The Vours: Evil, demonic beings that
inhabit human bodies on Sorry Night, the darkest hours of the winter solstice.
This isn’t how the horror ended for
us—this is how it began.
When Reggie reads about the Vours in a
mysterious old journal, she assumes they are just the musings of an anonymous
lunatic. But when her little brother, Henry, begins to act strangely, it’s
clear that these creatures exist beyond a madwoman’s imagination, and Reggie
finds out what happens when fears come to life.
To save the people she loves, Reggie must
learn to survive in a world of nightmares. Can she devour her own fears before
they devour her?
This
is definitely in my list of favorite books. It’s not a super imaginative and
new sort of way to present a horror story, but the monster Simon Holt creates
is quite terrifying. Creatures from another dimension that possess the bodies
of the alone and fearful, and then live out their lives while the original
owner of the body is forced into a world where all their fears reside and
torture them for the rest of their lives.
It’s
an awful thought, and I love that Holt set such a story to a well-known sort of
plot-backdrop. Reggie and her best friend love the macabre and all things
horror. Reggie likes to read her little brother bedtime nightmares. Reggie and
her best friend go all Bloody Mary on this Vours legend and Reggie’s little
brother gets possessed.
Even
though it’s a simple story, it packs a punch. There are a lot of twists and
turns that made me question whether I could ever be as strong as Reggie and
defeat my own fears. It’s a great book to read when you’re alone, at night. NOT.
Holt
did a great job, though. He packed in just enough description of all the fears
being brought to life, that I could really see and feel the terror. I’ve got to
say, I wouldn’t have survived a day in the “fearscape” of Reggie’s little
brother, Henry. But I didn’t survive the book, and look forward to reading the
other two in the series!
Of
course, despite there being so many things I enjoyed, there are always things
that could have been done better. While I think Holt used a good amount of
imagery, I’m still sad he didn’t use more. I didn’t just want to see the
horrors, I wanted to smell, taste, and feel them. I’m a horror buff, so I love
this genre. I also wish I’d gotten to see a little more of Henry before he was
possessed. Granted, I could tell that he was not Henry once he was possessed,
but I still wish I’d had a little more of the original to go off of.
Not
a lot of the mechanics are described in this book. They attack your brain and
push your soul to another dimension? I’m just going to assume that more will be
revealed on this in the next two books. Along with that, I thought Reggie’s
best friend, Aaron, was too much of a wimp for my liking. It played a great
importance in the book, but I think it was a little too much. That being said,
I wish Reggie had more fears than just spiders. The Vours say she’ll be an easy
target because of this, and that’s fun and all, but she needed more.
Oh
and the father is a total bust. He’s awful. I know Henry’s only a little boy,
but little to what your daughter has to say, okay? Jeez. I’m sure this awful
dynamic is only going to played on more in the next book. What an horrible
parent. Well, parents if you count that “mother of the year”. Anyway, I’m done
I promise. It’s a great book if you want a quick and scary read. It’s
action-packed and there’s some great plot twists in there too.
XOXO Tia
No comments:
Post a Comment