The Mary Shelley Club by Goldy Moldavsky REVIEW

 Summary:

New girl Rachel Chavez is eager to make a fresh start at Manchester Prep. But as a scholarship student, she struggles to fit in among the rich kids and finds herself turning to horror movies for comfort. Somehow, the stabby serial killers and homicidal dolls seem less scary than bored trust-fund babies.

Then Rachel gets caught up in a prank gone awry, going from "weird loner girl" to Public Enemy #1 overnight. To Rachel's surprise, however, the incident attracts the attention of the Mary Shelley Club, a mysterious society of students who orchestrate elaborate pranks known as Fear Tests, which are inspired by urban legends and movie tropes.

At first, Rachel embraces the power that comes with behaving recklessly, but as the Fear Tests escalate, the competition turns deadly and takes on a life of its own. When someone begins targeting the club itself, Rachel has to trach down the killer - even if it means finally confronting the dark secrets from her past.

My Thoughts:

I love the idea of meeting a final girl after she survives, and how she deals with her trauma. Rachel had a break-in happen before switching schools. The intruder wore a mask, and she killed him in self-defense. She turns to horror movies as a way of dealing with her trauma, and becomes an outsider at her new school. But when she gets on the popular girl's bad side, she finds out about the Mary Shelley Club, a group of students who play pranks and watch horror movies. Rachel joins the club, and starts to feel like she is finally fitting in and having friends - and maybe even something more  than friends with one of the members. But when students are reporting seeing a masked man and her clubmates start acting odd around her, she starts to feel uneasy and flashbacks to the break-in that she survived. 

Like I previously stated, I really enjoyed the premise and setup of this book. The main character and a few side characters are really fleshed out and seem like real people. It's a fun and easy read as well. I feel like exploring a final girl after survival isn't really explored much at all, and I absolutely love the way it was done here. The characters all seem like people you would know, and the story is really well done. The only complaint I have is that the notion of the Mary Shelley Club having different chapters at different school felt like it was thrown in as part of the twist ending. It wasn't hinted at in throughout the book, and was only briefly mentioned at the end. If the author was going to add this, it could have been handled better.

My Rating: 4 stars

My Darling Dreadful Thing by Johanna van Veen REVIEW

Summary:

Roos Beckman has a spirit companion only she can see. Ruth - strange, corpse-like, and dead for centuries - is the light of Roos's life. That is, until the wealthy young widow Agnes Knoop visits one of Roos's backroom seances and the two strike up a connection.

Soon, Roos is whisked away to the crumbling estate Agnes inherited upon the death of her husband, where an ill woman haunts the halls, strange smells drift through the air at night, and mysterious stone statues reside in the family chapel. Something dreadful festers in the manor, but still, the attraction between Roos and Agnes is undeniable.

Then, someone is murdered.

Poor, alone, and with a history of "hysterics", Roos is the obvious culprit. With her sanity and innocence in question, she'll have to prove who - or what - is at fault or lose everything she holds dear.

My Thoughts:

Roos is held hostage by a woman she calls her mother, though she has no relation to her. When Mother discovers that Roos truly does have a spirit companion, she exploits it with her seances to bring in money and hoping for a benefactor to bring them out of poverty. Agnes is a seemingly wealthy widow who recently lost her husband and attends one of their seances. She has a spirit companion too, and pays Mother to take Roos to her estate to stay with her. Roos falls for Agnes, but thinks that Agnes is still grieving her lost husband, so she tries to make him a spirit companion so that she can see her again. But Roos is wrong, and it may cost her everything.

The book alters between the past (what has happened with Roos's childhood and time with Agnes) and the present (Roos being questioned about the murder). I like the characterizations of the main characters, as there are really only three: Roos, Ruth, and Agnes. However, this book wasn't really for me. I enjoyed some parts of the story, but others left me not caring about it at all. I'm not sure what it was, as I tend to love gothic horror. It might have been that we barely get a glimpse at what is going on in the present. We know Roos is being questioned as a suspect for the murder trial, but that's all we get. Those glimpses are through transcripts of the questioning, and we don't get her inner thoughts during it.

