January 3, 2011
In this ghost story, McCann (the Wake trilogy) delivers an atmospheric but unsatisfying tale of smalltown horror. Kendall Fletcher, a soccer player with obsessive-compulsive disorder who dreams of performing on Broadway, is determined to escape her tiny hometown of Cryer's Cross, Mont., by getting into Juilliard. When her best friend, Nico, is the second student to vanish mysteriously in
recent months, it throws Kendall's ordered life into disarray. Soon, enigmatic daydreams and clues lead her to believe that Nico is the latest victim of a supernatural mystery, and she may be the next target. A handsome but surly newcomer, Jacián, may be the key to surviving whatever is preying on the teens of
Cryer's Cross. While the remote, rural setting is laden with potential (the one-room high school has only 24 students) and the constant whirring of Kendall's OCD-afflicted mind adds an interesting dimension, the elements never completely gel. McMann handles the buildup of the story's tension well, but her resolution feels quick and easy, and even bloody final revelations can't mitigate a premise that's far more silly than spooky. Ages 14–up.
May 2, 2011
Kendall Fletcher is a smalltown Montana high school senior with obsessive-compulsive disorder, waiting to hear if she's been accepted into Juilliard. At the same time, she's deeply concerned over the strange disappearance of two of her classmates. Both the story and Julia Whelan's narration are at their best when focusing on the more realistic aspects of Kendall's life. Whelan's very young, fragile voice is a good fit for the teen protagonist, and she puts feeling and warmth into Kendall's dealings with friends and adults. Her descriptions of Kendall's soccer games are lively and energetic, and the moments in which her heroine obeys her compulsions are handled with sensitivity. But the supernatural aspects, which seem to belong to another book entirely, and not an especially good one, give Whelan difficultiesâparticularly the voices of the doomed teens, which even Meryl Streep would have trouble interpreting. A Simon Pulse hardcover.