Synopsis:
When people go missing in the sleepy town of Smith’s Hollow, the only clue to their fate comes when a teenager starts having terrifying visions, in The Ghost Tree, a chilling horror novel from national bestselling author Christina Henry.
When the bodies of two girls are found torn apart in the town of Smiths Hollow, Lauren is surprised, but she also expects that the police won’t find the killer. After all, the year before her father’s body was found with his heart missing, and since then everyone has moved on. Even her best friend, Miranda, has become more interested in boys than in spending time at the old ghost tree, the way they used to when they were kids.
So when Lauren has a vision of a monster dragging the remains of the girls through the woods, she knows she can’t just do nothing. Not like the rest of her town. But as she draws closer to answers, she realizes that the foundation of her seemingly normal town might be rotten at the center. And that if nobody else stands for the missing, she will.
Edition:
E-ARC
Disclosure:
I received an ARC of this book from Net Galley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
My Thoughts:
Have you ever seen that episode of Eerie, Indiana where Marshall’s name is drawn to be the town’s Harvest King? You know, because Dash X was kind of a jerk and set it up? This book kind of reminds me of that. Only with less John Astin, corn, and werewolves that mysteriously only need to feed once every 13 years. It’s even set in the 80s. Yes, I know that Eerie was in the early 90s, but it’s close so…ha!
You all might know by now that I have a real weakness for folk horror. And The Ghost Tree presents a very solid folk horror story that involves revenge curses, monsters, and human sacrifice. So- all the good stuff.
The Ghost Tree does use some tried-and-true tropes of the sub-genre. I won’t go into detail about because I would hate to ruin the story for you. But it uses them well. I appreciate that although this is also a coming-of-age story, it’s different than the (unfortunate) norm in that it’s about a girl coming of age! OMG WHAT A CONCEPT! I’m not bitter, I swear. I’ve actually read quite a few female-centered coming-of-age horror stories in the last few years, but it bugs me that they are so few and far between outside of indie horror, so, when I see it from a big publisher, I want to shout about it.
I have never read any of Christina Henry’s work before this one, but she’s got quite a few to choose from, so this probably isn’t going to be the last I read of hers. Her writing style really worked for me, and I found her dialogue refreshing. It wasn’t overly wordy, the tones matched up to speakers, and it was never clunky.
About the Author:
CHRISTINA HENRY is the author of the CHRONICLES OF ALICE duology, ALICE and RED QUEEN, a dark and twisted take on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, as well as LOST BOY: THE TRUE STORY OF CAPTAIN HOOK, an origin story of Captain Hook from Peter Pan.
She is also the author of the national bestselling BLACK WINGS series (BLACK WINGS, BLACK NIGHT, BLACK HOWL, BLACK LAMENT, BLACK CITY, BLACK HEART and BLACK SPRING) featuring Agent of Death Madeline Black and her popcorn-loving gargoyle Beezle.
Christina enjoys running long distances, reading anything she can get her hands on and watching movies with samurai, zombies and/or subtitles in her spare time. She lives in Chicago with her husband and son.
You can visit her website, on Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads.
My Rating:
This book is really good, and even though it’s a fairly hefty page count (at least in comparison to all of the novellas I’ve been reading lately), it absolutely flies by!
The Ghost Tree By Christina Henry Berkley Books ISBN: 9780451492302 Expected Publication: September 8, 2020 Paperback, E-book 432 Pages Author's Website
