Showing posts with label Paranormal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Paranormal. Show all posts

December 2, 2020

The Twisted Ones by T. Kingfisher

 Synopsis:

When a young woman clears out her deceased grandmother’s home in rural North Carolina, she finds long-hidden secrets about a strange colony of beings in the woods.

When Mouse’s dad asks her to clean out her dead grandmother's house, she says yes. After all, how bad could it be?

Answer: pretty bad. Grandma was a hoarder, and her house is stuffed with useless rubbish. That would be horrific enough, but there’s more—Mouse stumbles across her step-grandfather’s journal, which at first seems to be filled with nonsensical rants…until Mouse encounters some of the terrifying things he described for herself.

Alone in the woods with her dog, Mouse finds herself face to face with a series of impossible terrors—because sometimes the things that go bump in the night are real, and they’re looking for you. And if she doesn’t face them head on, she might not survive to tell the tale.


I picked up this book after reading a comment in a Facebook reading group about it being an actually scary horror/thriller. It takes a lot for books to freak me out or scare me, but I decided to give it a go. 

My first impression was that the protagonist is very likable and adds some comedy to the density of the book with her personality. 

There is also a dog as one of the main characters. So, A+. 

Then, once I got to the first mention of the twisted ones saying, I had to close the book for the night. I’m not even sure why, but it creeped me out so much. 

I was creeped out, but I was super intrigued. So, I picked it back up in the daylight and, after reading more, I didn’t have to put it back down in order to sleep. It definitely had a huge creep factor to it. But, I’d say it was more mysterious. I don’t know if I psyched myself out when I first started it or what, but the rest of the book didn’t scare me. 

That said, I loved the journey that The Twisted Ones took me on. It was a fun read filled with mysterious and eccentric characters. It’ll make you laugh while simultaneously keeping you on the edge of your seat. 

For that, I definitely have it on my recommended list. 

I don’t know that we got a full explanation of what the large stones were all about, but it was enough of an explanation to not have me feeling like I needed more. I think it’s meant to be mysterious and weird, and it shall remain that way. 

5/5 Stars. This is a fun one. 



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May 9, 2019

Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz

Synopsis
"The dead don't talk. I don't know why." But they do try to communicate, with a short-order cook in a small desert town serving as their reluctant confidant. Odd Thomas thinks of himself as an ordinary guy, if possessed of a certain measure of talent at the Pico Mundo Grill and rapturously in love with the most beautiful girl in the world, Stormy Llewellyn.
Maybe he has a gift, maybe it's a curse, Odd has never been sure, but he tries to do his best by the silent souls who seek him out. Sometimes they want justice, and Odd's otherworldly tips to Pico Mundo's sympathetic police chief, Wyatt Porter, can solve a crime. Occasionally they can prevent one. But this time it's different.
A mysterious man comes to town with a voracious appetite, a filing cabinet stuffed with information on the world's worst killers, and a pack of hyena-like shades following him wherever he goes. Who the man is and what he wants, not even Odd's deceased informants can tell him. His most ominous clue is a page ripped from a day-by-day calendar for August 15.
Today is August 14.
In less than twenty-four hours, Pico Mundo will awaken to a day of catastrophe. As evil coils under the searing desert sun, Odd travels through the shifting prisms of his world, struggling to avert a looming cataclysm with the aid of his soul mate and an unlikely community of allies that includes the King of Rock 'n' Roll. His account of two shattering days when past and present, fate and destiny converge is the stuff of our worst nightmares, and a testament by which to live: sanely if not safely, with courage, humor, and a full heart that even in the darkness must persevere.

This book was recommended to me by a friend/bomb Americano maker. So, obviously I had to read it. She was kind enough to lend it to me. Now, I have to say, I’m pretty hooked on this character.

This book was a ride from beginning to end. It laid the foundation for the protagonists. It explored their depth and the depth of the story. Then it completely took off.

I didn’t know the synopsis when I went into the book, so I was going in blind. I think that was good for this one. It made for so many surprises. I didn’t think it was going to be creepy, but I didn’t expect that it would also break my heart. There were so many different emotions. I can’t wait to read the next one. I have to see what comes next for everyone involved.

5/5 Stars

Memorable Quotes: “We are not, however, a species that can choose the baggage with which it must travel. In spite of our best intentions, we always find that we have brought along a suitcase or two of darkness, and misery.”

“The dead are sensitive to the living. They have walked this path ahead of us and know our fears, our failings, our desperate hopes, and how much we cherish what cannot last. They pity us, I think, and no doubt they should.”

“In our dreams, we are not detached observers, as are the characters who dream in movies. These internal dramas are usually seen strictly from the dreamer’s point of view. In nightmares, we can’t look I to our own eyes except by indirection, perhaps because we fear discovering that therein lie the worst monsters plaguing us.”

