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b.Young (97 KP) rated The Wordsmith in Books
May 15, 2018
Horrifying in a good way
Have you ever wondered how famous authors pump out great book after great book? Well, it's probably not quite how Walt Erickson does it...or is it???
I read this book because I found it offered for free in the Amazon Kindle store. Honestly, I wasn't expecting much. Y'all! I was wrong to set my expectations so low!
This was a truly horrifying glimpse into what one famous author does to keep writing those best-selling books of his. And (spoiler): He's. Not. Writing. Them.
So who is? How does he keep from being found out?
My first thought was that his typewriter is bewitched and doing the writing for him.
My second thought was that he had a ghost writer that he pays very handsomely to keep quiet.
I had some other thoughts about it, but they were just too PG.
Let me just tell you, that NONE of my thoughts were what was actually going on and I was beyond freaked out when I discovered the truth!
This story reminded me a little of Secret Garden and a little of some episode of The Twilight Zone I saw when I was like 10.
If you read this and you will think you entered The Twilight Zone.
I read this book because I found it offered for free in the Amazon Kindle store. Honestly, I wasn't expecting much. Y'all! I was wrong to set my expectations so low!
This was a truly horrifying glimpse into what one famous author does to keep writing those best-selling books of his. And (spoiler): He's. Not. Writing. Them.
So who is? How does he keep from being found out?
My first thought was that his typewriter is bewitched and doing the writing for him.
My second thought was that he had a ghost writer that he pays very handsomely to keep quiet.
I had some other thoughts about it, but they were just too PG.
Let me just tell you, that NONE of my thoughts were what was actually going on and I was beyond freaked out when I discovered the truth!
This story reminded me a little of Secret Garden and a little of some episode of The Twilight Zone I saw when I was like 10.
If you read this and you will think you entered The Twilight Zone.
I might not go on that hiking trip.....
You're in at the deep end straight away with this story, and it doesn't come up for air for the next 200 pages (or so!). It starts as a ghost story told by their teacher to five 13 year old boys on a training weekend on Rutmoor National Park, and ends - well, that would be giving the game away! We get glimpses into the past with the use of newspaper articles written about missing children and mutilated animals, and we look at the present and one of the survivors from the ill-fated walk. We're also told the story of what really happened on that ill-fated weekend.
The suspense was portrayed really well, and the boys were written with an understanding of how teenaged boys talk and act (much like Stephen King, in fact). I actually dreamt about this story whilst I was reading it, and let me tell you, it wasn't pleasant! And yes, I loved it!
This is great for horror-suspense lovers, and isn't really gory, in my opinion. It just messes with your mind ?
Thanks to The Pigeonhole for choosing this book to serialise. It was fun (in a keep-you-thinking-about-it-late-into-the-night kind of way)!!!
The suspense was portrayed really well, and the boys were written with an understanding of how teenaged boys talk and act (much like Stephen King, in fact). I actually dreamt about this story whilst I was reading it, and let me tell you, it wasn't pleasant! And yes, I loved it!
This is great for horror-suspense lovers, and isn't really gory, in my opinion. It just messes with your mind ?
Thanks to The Pigeonhole for choosing this book to serialise. It was fun (in a keep-you-thinking-about-it-late-into-the-night kind of way)!!!
graveyardgremlin (7194 KP) rated Tombs of Endearment (Pepper Martin, #3) in Books
Feb 15, 2019
Another fun Pepper Martin mystery that's as good as the first and better than the second in the series. Again, the ghost is the best character, this time a 60s rocker who possibly died of an overdose forty years ago. I couldn't help but think he was a Jim Morrison prototype, especially with some of the lyrics.
Pepper was thankfully brighter in this book and figured things out at a good pace. Unfortunately, I have a tendency to figure out whodunnit early on in this series, for lack of suspects, but I liked how the author had Pepper go about it anyway.
I could do without the constant who-wears-what, how Pepper's hair or nails are done, everything she wears at every given moment, and most of all, I get annoyed at her overactive libido every time a hot guy - dead or alive - comes into contact with her. Get it together girl! What's your problem. Luckily, it looks as if she might (finally) get her act together for the fourth book. Hopefully it is not Quinn, because he is a boring, cut-out character that adds nothing to this series. However, I still look forward to the next book and hope it continues to get better.
Pepper was thankfully brighter in this book and figured things out at a good pace. Unfortunately, I have a tendency to figure out whodunnit early on in this series, for lack of suspects, but I liked how the author had Pepper go about it anyway.
