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Book Review: Through the Witches’ Stone by Scott A. Johnson

Cover art for Through the Witches' Stone by Scott A. Johnson

 

Through the Witches’ Stone by Scott  A. Johnson

Timber Ghost Press, 2023

Available: Paperback

Buy:  Bookshop.org  |  Amazon.com

 

 

12 year old  Hadley and her younger twin brothers are stuck for the summer on her grandma’s isolated farm. It isn’t as boring as she expects: she learns she is descended from a long line of witches, and her grandmother starts teaching her magical spells. Hadley’s grandma has only three rules: stay out of the locked rooms upstairs, stay out of the woods, and don’t invite strangers into the house. But while the twins have each other, Hadley has no one her age to talk to, until one night she spots a girl in a white dress and sneaks out to meet her.

 

Although her brothers are uneasy, Hadley keeps it a secret from her grandma. There’s a magical barrier that prevents the girl from crossing between the house and the woods, so she lets the girl lead her into the woods, and they become friends. Then Hadley makes the mistake of inviting the girl into the house. She turns out to be a changeling, who kidnaps Hadley’s brothers and grandma. Hadley must go into the inhospitable woods alone and attempt to find and defeat the changeling to rescue her brothers and grandma. She saves a pukwudgie (a short creature with hedgehog quills down its back and a large nose that originates in Native American mythology) She is also accompanied by a duo of brownies she calls Tom and Jerry. Despite the unfriendly folk and forest, Hadley wins them over and eventually, after some really creepy and compelling adventures, rescues her family.

 

There’s a lot of grief work going on. Hadley’s father was killed in a car accident she blamed her mother and herself for. Her mother is grieving her sister, husband, and father. The pukwudgie is grieving his family. Much of this is about making peace and letting go of grief and fear, but it does not overwhelm this fantastical, scary tale reminiscent of Mary Downing Hahn’s books, the Spiderwick Chronicles, and Outside Over There.

 

 

Posted on December 31, 2023 by , Reply

Book Review: Jedi Summer by John Boden

Cover art for Jedi Summer by John Boden

Jedi Summer by John Boden

Cemetery Dance Publications, 2022

ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1587678356

Available: Paperback, Kindle edition ( Bookshop.org | Amazon.com )

 

 

Jedi Summer is a fictionalized coming-of-age memoir by John Boden, taking place in 1983, the summer Return of the Jedi came out, when Boden was 12 and his brother Roscoe was 7. It meanders through a summer filled with the brothers playing, fighting, and just living through their days. Boden’s mother worked several jobs and he was both responsible for and unpleasant to Roscoe in the way siblings can be. Boden reflects on how his perspective has changed since then. Stylistically he uses italicized text in brackets for digressions. This would work in oral storytelling (it reminded me a bit of Donald Davis) but disrupts the flow on the page.

 

There are three additional stories. “Possessed by a Broken Window” is a powerful piece on grief and guilt.”Trick” is relatable to anyone who has meant to call someone important but never quite does. “The One Who Closes the Door”, a story about caretaking for the adults of your childhood, will stick with me for a long time.

 

The fictionalized darker and supernatural events that take place during the story range from gentle (Boden’s brother can see and interact with the ghosts of dead pets) to believable (a Ferris wheel that crashes to the ground) to the gruesome (a dead man hanging from a tree whose body has been turned into a birdhouse). Even without these, the story of these boys on summer vacation with plenty of time and imagination, and the pieces at the end, are worth reading.

 

Posted on March 18, 2023 by , Reply

Book Review: Daphne by Josh Malerman

Daphne by Josh Malerman

Del Rey, 2022

ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0593157015

Available:  Hardcover ( Bookshop.org )

 

Will Daphne continue the massive success for horror’s superstar author/musician/nice guy? 

 

Without spoilers, that would be a resounding “yes.”

 

Josh Malerman hasn’t written the same novel twice. That’s an amazing thing– he keeps on spinning his muse into fascinating circles, from the blockbuster Bird Box, to the utter weirdness of Unbury Carol, to the stunning Inspection. I won’t even attempt to describe Pearl. The bottom line is that he doesn’t seem capable of churning out a bad story.

 

Enter Daphne. At first, the story might seem to be your basic slasher novel. Yet in Malerman’s hands, nothing is rote, cliche, or a retread. There’s always something twisted that elicits something beautiful from what could easily be a miss in lesser hands.

 

Kit Lamb is in her senior year and a star on the basketball team. She’s fresh off the win in her latest game and contemplating her future. She has a quirk that adds something both unique and relatable to the teenage mindset. She shoots the free throw and asks the question she’s thinking.

 

She asks the rim about Daphne, a legendary killer that might be a figure from the supernatural or simply a regretful death caused by the previous generation, in a similar vein as Freddy Krueger. Of course, she makes the basket, and the story takes off from there.

 

Stories of the brutal killer begin to circulate and confuse the town. Who or what is Daphne? What does she want? Why does she only appear when thought about? As Kit struggles with her own destiny, one by one the basketball team begins to fall. Malerman allows us to contemplate the reasoning while ratcheting up the tension. The novel separates itself from the typical slasher by developing the characters of Kit and her friends.

 

Kit suffers from anxiety. Not the typical teen stress– true generalized anxiety disorder, which so many of us know well (raises hand high). It’s handled well here: Malerman obviously knows more than a little about the condition himself. 

 

Daphne is another must-read novel by Josh Malerman, written with the relatable prose of that King guy, but with a voice all Malerman’s own. Highly recommended.

 

Reviewed by David Simms

 

Posted on February 3, 2023 by , Reply
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