Review
"...THREE KIDS INVESTIGATING A LOCAL NEIGHBORHOOD "LEGEND" DISCOVER THAT THINGS THAT GO BUMP IN THE NIGHT COME COMPLETE WITH FUR, AND CLAWS, AND FANGS IN THIS ENGAGING, ATMOSPHERIC, COMING-OF-AGE, RL STINE "GOOSEBUMPS" MEETS "THE WOLFMAN" STYLE HORROR THRILLER" -- THE CREATURE FEATURE FEST BLOGSPOT
"THE LOOKYLOO IS A THROWBACK TO THE BYGONE DAYS WHEN LIFE WAS SIMPLER AND MYSTERIOUS EVENTS ARE COVERED UP RATHER THAN TALKED ABOUT ON THE EVENING NEWS. THE CHARACTERS ARE WELL WRITTEN AND THE AUTHOR IS ADEPT AT MAKING THEM COME ALIVE. IT'S LIKE A CROSSOVER OF "TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD" AND STEPHEN KING'S "SILVER BULLET". IT'S FAST PACED AND VERY ENTERTAINING". -- 4 STAR REVIEW, AMAZON US
"SPOILER ALERT: I AM 76 YEARS OLD, A RETIRED HISTORY TEACHER AND PROBABLY READING WAY BELOW MY LEVEL. BUT...I ABSOLUTELY LOVED THIS BOOK AND I'LL SAY THAT AGAIN, I ABSOLUTELY LOVED THIS BOOK. IMAGINE IF "TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD", "TOM SAWYER", AND "THE BODY" WERE TOSSED INTO A BLENDER...FROM THE RELAXED NARRATIVE STYLE TO THE TOTALLY LIKEABLE CHARACTERS (ESP. "TAZZIE") AND A CREEPY RL STINE KIND OF PLOT AND YOU HAVE A WONDERFUL EXPERIENCE. 5.1 STARS" -- 5 STAR REVIEW, AMAZON US
"WHAT AN ABSOLUTE GEM OF A BOOK. AS AN ADULT, I WAS TOTALLY ENTHRALLED BY THREE CHILDREN WHO, DESPITE THEIR FEARS, WERE SO DETERMINED TO PROVE THE EXISTENCE OF A WEREWOLF LIVING IN THEIR NEIGHBORHOOD. WELL WORTH READING FOR ANY AGE"-- 4 STAR REVIEW, GOODREADS
"IMAGINE JEM AND SCOUT FROM "TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD" HAVE A BRUSH WITH A POSSIBLE WEREWOLF AND YOU ALMOST EXACTLY HAVE THIS BOOK...IT'S A CHARMING READ SUITABLE FOR ALL AGES" -- 4 STAR REVIEW, AMAZON UK
"LOOKING FOR A FUN READ? THIS IS ONE. YOUNG READERS OR OLD WILL FIND THIS BOOK AMUSING. WHAT CHILD DOESN'T LIKE A MYSTERY? AND WHAT NEIGHBOR DOESN'T HOLD ONE. LOOKING FOR SOMETHING QUICK TO READ? SOMETHING TO MAKE YOU REMINISCENT OF CHILDHOOD? THIS IS THE BOOK. SPYING ON NEIGHBORS, LISTENING TO ADULT CONVERSATIONS, AND PLANNING SCOUTING MISSIONS TO FIND WHO IS AN ACTUAL FACT WEREWOLF" -- 3 STAR REVIEW, AMAZON US
"IT'S A SOLID STORY WITH ALL THE TRAPPINGS OF A CLASSIC CHILDREN'S MYSTERY BOOK. AND I'M EXCITED TO SEE IF WE GET A SEQUEL ABOUT A HAUNTED RIVERBOAT OR NOT." -- KIDZ READZ REVIEWZ
From the Author
EXCERPT:
"Did you really go to school with Bodene, momma?" I asked, trying to steer the conversation back to the subject at hand.
"He, your daddy, and I all went to school together".
"What was he like, Mrs. Beaumont?" Woody asked as he sat down next to Tazzie at the patio table.