I could do without the constant who-wears-what, how Pepper's hair or nails are done, everything she wears at every given moment, and most of all, I get annoyed at her overactive libido every time a hot guy - dead or alive - comes into contact with her. Get it together girl! What's your problem. Luckily, it looks as if she might (finally) get her act together for the fourth book. Hopefully it is not Quinn, because he is a boring, cut-out character that adds nothing to this series. However, I still look forward to the next book and hope it continues to get better.
Brecoles Nine (16 KP) rated The Haunting of Hill House- Season 1 in TV
Mar 12, 2019 (Updated Mar 12, 2019)
Haunting of Hill House Review
Haunting of Hill House is a Netflix Original released mid 2018. The show caught me off guard as I suspected it was just another show on Netflix thst was hyped up and failed to entertain. However, I was surprised to find myself binging the season every chance I got in my spare time. The first thing that intrigued me was the "Easter Egg Ghosts" is what I have labeled them. These ghosts would appear somewhere in certain scenes that the characters never notice but we, the audience, noticed. They're not in every episode or every scene, but they're there. The spookiness of this show was far better than I thought it would be, the story was unique enough to leave me wanting more, the ending took a different turn than it was leading up to, not a bad turn, definitely a different turn. The show in my opinion deserves a lot more attention than I feel it has received as it isn't just another ghost story, it's one that had kept my wife and I on the edge of our seats but also on guard in the dark. Check The Haunting of Hill House out on Netflix if you're brave!
Merissa (12969 KP) created a post
Mar 22, 2019
Lindsay (1760 KP) rated A Sound Among the Trees in Books
Feb 15, 2018
The young bride that moves into her husband's first wife home is first scared that there a ghost in the house. She not understand what it was doing to the people inside the home or what the people inside the house was doing to the family.
A mystery unfolds itself though Marielle. Caroline come home to help explain what was going on and what was happening Carson and her mother. Her mother does not know what going but think the house is stuck. Things start to clear up about Susannah Page in letters when Caroline less her in on what the truth is and what is happening.
I do not want to give away how it ends or any of the secret the books has to offer. Though I will tell you it tell you about the part of the Civil War and the Battle of Fredericksburg. It tell about romance and in love. But I will let you decide If you want to pick it up and want to read. Just because I like to read about Civil War a bit does not mean you would not to so you may decide that you want so I will let you decide for yourself. Now if I were asked I recommend this book for sure.
A mystery unfolds itself though Marielle. Caroline come home to help explain what was going on and what was happening Carson and her mother. Her mother does not know what going but think the house is stuck. Things start to clear up about Susannah Page in letters when Caroline less her in on what the truth is and what is happening.
I do not want to give away how it ends or any of the secret the books has to offer. Though I will tell you it tell you about the part of the Civil War and the Battle of Fredericksburg. It tell about romance and in love. But I will let you decide If you want to pick it up and want to read. Just because I like to read about Civil War a bit does not mean you would not to so you may decide that you want so I will let you decide for yourself. Now if I were asked I recommend this book for sure.
Goddess in the Stacks (553 KP) rated The Astonishing Color of After in Books
Mar 29, 2018
Evocative descriptions (1 more)
Good characters
Just WOW. The Astonishing Color of After is about a teenage girl, an artist, dealing with her mother's depression and ensuing suicide. Part of what makes the book so fascinating is Leigh's constant description of colors. She uses color as shorthand for emotions - her grandmother might have a vermilion expression on her face, or she might be feeling very orange while staring at her mother's coffin at the funeral. Between colors-as-feelings and her insomnia-induced hallucinations (or magic - the book is deliberately, I think, noncommittal on whether some things only happen in her head or not) the entire book feels a little surrealistic. But grief and mourning DO feel surrealistic. The book is amazingly evocative and emotional and I absolutely adore it. This, along with City of Brass and Children of Blood and Bone, are definitely on my Best of 2018 list.
As an added bonus, the author is the American child of Taiwanese immigrants herself. So all the ghost traditions and folklore from Leigh's journey to Taiwan are from her ancestry as well.
This book was gorgeous. It may need a trigger warning for depression and suicide. If you can handle those themes, read it.
You can find all my reviews at http://goddessinthestacks.wordpress.com
As an added bonus, the author is the American child of Taiwanese immigrants herself. So all the ghost traditions and folklore from Leigh's journey to Taiwan are from her ancestry as well.
