Someone might hear you. No one will listen.
Norah ignored her brother’s screams that night. Because nothing in the haunted attraction was supposed to be real—let alone deadly.
Later, security footage will reveal that the killer walked right through the crowded plaza, his clothes stained red.
Desperate for answers and tormented by survivor’s guilt, Norah returns to the scene of the crime. And to her horror, the chorus of screams is louder than ever. Thrill seekers, including some of her classmates, are still eagerly lining up to purchase tickets.
But the killer hasn’t chosen his hunting ground at random.
And, like everyone else, he’s planning another visit.
I’m all over the place with this book…
I enjoy a good psychopathic thriller…but I simply despise the slasher subgenre.
I like a good horror novel with a tortured hero…but I’m not crazy about anything that doesn’t give some insight into character motivation.
So, let’s dive in. First and foremost, for a novel that mostly spans two nights at a Halloween attraction, I’ve got to say, Ihli does a phenomenal job of keeping the tension on, even while skipping over various characters. I’m going to say it was absolutely the tight, assured writing that kept me going, and also what saved the story from just relying on the same old tropes the slasher subgenre tends to wallow in.
Second, Ihli also does a very good job of painting the primary characters and making them all incredibly believable—with one notable exception, that I’ll get to in a moment. The main viewpoints through this novel are real, and they’re catty, and loyal, and disrespectful, and caring, and everything teenagers are supposed to be. They brought a rare realness to the story, and I got invested in each one.
Where the story disappointed a bit—though I think I understand exactly why the author did it—was to not dig into the killer’s mind. I will say I’m happy she didn’t turn the killer into the mythical, unstoppable knife-wielding larger-than-life monster. I think she was doing her best to craft a story that, while still thrilling, kept the focus more on the victims and survivors. Which is actually a very cool angle, and one I have no problem getting behind, however, while I really don’t like the mythical, unstoppable knife-wielding larger-than-life monster, I do still like a peek into their reasoning. Even if real life is messy, and the killers don’t necessarily know why they do what they do, or why they choose particular people and let others live, fiction’s a bit more demanding.
Overall, as I said, this wasn’t necessarily the typical horror I enjoy—and before you ask why I even picked it up if that’s the case, I will say that, with indie authors, if I see a couple of friends sing the praises of a horror novel, I’ll often pick it up without really looking to see what it’s about. Yes, it’s bitten me in the behind a couple of times, and disappointed me horribly a couple of times more, but mostly, it works out—so, while it’s not my go-to type of read, it was a good read, and it’s absolutely worth your time. You’ll probably dig it even more than me.
