Weekly Reader: Girl Gone Ghost by Dawn Husted; Terrifying and Spooky YA Novel About Ghosts and Murder

 

Weekly Reader: Girl Gone Ghost by Dawn Husted; Terrifying and Spooky YA Novel About Ghosts and Murder

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: Girl Gone Ghost by Dawn Husted is a terrifying and spooky YA novel about a teenage girl haunted by the ghost of her deceased best friend.

Sonora Stewart is a high school cheerleader and popular girl when her best friend, Magnolia is murdered. More than likely, she was killed by the Creekside Killer, a local serial murderer who killed several young women but has yet to be identified. 

Sonora is naturally depressed. She is unable to enjoy things that she used to like hanging out with her boyfriend, Chris (especially since Magnolia dated Chris's twin brother, Cooper.). She withdraws from her well-meaning parents and is just floating along in school. She would talk to her older brother, Bram, but he has been out of touch since he moved out and left for college. The only person she can still connect with is her other friend, Rosa, a wild rebel who encourages Sonora's more obstreperous side. Sonora feels lost and adrift without her best friend until she starts seeing Magnolia's ghost and now she feels lost, adrift, and terrified.

Among the more haunting aspects to the book is Magnolia's appearance. This is not a beautiful guardian angel given the task of helping her friend to move on so she can ascend into Heaven. Instead, she is more like a hellacious apparition that frightens Sonora almost to death every time she appears. A smell of rotten fish precedes her arrival. She has one silvery eye that hangs from her socket with worms sometimes peering out from the socket. Water droops from her body to the floor below. Golden hair hangs to her side and her drenched white dress clings to her body. Magnolia's appearance is similar to that of a creature in Alvin Schwartz and Stephen Gimmell's Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark and is about as welcoming. She haunts Sonora so she can learn the truth of what happened to her.

Because of this apparition, Sonora begins to doubt everyone around her, even herself. She is surrounded by suspicious behavior and questions everyone around her to find out what happened to Magnolia. Who is the Creekside Killer anyway? Is the killer Chris, Cooper, or Cooper's new girlfriend, Angela? Is it the strange Goth boy, Lachlan, son of the police investigator who is studying Magnolia's death, especially since Lachlan is taking an interest in Sonora? What about Rosa, did she take her rebellious acts and troublemaking  too far? Is Magnolia's father's suicidal grief just an act or is it sincere? What about Sonora's own father, especially when he shows up with jewelry that looks suspiciously like Magnolia's? Worst of all since Sonora is the only one who can see Magnolia, is Magnolia's ghost real or a hallucination? Can Sonora trust her own mind?

Girl Gone Ghost plays on one of my favorite tropes in the horror genre: the fine line between sanity and madness and whether what we are seeing is real or a manifestation of one's insanity. Husted balances these possibilities very well by providing Sonora with a backstory that suggests Magnolia's arrival could go either way. 

Sonora's grandfather, Paw Paw, has been in a psychiatric hospital for some time so mental illness could be genetic in her family. Not to mention other stuff gets revealed later which causes the Reader to think Sonora's narration is less than reliable.

There are multiple plot twists. A couple twist actually caused this Reader to go back and re-read the earlier chapters just to make sure that she didn't miss something. The final revelation is one that the Reader is completely left unprepared for and that's what makes it a good murder mystery, that the Reader is left in complete surprise at the end. Though there are variations of this ending, the Reader was left unprepared for this ending in this particular context.

Girl Gone Ghost is the type of YA book that is perfect for any lover of mysteries and ghost stories. Just be prepared to feel a chill down the spine and jump with fright at the sound of footsteps nearby while reading. Also, beware of that rotted fish smell.

New Book Alert: Forgive Me by Joy Ellis; Tense and Intricate Short Story About Guilt and Suicide

 New Book Alert: Forgive Me by Joy Ellis; Tense and Intricate Short Story About Guilt and Suicide

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: Sometimes guilt can overwhelm people so much that they will do the most self-destructive acts to make the pain go away. Sometimes that guilt can be exacerbated by reminders, news articles that state the crime, anniversaries of the witnesses, including friends and family members. The guilty party will do anything to end that hurt, including murder and suicide.

That is the premise behind Forgive Me, Joy Ellis' engaging, tense, and intricate stand alone short story about the investigation of a man's presumed suicide and the guilt that preceded it.

PCs Yvonne Craig and Jamie Smith are investigating the death of Arthur Sims. He appeared to have committed suicide, but he seemed like a decent enough guy. He was involved in charities and volunteer organizations and was a staunch Catholic. He was described as a decent, calm, helpful guy. So why would he do it? Why would he leave a note that says "Please forgive me?" Forgiveness for what and who had been sending him threatening notes saying that the sender didn't forget something? What was that something and why would it be so traumatic that it would drive Sims to suicide?

