
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Release Date: June 2, 2015
Rating: 4/5

Cover Impressions: Loooooooove this cover.  The shoes are so sparkly and a great updated version of the ruby slippers.  The font in evil villain green is pretty classic as is the curl of the smoke around the magic mirror. 

The Gist: Fairy Tale Survival Rule #32: If you find yourself at the mercy of a wicked witch, sing a romantic ballad and wait for your Prince Charming to save the day.

Yeah, no thanks. Dorthea is completely princed out. Sure being the crown princess of Emerald has its perks—like Glenda Original ball gowns and Hans Christian Louboutin heels. But a forced marriage to the brooding prince Kato is so not what Dorthea had in mind for her enchanted future.

Talk about unhappily ever after.

Trying to fix her prince problem by wishing on a (cursed) star royally backfires, leaving the kingdom in chaos and her parents stuck in some place called "Kansas." Now it's up to Dorthea and her pixed off prince to find the mysterious Wizard of Oz and undo the curse...before it releases the wickedest witch of all and spells The End for the world of Story.

Review:

Like many princesses she knows, Dorothea is cursed.  A wicked witch put a spell on one of her ancestors that she would burn the entire world, but she messed up and it skipped a generation, or many.  Without knowing WHICH princess was a dangerous to the world as they knew it, all the women in Dorothea's line have been forced to stay within the castle walls.  As if that isn't bad enough, Dorothea must endure a long line of suitors hoping to gain her hand, and control of the kingdom.  When her insurmountable mother finally settles things by choosing a husband for her, Dorothea wishes that everything could be different - until it is.  With her kingdom in shambles, her parents missing and an evil witch taking up her mother's crown, Dorothea makes a run for it.  She is accompanied by Kato, her not so handsome anymore Prince, and Rexi, the servant with a loud mouth and sticky fingers.  With nothing to go on but the cryptic directions of her own green-skinned witch, the trio attempt to escape the witch and restore the rules of magic to the kingdom.

Spelled is a truly fun novel.  It takes place in a world where fairy tale kingdoms are melded together like squares on a quilt.  This allows for some really amusing connections between the various characters and worlds.  There are connections to The Wizard of Oz, like Dorothea's love of designer footwear and her guardian/witch named Verte, that are bound to make any reader smile.  The author also makes references to modern day words, but with a fairy tale twist.  And ebook is an enchanted book where the pictures move.  The storage area for all things is, literally, the cloud.  These pepper the plot with humor and were such an amusing touch. 

The main characters are interesting, if not overly complex.  Dorothea's character development is the standard spoiled brat learns to be a better person, which is fine.  She also has some internal turmoil over the use of her powers and whether she is the hero of the story or the villain.  Kato is a little dull as love interests go.  I think I liked him more when he couldn't talk.  Rexi, on the other hand, has some of the best lines in the book.  Despite being a servant, she is certainly not subservient and refuses to bow down to the royals and is constantly sniping at one or both of them.  She also has a serious issue with stealing anything that isn't nailed down, which sometimes comes in handy, and other times gets them into trouble.  I am really hoping that any subsequent books go a little further into her backstory as I am curious how she came to live at the palace with such an anti-royal attitude. 

Where Spelled really shines is in its side characters.  We have a wizard with a serious Dorothy obsession, a massive Chimera with a heart of gold and Hydra - who switches heads AND personalities (not to mention mixing spells in a crockpot!)  The world these characters inhabit is equally strange and wondrous, with new surprises around every turn.  I was slightly disappointed in the villain.  We just didn't spend enough time with Griz (at least when she wasn't tossing lightning balls) to really flesh out her character and make her truly terrifying. 

Each chapter in Spelled starts out with a quote or rule from fairy tale characters or books.  My favorite was:

"There's nothing really to fear but fear itself.  And trolls.  Fear and trolls.  Oh, and I guess gigans and dragons too.  And can't forget wicked witches. Yeah, I guess there really is a lot to fear."

- Prince Charming, excerpt from an interview in Hero Beat

These add an extra sense of amusement and charm to the novel.  The plot is non-stop, with lots of action.  We have Kingdoms being torched, houses falling from the sky and a giant tinman bent on destruction.  The main characters face traitors and deception from all sides and the reader is left guessing who they can trust up to the very last minute.  While nothing has been mentioned about this being the first book in a series, it is pretty clear from the ending that there is more to the story and we have yet to see the last of Dorothea, her shape shifting fiance or their foul-mouthed friend.  I, for one, will definitely be waiting on the next one.   

Teaching/Parental Notes:

Age: 12 and up
Sex:  Kissing
Violence: Knifeplay, Death by Magic, Death by Drowning, 
Inappropriate Language: None
Substance Use/Abuse: None

Great For Readers Who Loved:

Flunked by Jen Calonita

Title: Flunked
Author: Jen Calonita
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Release Date: March 3rd, 2015
Rating: 2/5

Cover Impressions: I love the fun, magical vibe of this cover.  It has just enough details to keep the eye moving without becoming overwhelming.  I so wish the inside had maintained the standard of the outside.

The Gist: Would you send a villain to do a hero's job? An exciting new twisted fairy tale series from award-winning author Jen Calonita.

Full of regret, Cinderella's wicked stepmother, Flora, has founded the Fairy Tale Reform School with the mission of turning the wicked and criminally mischievous into upstanding members of Enchantasia.

Impish, sassy 12-year-old Gilly has a history of petty theft and she's not too sorry about it. When she lifts a hair clip, she gets tossed in reform school-for at least three months. But when she meets fellow students Jax and Kayla, she learns there's more to this school than its sweet mission. There's a battle brewing and she starts to wonder: can a villain really change?

