Synopsis
Midsommar meets Fear Street in this modern, sea-soaked folk horror debut about fighting to survive, and fighting to be yourself.
Seventeen-year-old Lindsay Weinberg has just gotten kicked out of another prep school, and has consequently found herself shipped to her Uncle Levi’s farm in the cold, isolated town of Marbury, Maine.
When Lindsay arrives at a big, old farmhouse miles from civilization, she is greeted by her uncle’s new wife, a goy with a little too much Jesus decor for Lindsay’s taste―with Uncle Levi mysteriously away on a business trip. Not only that, but Lindsay isn’t the only teen staying there. In fact, there is a small group of teens going through some kind of reform program. Up at dawn. Manual labor all day. No phones, computers or tablets.
Things start to feel hopeless until Lindsay meets the twins, Phin and Cass. They live on an island off the Peninsula’s coast―and they have internet. Lindsay convinces the others at Haven House to sneak out for a party on the island, and the night is incredible. At least…what they can remember of it. All of them wake up in their beds with sea-shell mementos, no memory of how they got home, and wicked hangovers. All of them except one. And as the disappearances and mysteries pile up, Lindsay and the others realize that they have become involved in a terrifying fight to survive, before the Cove claims them all.
Review
Thanks to Netgalley and Macmillan for the audio ARC! I really like the cover for this one, and the blurb relating anything culty to R. L. Stine is an instant yes for me. This didn’t disappoint. The audio by Jesse Vilinsky was fantastic. It really felt like she embodied Lindsay.
Lindsay isn’t your average troubled kid. With parents as emotionally cold as an iceberg, she has managed to get kicked out of just about everything ever, including expulsion from multiple schools. She cuts classes, smokes to get attention, and never stays anywhere long enough to even begin to make friends. Her parents are rich, seeming to believe that money is enough to hush things up and get her to graduation, when all she really desires is to be seen. Instead, they decide they’ve had enough of her antics and ship her off to stay the summer with her uncle and aunt. If the family estrangement isn’t weird enough, it’s also a kind of teenage reform house…and more importantly, where the hell is her uncle?
This novel does well to toe the line between reading almost new adult, while definitely having the air of a young adult story with its chosen POV. Some of the themes and language are dark, and the crimes and horror are pretty violent at times, too. It also has a pretty positive commentary on sexuality and being perceived as different that I quite liked. There has been a somewhat recent push for young adult books to be more tame and “clean,” but this one does the opposite. I think both are valid and deserve to exist, the same way no two kids are alike. If you are a Jewish bisexual girl drummer who just wants love and attention from her parents, then you deserve to see it exist on the page too.
This is also a pretty well-handled showing of how Christianity, bible verses more specifically, can be weaponized in a controlling manner. How the idea of God’s eternal glory can be tainted into something far from bountiful…and that’s not even really the cult stuff! Phin and Cass, these sort of ethereal, The Shining-esque twins, were really creepy to me. From their too-helpful nature to their old-timey accents that made me think of Leo in The Great Gatsby, I wanted no part of them. Of course, they would live on an island that can only be reached during low tide, or via boat. Nothing strange going on there at all…
The cast of characters that are introduced as this sort of halfway house-for-trouble- kids kids(?) were really enjoyable. With one of them being sent there for being gay and another for being trans, I felt it really gave the setting an eerie feeling—like even before anything happens, it all felt like a sham. And of course, the fact that they all turn out to be perfectly capable, caring, and helpful teens really tied together the entire arc for Lindsay. Found family that pulls on the heartstrings. If you’ve ever read Stine and desired a little more creepiness and a tad more character depth, this one might work perfectly for you!
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