Because of the short length and the fact that they are mostly investigating a suicide not a murder for the most part, there aren't any suspense chases and moments where they are trailing potential suspects. Most of the investigation is done primarily through computers and researching newspaper archives. It may be dull to some mystery Readers, but others may like a bit of realism mixed in with their literature. This is how many investigations are conducted these days. Sometimes it's just a matter of lots of research and finding the right article. Rarely are dangerous criminals apprehended in violent confrontations with a heart stopping confession that reveals all. Because of the realism,,the plot is more subdued but still interesting.

Because the short story is all about the investigation, there is not a whole lot in terms of character development except one moment that is best not revealed. This characterization seems to come ot of nowhere but is good in getting the Reader to question the characters' motives, means, and pre-knowledge of the events.

Aside from the revelation, Craig and Smith are a good team for a short story like this. They don't have time to deal with marital conflicts or family squabbles. They are here to investigate and investigate they do to solve not only the reason for Sims' suicide but also a long buried cold case that can no longer wait to be solved. A cold case in which Sims was involved which haunted him for the rest of his life.

Forgive Me is short, but Ellis does a great job capturing this tension of investigating a death and revealing that sometimes, a person can not run away from past guilt fast or far enough.

New Book Alert: Witness by Simon Maltman; Character Driven Suspense Thriller About Past Crimes and Sins

 

New Book Alert: Witness by Simon Maltman; Character Driven Suspense Thriller About Past Crimes and Sins

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: Witness, Simon Maltman's suspense thriller, shows in graphic detail the proverbial Road to Hell along with the Good Intentions in which said road is paved.

Witness is a tense, edgy, but also character driven novel about Pastor Tom Carter, a Belfast-based minister with the International Church of Tertulian's Trinity (ICOTT). When he was a young man, he was a part of terrorist organizations. However, he has put that all behind him. He is a popular man of the cloth with a large following. He is happily married to Cherry and the father of an adorable daughter, Becky. He even has some far reaching plans to build a youth center that would help street kids, like he used to be, get a new start in life. He just needs some extra money to help build the center.

In a desperate attempt to get that money, Tom appeals to "Uncle" Paul, an old family friend and fellow former terrorist. Well Paul isn't as former as he appears. Even though he had been released from prison, he still has a toe in the old world as Tom learns. Paul says he will hand over the cash if Tom does him a favor.

Meanwhile, there is an extended kidnapping plot in which an unnamed family is abducted by two ruthless kidnappers. At first this subplot is suspenseful but appears unrelated to the main plot until we later learn who the players actually are and how they are linked to the rest of the story.

Maltman captures a Northern Ireland that is still struggling to recover from the violence that played into almost 100 years of their history. While on paper, tensions have cooled down and laws have been set to improve relations between Protestant and Catholic factions, the human heart corroded by decades of hatred is not always so easily swayed. Many of the characters are still caught up in their prejudices and lust for violence and people like Paul love to play into that. 

Paul is like a mob boss knowing others' weaknesses and using them against them. In his conversations with Tom, Paul is like a chess master playing against a new opponent. There are subtle suggestions that his allegiances to his former ways have less to do with national pride than they do with controlling his enemies and quenching a sadistic pleasure for blood. Tom is just one of many that he likes to control and force them to do exactly what he wants.

Tom is also a fascinating character. Unlike many religious figures in fiction, he sincerely practices his faith and wants to live a good life. He does everything that he can to repair the damage that he was instrumental in causing in his youth.

However, when Tom encounters Paul, he realizes that the more he tried to run from his past, the more it catches up to him. It is all too easy for him to be seduced back into that life because those feelings were still there. He tried to be a good faith driven person to hide what had been inside all along.

Once Tom follows Paul, his actions interfere with the rest of his life. He becomes a man easily swayed by darker impulses that were simply buried and just waiting to come out. He has an affair with a barmaid and the guilt eats away at his marriage to Cherry. He blackmails a fellow pastor with pederastic tendencies when he gets too close to the church's financial transactions and the sudden generous donation. While Tom still suffers from intense guilt, he goes along with these actions almost like an addict who can no longer stop himself.

The title Witness refers to a crime that Tom saw when he was a child that he had buried, but had changed his life forever. He is also a witness to his own self destruction as the good man that he tried to be is swallowed by the man he once was. He is helpless to stop his own transition into villainy until the end when he finds a way to stand up to Paul and go from the witness to the actor.