Review:
Oh so much potential.  I love fairy tale books.  I read a ton of them and I enjoy seeing each other's personal take on that world.  This story has a pretty good premise: a reform school for kids from fairy tale villages who had fallen on the wrong side of the law.  It should have been fun, it should have been charming, it should have been edited!  Flunked felt like it was written by one of my students.  There was an overwhelming amount of dialogue and very little exposition.  The entire plot was revealed by characters telling rather than the author showing anything.  The narrator had an annoying habit of adding thoughts in parenthesis that just made me roll my eyes with how false they sounded. 

"We cross to another classroom (Wand Training! Who knew?)"
"Someone from Happily Ever After Scrolls is trying to sell magical scrolls (their latest invention)"
"Ogres are running at top speed (for them)."
 
There was no character development whatsoever other than the main character having some out of the blue change of heart at the end that came off preachy and unrealistic.

While the world itself was interesting, nothing was really all that different from the traditional fairy tales.  There was so much thrown at the reader at once and it felt like the author was trying to cram in as many references as possible.  This created a completely convoluted plot that had WAY too many villains, several of whom only showed up in the last 10 pages or so.  This left no time to allow the reader to develop feelings toward any of the characters and it made it incredibly difficult to keep all the bad guys straight (especially since we hadn't even met 2 or 3 of them - only heard about them through other characters).  Eventually, I just stopped caring.

I realize that this is a middle grade novel - but give the kids some credit. They need well written books too. If you are looking for a middle grade book with fairy tale connections - try The School for Good and Evil instead.  It has all the fairy tale elements without the poor writing. 

Teaching/Parental Notes:

Age: Any

Sex: None
Violence: Magical spells, no one seriously injured. 
Inappropriate Language: None
Substance Use/Abuse: None

Unanswered Questions:

If this is a school.  Why did she only attend like one class?

The Girl From The Well by Rin Chupeco

Title: The Girl From The Well
Author: Rin Chupeco
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Release Date: August 5, 2014
Rating: 4/5

Cover Impressions:  It was the description of this one that really drew me in.  I am hoping for a re-vamp of the cover as this one just doesn't do the creepy nature of this novel justice.  I wanted to see Okiku featured on the cover.

The Gist: A vengeful spirit is stalking those who murder children and teens.  She seeks revenge on the one who scorned and killed her hundreds of years ago and moves from city to city seeking out her prey.  On one of these hunts, she encounters Tark, a strange tattooed boy with a dark and sinister force surrounding him.  Through the ghost's eyes, the reader is drawn into Japanese folklore and rituals as Tark and his family try to exorcise the evil that is threatening to escape.

Review:
I read this book, cover to cover, in just a few hours.  With an almost three year old and pregnant with my second - it takes a special kind of book to get me that involved.  In fact, it has single-handedly ended by several month long reading slump.  My only regret is that this novel was not scheduled for release in October so that I could have read it on a cool crisp night as autumn began to set in. 

The Girl From The Well had me from the very first page.  The writing is just stunning and the way that she talks about death is incredible.

"I am where dead children go.  With other kinds of dead it is different.  Often their souls drift quietly away, like a leaf caught in the throes of a hidden whirlpool; slipping down without sound, away from sight.  They roll and ebb gently with the tides until they sink beneath the waves and I no longer see where they go - like sputtering candlelight, like little embers that burn briefly and brightly for several drawn moments before all their light goes out."

Okiku is not like these gentle spirits.  She is vengeful and cruel to her victims.  She enjoys torturing those who would hurt children and is very inventive in their manner of punishment.  The opening scene of this novel features just such a death.  It is creepy, suspenseful and very well written.  It was like watching the first moments of a truly terrific horror movie.  One of the aspects that I loved was the idea that the victims of these men were tethered to their murderer.  Forced to follow him as he stalked the next child until Okiku ends his reign of terror and sets them free.  Much like Anna Dressed in Blood (which I LOVED) it was very easy to root for the slightly psychotic ghost who murders people in the most brutal of fashions, which is a pretty fun twist on the conventional ghost story. 

The narrative style is very unique.  We watch through Okiku's eyes and most of the other characters spend most or all of their time being referred to by names like The Stained Man or The Smiling Man.  We only begin to see names for them as they become more important to the plot.  We do not even learn Okiku's name until we are quite a ways into the narrative.  These adds and extra sense of mystery to the novel as we are not only waiting to learn what exactly is plaguing Tark, but also the sad story behind Okiku's fate.  While the narrative style make take some getting used to, the plot features great pacing with lots of scary moments and horrifying interludes.  Even as we travel from the states to Japan, there are both small, creepy, moments that make the hair on the back of your neck stand up and those big, intense, scenes that can leaving you reaching to turn on yet another light.

I will fully admit that I know next to nothing about Japanese culture and mythology so, please, correct me if I am wrong but the background here seems very solid and well researched.  I found it very refreshing to read about the folklore of a culture that is so far removed from my own and not just another take on the same old ghost story that I have been reading since childhood.  The one thing I did find a little off-putting is that,once they arrived in Japan, there were a number of Japanese terms that were explained once and then brought up again later.  I could not, for the life of me, remember what those words had meant and I found the plot slowed for me as I tried to remember or sometimes, flip back to locate the meaning.

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this book.  I am definitely recommending this one, especially as a Halloween read, and signing on for Chupeco's next book.


Teaching/Parental Notes:

Age:  15 and up
Sex: None
Violence: Kidnapping, A number of very violent death scenes.
Inappropriate Language: Fag, Bastard, Bitch, Jesus Christ, Prick, Fuck
Substance Use/Abuse: None