Living
together unsupervised, five troubled teens confront demonic forces and are
compelled to deal with their problems in distinctly different ways. Paranormal
meets psycho meets Goth in this story of a supernatural haunting and budding
love.
High
school junior, Ben, hacks into his step-father's real estate holdings and
provides rooms in an old two-story house to various outcasts: the schizophrenic
kid, the angry Goth girl, and the homeless girl who worships him. When Megan
needs a place to live she comes to the rooming house with a different set of
problems and the ability to confuse and attract Ben.
One by one strange and mysterious occurrences
stretch the teens’ beliefs in the supernatural. How they deal with demons, real
and imagined, has tragic as well as redeeming consequences.
First
line: “Emily knew the precise moment that Ben returned, she felt him in her
scars.”
I was actually really
disappointed with this book. I was expected a huge thriller. Something creepy
from start to end. It was just too unbelievable for me. Sure it’s a paranormal
story, but it seemed like the characters would just go on with their normal
lives after some freak of nature incident. I couldn’t get into it.
Honestly, if the
paranormal was taken out, I might like it more. The characters are people with
a lot of problems and I’d like to hear more about their stories without demons
and such. Ben is the cute guy who is way too mature for his age; Megan is the
teen mom who’s fighting for custody; Emily is the cutter; Cori is the druggie;
and Chuck/Adam is the schizophrenic. These teens all end up living together
without parental supervision. Without the paranormal, this would have created a
really interesting story.
But there is paranormal
stuff going on. Mostly demonic possession. By the end of the book I was
starting to notice that it was really a religious thing. All the characters who
happened to get possessed were those who were weak, without a god, and
susceptible to the possessions. The possession scenes were super creepy, but I
feel like they could have been incorporated into the book in a better way.
Overall, I probably
wouldn’t recommend this, sadly. I had high hopes for this book, but was let
down.