My Rating: 2 stars 

Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite REVIEW

Summary:

To serial slayer Andrew Compton, murder is an art, the most intimate art. After feigning his own death to escape from prison, Compton makes his way to the United States with the ambition of bringing his art to new heights. Tortured by his own perverse desires, drawn to possess and destroy young boys, Compton inadvertently joins forces with Jay Byrne, a disolute  playboy who has pushed his art to limits even Compton hadn't previously imagined. Together, Compton and Byrne set their sights on an exquisite young Vietnamese-American runaway, Tran, whom they deem to be the perfect victim.

My Thoughts:

Andrew, a convicted gay murderer, escapes prison in England by faking his death. He kills a man and steals his wallet to get into the United States, where he finds himself in New Orleans. Jay is a gay murderer and cannibal living in New Orleans that has been very careful not to get caught. He mostly kills tourists to avoid the eye of the police. Tran is a young gay man who recently broke up with his boyfriend and was kicked out of his home for being gay.

This book is more of a character study rather than much of a plot, and it was beautifully written. It takes place during the AIDs crisis, which also has a drive in the story. Most of the characters, including Andrew and Jay, are incredibly unlikeable, but it was done well, as I didn't outright hate any of them. I found Tran to be the only sympathetic character out of them all, and I felt really bad for all the things he was going through. I would recommend this book to fans of horror and extreme horror, but not for the faint of heart.

My Rating: 4 stars

It's Only a Game by Kelsea Yu REVIEW

Summary:

When Marina Chan ran from her old life, she brought nothing with her - not even her real name. Now she lives in fear of her past being discovered. But when her online gaming team is offered a tour of their favorite game company, Marina can't resist accepting, even though she knows it might put her fake identity at risk.

Then the creator of the game is murdered during their tour. The killer plans to frame Marina and her friends for the murder unless they win four rounds of a dangerous game.

A game that requires them to lie, trespass, and steal. A game that could destroy everything Marina's worked so hard to build. A game that she might not survive.

My Thoughts:

I devoured this book. Marina is running from her past, which we get snippets of throughout the novel to piece together. When she meets up with her gaming friends for a tour, it seems surreal - even more when the creator offers to pay Marina to make artwork for the game. But things go south when they hear a gunshot and discover the creator's body on their way out of the building. They are tasked with completing a game designed by the elusive online gamer Cixi - or they will be framed for the murder and their lives will be ruined.

Marina is such an intriguing character to follow. We only know bits and pieces about her, and more gets slowly revealed throughout the book. We also learn more about her online friends - Syl, Dread, and Rock. Despite this being their first in-person meetup, they hit it off immediately with each other. However, it doesn't feel rushed or unrealistic at all.

After starting the first few chapters, this novel was practically impossible to put down for me, and when I wasn't reading it, I was thinking about it and theorizing what might happen next. While there was one twist I did see coming, the rest I did not. I would definitely recommend picking up this book and giving it a read.

My Rating: 5 stars

Contract Bound by Elle Mae REVIEW

My Thoughts:

Sylvia hates vampires. A few years ago, she came home to find her entire family dead - killed by vampires. She joins the Order, a group dedicated to hunting them, partly for revenge and partly to pay off her family's debt to them. One day, she is given a mission to be a bodyguard to a vampire heir which will pay off her debt for good, so she takes it. Keir is the heir to a vampire clan and hates hunters. She had previously driven off all her other bodyguards, and plans to do the same with Sylvia. But the plans change when Keir takes a liking to her, despite  Sylvia's utter distaste for all vampires. Against all odds, Sylvia also develops feelings for Keir. Vampire clan leaders can only rule for a certain time, and Keir's father's time is almost up. Ruthless and unkind, he plans to not give up his position, and Keir will have to find a way to make him step down.

I fell in love with this book. Sylvia and Keir are such interesting and opposite characters, and their romance did not seem rushed at all. They were very well developed, and I even found myself loving side characters like Gillard as well. The writing is well done, and the story is captivating. I would definitely recommend giving this book a read.

My Rating: 5 stars