Book 80: Heart Shaped Box

Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill is a twisted, demented modern day ghost story with an evil twist.

Aging rock star Jude Coyne has young girlfriends and one of those girl's from the past, caused him to be haunted.

Jude is into the occult and he sees an online auction to buy a "ghost." What he gets in the mail is an old man's suit in a heart shaped box. He thinks it's a funny joke until the haunting does begin.

A horrible old man ghost tries to make Jude kill his current girlfriend, Mary Beth, and then himself. Once Jude realizes he's not crazy and convinces his young Goth girlfriend he's not nuts, they go on the run, to save themselves and each other. While on the run, and through the use of a Ouji Board, Jude and Mary Beth realize things aren't what they seem. They must save themselves and destroy the ghost, but at what cost to themselves?

This was a good thriller with a ghost twist. It's deep and dark. This prose is deeply gruesome, and it will haunt the reader.

Book 46 The Lace Reader

I can't decide if I like this book, or not. The Lace Reader (by Brunonia Barry) is set in Salem Massachusetts in 1996.

Towner (aka Sophya) Whitney, a young woman from a long line of fortune tellers and mind readers, comes back to her childhood home because of the death of her beloved aunt. Towner is a self proclaimed liar and claims she's had hallucinations, which caused her to become an inpatient in a mental institution who requested shock therapy. Now "better", or at least medicated, she returns home after having just had a surgery (which readers never find out specifically what happened, though we can guess through some veiled references) to her Aunt Eva's house.

She knows her aunt didn't accidentally drown. While trying to convince a local authorities of this, based on her feelings and visions, she comes in contact with Rafferty, a police detective takes a romantic interest in Towner. He was also friends with Eva and he doesn't want to believe she drown either.

During the course of the story, Towner also meets with her mother, May, who gave Towner's twin sister away when they were babies. May gave her to her sister Emma. Emma was married to Cal, who beat her do badly she's mentally handicapped and blind now. May takes care of her. But Towner's sister suffered in a childhood tragedy. Call is now out of prison and has started his own cult like religion and causes problems for the whole Whitney family. May also takes in abused women and gives them a job as lace makers, and a safe place to stay.

Because the mystic abilities that run in the Whitney family, all the women are fortune tellers or readers of some kind, and they can all "read lace" as a way of telling a fortune. Apropos since they family fortune comes from making lace, too.

Take all these pieces together, Rafferty is trying to solve the death of Eva and to see if it ties in to the disappearance of Angela, a girl who ran away from Cal's cult, and you have The Lace Reader. I like the setting in Salem; obviously the witch history plays a part in this novel. The peripheral storyline of witches, and the tourists who visit the historical town, as well as the modern day witch who inhabit Salem are an interesting and fun part of the story.

There is a wicked, wicked (no pun intended) twist to this story. Interesting read. I also found at the beginning of each chapter interesting because of the lace reading information.

I just can't decide if I like this or not. It was sad, tragic really, and though I like a good twist, I thought this one was "twisted." Psychological thrillers often leave me feeling out of sorts. I also hate it when author's leave important details left unanswered.

Just not sure how I feel about this one...

Book 29- Of Bees and Mist

Erick Setiawan's debut novel Of Bees and Mist has love lost and then found, fortune tellers, magic mists, ghosts, seers, and lots of unexplained oddities in a mythical land, not unlike a small town somewhere near you.

Meridia is a little girl who is raised in a house with mists and ghosts, a hateful father and a confused mother. She plays with the ghosts and chases the mists and is raised my nannies. She attends school but has no friends. Then one day, when a festival comes to town, she meets the man of her dreams. For a girl who's been raised in a home with no lover and an inordinate amount of hate, she loves Daniel, and soon marries the charming and beguiling young man.

She moves from the homes of her family, hoping to leave behind the mists and the ghosts, into the home of Daniel's family. At once she is taken with her new mother-in-law, Eva, and two sisters, eager to please and desperately wanting to experience a total family. But her mother-in-law is a new sort of evil, full of lying and conniving, bring on bees when the vitriol spews from her mouth.

Meridia needs to become strong, and does, to stand up to her mother-in-law and to find her own way in the world. And she does find that she can make friends and be a mother, that she has a head for business and she can run a household, and stand against the evil Eva, and the supernatural that surrounds her.

This novel spans over 30 years and the magic flows through the nameless town where Meridia lives, revealing all sorts of secrets. It's like a modern day ghost story with fiction and fantasy blended together.

I rather enjoyed this novel. I've never really been one to read fantasy so I wasn't sure what to expect from the genre. I had been told that is was like a modern day ghost story, which I didn't find to be true at all. I liked just going with the flow of the story. Setiawan writes with rich, colorful words, and boundless energy. I could feel the retain of Meridia and the personalities of the mists. I was impressed with the entire story and the twists and turns. And as I always seem to notice and enjoy, a strong and likable female character in Meridia.

This was a pleasure to read, lush in imagery, making it a veritable feast of a novel.