From Publishers Weekly
At the start of screenwriter Sokoloff's first novel, a teen terror flick in prose, generic Baird College is emptying out for Thanksgiving break, but a few stalwart students have decided to stay on campus to avoid going home to their dysfunctional families. One night, under the influence of booze and drugs, they whip out a ouija board and inadvertently summon what they believe is the spirit of a student who died there decades before. In truth, it's something nastier, and the quintet spend the rest of the story desperately trying to send back to the void an evil entity that won't go gently. The characters, who include the mousy good girl and the nerd whose scholarly skepticism grows increasingly grating with each repeat expression, develop little personality outside of their carefully crafted types. The pyrotechnic climax, in which the kids prove unusually adept at occult subterfuge, stretches credibility but provides a suitably cinematic finale.
(Sept.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From School Library Journal
Grade 10 Up–Robin, an outcast college student, has problems connecting with others because of her dark past. When she stays at school over the Thanksgiving holiday, she believes that she is alone in the gothic castle of a dormitory. However, four other students are also there. The first evening, they find themselves in a lounge together, and, after drinking and smoking pot, they discover a Ouija board. When Robin and another girl use it, they connect with a spirit who calls himself Zachary, a student who died in a fire in the dorm years before. But the five students have actually contacted something far more sinister and dangerous than a ghost. Soon the question becomes whether any of them will survive the encounter. The book reads like the script of a low-budget horror movie, and the characters never rise above stereotypes. Additionally, the story is undermined by the rushed ending. Skip this derivative work in favor of more original titles.
–Tasha Saecker, Menasha Public Library, WI Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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