Another Little Piece by Kate Karyus Quinn
eARC received from HarperTeen via Edelweiss
On Shelves Now
Reviewed by: Middle
Sis Jenn
The Sisters Say:
Dark, Gritty, and Unsettling
On a cool autumn night, Annaliese Rose Gordon stumbled out of the woods and into a high school party. She was screaming. Drenched in blood. Then she vanished.
A year later, Annaliese is found wandering down a road hundreds of miles away. She doesn't know who she is. She doesn't know how she got there. She only knows one thing: She is not the real Annaliese Rose Gordon.
Now Annaliese is haunted by strange visions and broken memories. Memories of a reckless, desperate wish . . . a bloody razor . . . and the faces of other girls who disappeared. Piece by piece, Annaliese's fractured memories come together to reveal a violent, endless cycle that she will never escape—unless she can unlock the twisted secrets of her past.
I love and hate horror movies. I love them because I like being on the edge
of my seat, waiting for something to jump out of the dark corner; but I hate
them because inevitably, as soon as the lights go out, here come the
nightmares. So my solution? Never watch horror movies. So, I haven’t watched a horror movie in
years, and I have started to miss them.
And then lo and behold, horror starts becoming a trend in YA books! Problem solved. I love this growing trend because for some
reason, books can be scary and thrill me
without causing nightmares.
So when I saw Kate Karyus Quinn’s debt novel a couple of
months ago, I knew it was one I was going to want to read; and it definitely
delivered. Kate’s world was
grisly—soaked in the blood of recklessness and evil. With every new memory Annaliese regains, the
truth becomes more daunting and more grotesque.
Fans of Kendare Blake will love this one.
From Chapter 1, I was pulled right into the twisted world of
deception and brutality. Kate’s
descriptions (while overly detailed at times) were hauntingly beautiful and
terrible at the same time, and I found myself lost in a maze of shadows. Annaliese was a great mc for a horror novel
because she had this brokenness to her that made you want to feel sorry for her,
but at the same time, she had an air of coldness that sent my teeth to
chattering. She was a completely
unreliable narrator which made the tension much more palpable. I also liked that I didn’t take a liking to
her. Does that make sense? She’s made horrible decisions in the past and
there is a part of her that would scare the dark side of the moon. Her treachery and darkness made her a great
character to both love and fear.
Now the bad guy (well, one of them) really disgusted
me. I won’t say much about him because
it’s too spoilery, but let me just say, he definitely triggered my gag
reflex. His words and actions were
manipulative and sociopathic; and seeing how much he enjoyed pain and suffering
totally gave me the heebie jeebies.
The only thing that really bothered me was the length of the
story. I really enjoyed it, but I got to
a point where I wanted it to hurry up and end so I could see how everything was
going to either work out or go to hell.
I truthfully think it was a good 50-75 pages too long, and maybe that’s
my attention span talking, but I had a hard time finishing it as quickly as I
do other books. Most books I read in 2
days, and this one took me 4 days to complete.
But then again, it might be because I couldn’t sit down and devour a
book with so much grotesque imagery.
Overall, while it wasn’t my favorite ya horror that I have
read, it was still a story that grabbed me and pulled me under. The ending was both somber and cathartic,
though, so while I was still left with an unsettling feeling from the tragic
decisions, I wasn’t left thinking, “Wow, sucks to be her.” If you are a horror fan, then you should
definitely check this one out.