This book was gorgeous. It may need a trigger warning for depression and suicide. If you can handle those themes, read it.
You can find all my reviews at http://goddessinthestacks.wordpress.com
Mark @ Carstairs Considers (2357 KP) rated The Ghost of Christmas Past (Molly Murphy #17) in Books
Mar 9, 2018
December of 1906 finds Molly Murphy Sullivan hoping that the new year will bring some changes and good news. When she, her husband Daniel, and their son Liam get invited to a house party for Christmas on the Hudson, Molly thinks this might help take her mind off everything going on in her life. However, she finds the household has a weird tension to it, with relationships she can’t quite read. Then she learns that a child disappeared from this house 10 years before right before Christmas. Molly is determined to figure out what happened, but has it been too long?
As is often the case, we start out with some updates on the series regulars before Molly fully plunges into the mystery, but once she does, I was hooked. In fact, as soon as I got off work, I sat down to finish. While I don’t feel like Daniel has grown, I love the rest of the cast, and the new characters are very strong. There is a more serious tone than you might expect from a Christmas mystery, but the contrast works well in this case.
Read my full review at <a href="http://carstairsconsiders.blogspot.com/2017/12/book-review-ghost-of-christmas-past-by.html">Carstairs Considers</a>.
As is often the case, we start out with some updates on the series regulars before Molly fully plunges into the mystery, but once she does, I was hooked. In fact, as soon as I got off work, I sat down to finish. While I don’t feel like Daniel has grown, I love the rest of the cast, and the new characters are very strong. There is a more serious tone than you might expect from a Christmas mystery, but the contrast works well in this case.
Read my full review at <a href="http://carstairsconsiders.blogspot.com/2017/12/book-review-ghost-of-christmas-past-by.html">Carstairs Considers</a>.
Dianne Robbins (1738 KP) rated Amityville: The Awakening (2017) in Movies
Jan 27, 2019
Not much (2 more)
Stays within the Amityville realm
Shows footage from DeFeo's crimes and mentions the Amityville history/"haunting"
Slow and drags on (8 more)
Boring
Tense in a teen angst way
Poor character relationships
One-dimensional characters
Vague plotlines
Visually too dark to see most action
Unoriginal
Flat acting
Drags on and on and on and blah.
If you expect a family to move into the Amityville house where DeFeo murdered his family in the 1970s and be haunted or possessed by a ghost, demon, poltergeist, etc., you are 100% correct. That premise could be interesting but unfortunately, this film falls short. It is tense because of the relationships between the characters and not from suspense. It's pretty boring and relies on a few jump scares and flashes of horror. The storyline is unoriginal and poorly done. The lighting is so dark that it's difficult to see the last 30 minutes of the action. You might as well be listening to an old-fashioned radio show or horror podcast instead. This movie is problematic from beginning to end. There are much better films out there with a similar premise so unless you're extremely bored and like to torture yourself, avoid this one.
Andy K (10823 KP) rated The Devil's Backbone (2001) in Movies
Jul 19, 2019
Who knew Pan's Labyrinth had a companion film?
Early film from Guillermo del Toro is similar to Pan's Labyrinth in a lot of ways. In watching an interview after viewing the film, del Toro actually says this is a companion film since they have a lot of the same themes and cinematic elements most notably a child being introduced to a foreign hostile environment and the element of the supernatural influencing the actions of other characters.
I can see how others might complain about the slow pacing of certain scenes or the noticeable subplots that don't all have conclusions, but I guess those didn't bother me as I was engaged in the story. The kids eventually learn of the existence of the "ghost" in the basement and try and figure out its motives and reason for existence.
I enjoyed the look of the film immensely and thought all the acting was solid. The film had a haunting soundtrack which supplemented the spooky scenes very well.
I could even see some scenes which could've been out of The Shape of Water as del Toro's films all seem to have the director's signature look which isn't a complaint; only an observation.
I enjoyed it a lot.
I can see how others might complain about the slow pacing of certain scenes or the noticeable subplots that don't all have conclusions, but I guess those didn't bother me as I was engaged in the story. The kids eventually learn of the existence of the "ghost" in the basement and try and figure out its motives and reason for existence.
I enjoyed the look of the film immensely and thought all the acting was solid. The film had a haunting soundtrack which supplemented the spooky scenes very well.
I could even see some scenes which could've been out of The Shape of Water as del Toro's films all seem to have the director's signature look which isn't a complaint; only an observation.
I enjoyed it a lot.
Stormi (105 KP) May 15, 2018