“Most people desperately desire to believe that they are part of a great mystery, that Creation is a work of grace and glory, not merely the result of random forces of colliding. Yet each time that they are given but one reason to doubt, a worm in the apple of the heart makes them turn away from a thousand proofs of the miraculous, whereupon they have a drunkard’s thirst for cynicism, and they feed upon despair as a starving man upon a loaf of bread.”

“A cynic once said that the most identifying trait of humanity is our ability to be in humane to one another.”

“The town slept, but not its demons.”

“Life, Stormy says, is not about how fast you run or even with what degree of grace. It’s about perseverance, about staying on your feet and slogging forward no matter what.”

“Most people tend to think the best of those who are blessed with beauty; we have difficulty imagining that physical perfection can conceal twisted emotions or a damaged mind. “

“We are not strangers to ourselves; we only try to be.”

“It takes awhile to realize what a lonely world it is, and when you do . . . Then the future looks kinda scary. “

“We who survive must go on in the names of those who fall, but if we dwell too much on the vivid details of what we’ve witnessed of man’s inhumanity to man, we simply can’t go on. Perseverance is impossible if we don’t permit ourselves to hope.”


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June 2, 2016

Joyland by Stephen King

Synopsis:
College student Devin Jones took the summer job at Joyland hoping to forget the girl who broke his heart. But he wound up facing something far more terrible: the legacy of a vicious murder, the fate of a dying child, and dark truths about life—and what comes after—that would change his world forever.
Stephen King novels are very hit or miss with me. I would love to say that I really enjoy them all and I can get into them right away, but that isn’t the case. When they hit – they hit hard, though. That is exactly what Joyland did. It hooked me from the very first page, and it didn’t let go.

I'm not sure what was so gripping about this novel. It had to be a combination of the amusement park mystique as well as the inner monologue of Devin. He is a very relatable character, and that fact made it easier to read through the book. I would read a sequel written from his point of view as well. He has a lot of insightful thoughts and an interesting personality.

Every character in this novel was really complex, and they all added to the intrigue of the story.

I was expecting it to be a little more in the horror genre, but I would call it more of a suspense novel. Nothing about it was really scary, but the mystery of it all kept me guessing and kept me holding on until the last page.
Also – I loved Annie and Mike, and the end of this book made me very, very sad.

5/5 Stars. Highly, highly recommend this one. This book touched me in ways I never would have expected. 

Memorable Quotes: “That first broken heart is always the most painful, the slowest to mend, and leaves the most visible scar.”

“Love leaves scars.”

“You think ‘Okay, I get it, I’m prepared for the worst,’ but you hold out on that small hope, see, and that’s what fucks you up. That’s what kills you.”

“The powers that be have a way of outlawing many beautiful things made by ordinary people. I don’t know why that should be, I only know it is.”

“The last good time always comes, and when you see the darkness creeping towards you, you hold on to what was bright and good. You hold on for dear life.”

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January 4, 2015

The Lords of Salem by Rob Zombie

Synopsis:
From the singular mind of horror maestro Rob Zombie comes a chilling plunge into a nightmare world where evil runs in the blood...

THE LORDS OF SALEM

Heidi Hawthorne is a thirty-seven-year-old FM radio DJ and a recovering drug addict. Struggling with her newfound sobriety and creeping depression, Heidi suddenly receives an anonymous gift at the station-a mysteriously shaped wooden box branded with a strange symbol. Inside the box is a promotional record for a band that identifies themselves only as The Lords. There is no other information.

She decides to play it on the radio show as a joke, and the moment she does, horrible things begin to happen. The strange music awakens something evil in the town. Soon enough, terrifying murders begin to happen all around Heidi. Who are The Lords? What do they want?

As old bloodlines are awakened and the bodies start to pile up, only one thing seems certain: all hell is about to break loose.
What did I just read? This was the most twisted book I have read in a long time, maybe the most twisted one I have read so far.  I have been wanting to see this movie for awhile, but I wanted to read the book first. So, when I got it for Christmas, I was super excited.
There were horror elements, there were gruesome scenes, and there were chapters that actually left me really creeped out.

It was an interesting experience to say the least.

That being said, I did actually enjoy the book. It held my attention with how strange and out there is was. It is easy to read the whole thing rather quickly because you want to find out what is happening. It is definitely not for people who cannot handle gore though. Reading through many of the scenes had me cringing in my seat.

The characters were all pretty interesting in their own ways. Heidi was a good protagonist and it was easy to root for her.

This book was good if you want an interesting horror, paranormal book. I wouldn’t have expected any less from the mind of Rob Zombie.

4/5 stars

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