"Oh, I will remember that boy the sum and total days of my life", Momma said with a slight whispery quality in her voice. Then she paused for a moment, as if reliving a memory, before starting again, "He was quiet. And unusual to look at. The type of of unusual to look at that caught your eye and made you stare despite yourself. And even though a boy of twelve or thirteen when I knew him, Bodene's features had no boyish plump roundness to them. No softness to them. His features were all sharp and very angular, just like the ones a predatory animal might have. He was tall and reed thin. The type of thin that would make you think he'd be blown away to Oz by a strong breeze. Or that he would surely break if bent. But at the same time Bodene gave off a true sense of physical menace when you were in his presence that was off-puttin'. He seemed to have only one single eyebrow, because his unkempt eyebrows had more or less grown together from neglect. And his eyes. Bodene Madison had the oddest honey colored eyes in God's creation".
"Where's the rest of Mr. Madison's family?" I wondered out loud. "I mean, he had to have a wife, right?"
"I can't say, factually. I know that he and Bodene moved to HannibleMoe and into that house just shortly before your daddy and I first started goin' together", Momma said as she began to space the clothes out on the clothes line. "Your daddy being my beau, I spent a lot of time around here, and I'd see Bodene sittin' all by himself in their front yard. I do remember once hearin' your late grandma Theadora and a few of the neighbor ladies talkin' about an incident that happened one evenin'."
"What incident?" I asked, sitting opposite Woody at the patio table.
"Y'all are really interested in all this, huh?" Momma asked as she pulled more clothes pins from her apron. "Well, the tale of it is this. It was late one night when a strange woman drove up to the Madison house and began rantin' and ravin' in the front yard; drawin' the entire neighborhoods attention with the commotion, and all because Ebenezer wouldn't let her inside the house. Now what was overheard was that the woman, Bodene's momma, had tracked them down all the way from Jonesboro. They say she was hollerin' that she wanted to see Bodene. That she wanted him back. That she didn't believe Ebenezer's stories about Bodene's birth order, and that she shouldn't be made to suffer by havin' her baby boy taken away from her because of some foolish folklore."
"What was so strange about Bodene's birth order?" Woody asked. His interest, as well as my own, peaked by momma's tale.
"Now this particular part of the story was recounted by Mrs. Irene Cunningham, who lived next door to the Madison's back then as a young bride, and we all know what a wayward imagination she has", Momma cautioned before going on. "Mrs. Cunningham claimed that, after Ebenezer finally let his wife inside the house, she overheard him tryin' to convince her that what he'd told her wasn't folklore. That he in his lifetime, even in his very own family, had witnessed the truth of the affliction with his own eyes. He told her that Bodene was the seventh son born to a seventh son. And as such, he was cursed by God unnatural."
"As an actual fact?!" Tazzie gasped, her voice quivering with excitement.
"According to Mrs. Cunningham anyway", Momma cautioned again. "She said that Mrs. Madison swore up and down that she'd get Bodene back. Even if she had to go to the police to do it."
"And did she?" I asked, and watched as my question seemed to stop momma right in the act of hanging a wet pair of pants on the clothes line.
"One month later", Momma said, turning to face us, her gaze catching our own. "To the day, sheriff deputies took Bodene back to Jonesboro to be with his momma. And Ebenezer Madison just watched from his doorway as they put Bodene in the backseat of a police car. He just...", Momma paused again, as if trying to make some sense of the memory before telling it. "He just waved to him once, and then smiled the coldest, cruelest imitation of a smile I'd ever seen in life."
"You mean, after everything he'd said to his wife, he just up and let them take Bodene away?" Woody asked, in a small way speaking for both me and Tazzie as well, because we shared his boggle. "It doesn't make much sense, Mrs. Beaumont."
"The sense of it is this", Momma began again. "And it again comes from Mrs. Irene Cunningham. She heard Ebenezer tell the deputies that he wanted Bodene to see his momma again. That he wanted her to see what he was becoming." Momma used her fingers like quotation marks in the air when she said the word "becoming", as if it had some special meaning. "And one week later, to the day, