ARC Review--Holly Horror by Michelle Jabes Corpora

 

"Playmate, come and play with me..."

A beloved classic reimagined with a dark twist.

After her parents' painful divorce, Evie Archer hopes that moving to Ravenglass, Massachusetts, is the fresh start that her family needs. But Evie quickly realizes that her new home—known by locals as the Horror House—carries its own dark past after learning about Holly Hobbie, who mysteriously vanished in her bedroom one night.

But traces of Holly linger in the Horror House and slowly begin to take over Evie's life. A strange shadow follows her everywhere she goes, and Evie starts to lose sight of what's real and what isn't the more she learns about The Lost Girl.

Can Evie find out what happened the night of Holly's disappearance? Or is history doomed to repeat itself in the Horror House?

 

 

 

I received this ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest and voluntary review. I was in no way compensated for this review.

Michelle Jabes Corpora's Holly Horror had a strong premise that had me excited and thrilled to be terrified! This is a book rich with family history and mysteries and the ghosts that are left behind! There were some chilling moments in this one that had me turning the pages as quickly as I could.

The story starts off with Evie moving into an old family house after her parents divorce. Funds are tight, so Evie's aunt allows them to move into the house she inherited from family years ago. It's sat pretty much untouched for years, ever since Evie's young relative went missing decades ago. It's rumored that the house is haunted, they even call it Horror House. But Evie learns that there is more than just one mystery to this house.

Soon the weird things start happening. Strange sounds that can't be explained, the odd dreams that haunt Evie's sleep and then there's the terrifying fact that Evie continues to see a shadowy figure with a skeleton like face behind a bonnet. Hello cover! It was definitely spooky at times! All those creaky sounds that you could practically hear off the page and then the terrifying childlike voice that sings what sounds like a lullaby but really has frightening lyrics! Evie soon begins to think that she is being haunted by Holly!

With a title like Holly Horror, I fully expected this to be a nonstop terror inducing story and yet, I sadly felt like it took a bit too long to get into the spookiness. Perhaps I am expecting too much from my "horror" reads these days. Which I totally think I am. I was expecting the buildup, the history, needing to set the scene so we can be ready to be terrified, yet there were perhaps a few too many normal downtime moments for me. 

I found some of the mystery parts puzzling as well, which I guess is to be expected since it is a mystery. But I guess the inclusion of the mystery that came before Holly's "mysterious disappearance"left me befuddled as we only ever get brief mentionings of it. I guess I thought there would be more digging into this first mystery that in turn led to the mystery of Holly's disappearance. I know now that this is meant to be a series, and I kind of saw that before I started but wasn't entirely sure if it would be a continuous series or a standalone series, if that makes sense! This is definitely a continuous series based on that ending!

The characters were pretty likeable all things considered. Evie was your sort of average quiet girl who had a "scary" past. We got hints of a history with Evie and that led her to have "problems" that her mother still worried about in the current day. I went back and forth between a few ideas, but as the ending began to unwind its tangled web, the answer was clear to what Evie's past issues were. It was fitting I'd say once we reached the end and all the dots were connected. Evie was a likeable girl.

There was some budding romance going on as well between the horrifying and contemporary moments. Naturally, Evie has caught the eye of Mr. Popular Football Star, Dominic. What started as a simple desk neighbors in class soon transformed into something more little by little. But not everyone was happy about this new budding relationship between Mr. Football and the Ne Girl. Dominic's ex-girlfriend pretty much makes an enemy out of Evie on day 1 believing that she and Dominic were just on some sort of break. Yeah, she's one of those types. But I have to say, there was a moment where I kind of loved how Evie handled her bullying.

All in all, I can say that I was mostly entertained with the story though I did find the pace a bit staggering. I'm not a contemporary reader by any means, so when we had these mundane moments of ordinary happening in between spooky or mysterious moments I was a bit bored. Sometimes it wouldn't be long before something creepy happened, other times it was a handful of pages. That's not to say there was anything wrong with this book. There wasn't really, it's just me and my aversion to normality. Lol. I guess I was just hoping for something more like 70/30 on the spooky/normal moments happening throughout and what I got was more like 55/45. So not terrible, but not what I was anticipating when I started the book. 

Things did end a bit oddly. I say oddly, because it felt like we were getting a nice conclusive ending with a bit of a question or two hanging but then we got a big bombshell of a cliffhanger! It was one that had me taking notice, like holy cow, we really went there! So not only do we still have a bit of a mystery going on in the background concerning the ghost side of things but we now have this whopper of a cliffhanger dangling in our faces! It makes for interesting reading that's for sure!

Holly Horror was a nice foray into the spooky side of YA! While it wasn't the horrorfest I was secretly hoping for--on the upper YA scope of things, I know this isn't adult horror, but I've read some pretty scary YA stories to date--it still made for some spooky reading! If you're looking for some chills and thrills, this is definitely the read for you! I haven't yet decided if I'll be continuing the series, I guess it will depend on what kind of story the next book promises. But I'm definitely keeping my eyes on the horizon for it nonetheless!

 

Overall Rating 3/5 stars

 

Holly Horror releases August 15, 2023