Asbury Dark: Haunting Tales From the Jersey Shore by Lori Bonfitto

Synopsis:

A telekinetic teenager. A doomed ocean liner. A haunted bed & breakfast. A zombie-fighting real estate developer. These are but a few of the eerie people, places and things that go bump in the pages of Asbury Dark: Haunting Tales from the Jersey Shore.

Spanning six decades, Asbury Dark will thrill and delight anyone who’s ever ridden the rides on the fabled boardwalk, searched for Bruce at The Stone Pony, or shambled along in the Zombie March.

Mystery and suspense author Lori Bonfitto delivers seven unforgettable tales of fright and fantasy, transforming Asbury Park from a nostalgic playland into a world fraught with obsession, reincarnation, and the paranormal.

This was a very, very entertaining read with eerie twists and turns woven into each story.

What made this collection unique to me was that every story was centered around the same town and most of them took place there. It was easy to imagine that somehow all of the different stories were woven together. It was like meeting a bunch of different neighbors that live on the same street and hearing their stories. That made it super cool for me.

There was also never a time where I felt like I had to skip a story. When I am reading a collection, I sometimes find that a story in the middle of it is less interesting than the rest, and I will skip it to get to the better ones. That wasn’t the case here. I genuinely enjoyed all of the stories that were a part of this collection in their own way.

They were all different, but as I stated before, they all seemed wove together, and they fit together well.

For short story lovers who want a hint of creepy, spine-tingling fun, I would definitely suggest you grab a copy.

4/5 Stars

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Wolf Girls: Dark Tales of Teeth, Claws and Lycogyny Edited by Hannah Kate

Synopsis:

Feral, vicious, fierce and lost... the she-wolf is a strange creature of the night. Attractive to some; repulsive to others, she stalks the fringes of our world as though it were her prey. She is the baddest of girls, the fatalest of femmes - but she is also the excluded, the abject, the monster.

The Wolf-Girls within these pages are mad, bad and dangerous to know. But they are also rejected and tortured, loving and loyal, avenging and triumphant. Some of them are even human...

Wolf-Girls is a collection of short stories about she-wolves. No two are the same. They range in writing style, emotion, and themes. But one thing remains the same – bloodlust.

I am not a big reader of werewolf (or she-wolf) tales, so I had to go into this one with an open mind and no expectations.

By doing so, I actually started to enjoy the stories as I got through more and more of them.

The writing in each of the stories was decent. Some of them seemed to drag on more than others, and some seemed to go really quick. It is definitely a grab bag of stories which made it a bit more exciting. I never felt like I was reading the same thing twice.

I never really felt attached to any on character or story, but they were super short so there wasn’t much time for that to happen and grow. This made it easy to set it to the side and pick up another book instead of just finishing it all at one time since it is relatively short.

For those interested in this genre of books, I would say give it a try.

3/5 stars.

If I Stay by Gayle Forman

Synopsis:

Choices. Seventeen-year-old Mia is faced with some tough ones: Stay true to her first love—music—even if it means losing her boyfriend and leaving her family and friends behind?

Then one February morning Mia goes for a drive with her family, and in an instant, everything changes. Suddenly, all the choices are gone, except one. And it's the only one that matters.

If I Stay is a heartachingly beautiful book about the power of love, the true meaning of family, and the choices we all make.

I am not sure what I was really expecting out of this book, but it did not live up to my expectations.

Most of the book was spent living in the past telling the story of Mia’s life through flashbacks. This helped to show the relationships between her and the people in her life, but it got dragged out and boring at times.

The characters were pretty well written. I felt like I knew them all pretty well by the time I was done. The dialogue flowed really well between them as well. Character development was the best part of the book.

The story itself is interesting before you get into it. The execution comes up a bit short. I felt that there should have been more about the accident and maybe her condition instead of all of the flashbacks. A good majority of them served a purpose, but a few could have been left out for a more relevant story-line.

I thought there would be more drama surrounding her decision. I didn’t feel emotionally tied to it or her character at all. Maybe that is why I wasn’t as into it as the next reader.

That said, I want to read the sequel.

4/5 stars. I did really enjoy it, I was just expecting more.

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