When Jay said he'd downloaded a Ouija-board app onto his phone. I wasn't surprised. It sounded like the kind of daft thing he'd do. It was Thursday night and we were sitting in our favourite greasy spoon cafe, eating baskets of curly fries.
First published in January 2015
Republished in October 2016
Published by Red Eye, an imprint of Stripes.
Summary
We're waiting for you to come and play. Dunvegan School for Girls has been closed for many years. Converted into a family home, the teachers and students are long gone. But they left something behind...Sophie arrives at the old schoolhouse to spend the summer with her cousins. Brooding Cameron with his scarred hand, strange Lilias with a fear of bones and Piper, who seems just a bit too good to be true. And then there's her other cousin. The girl with a room full of antique dolls. The girl that shouldn't be there. The girl that died.
*****
What a creeptastic book!
I don't get scared that easily these days, but just the mention of the ouija board filled me with fear. I've heard too many true life accounts of using them to ever want to mess with one myself. I found myself screaming at the characters, Sophie and Jay to get rid of it as I read the first chapter! No good will come of it! And by God,I was right! And then add in the mix of Chucky style dolls into the plot and I was running for safety.
Dolls are pretty creepy looking anyway, but this book takes their creep factor to a whole new level. The fact that they were buried in the walls, would have made me reconsider my house buying choices.
The whole scene in the cafe really really creeped me out. And stupidly I stayed up way too late reading it. A quick lesson learned after imagining the waterlogged girl from The Ring in my dreams, made me move this book to a day time read.
The story is set in an old Victorian school that was shut down many years ago. There's a lot of speculation and stories about why it closed down, involving horrific accidents and unsolved deaths. Sophie is unsettled even before she arrives, but she knows she has to find out what really happened to her cousin who died when she was young. Little does she realise that she has brought her back from the dead.
This book twists and turns through a gripping plot, leaving you as confused as Sophie as to who she can trust. All the kids in the house are pretty screwed up, so it's not surprising Sophie becomes desperate to leave.
The ending is excellent and surprising. Certain events happen that I wasn't expecting.
I'm so pleased that there is going to be a prequel, because the hints about the house's back story were really intriguing.
If you love your horror Chucky style, this book is definitely for you.
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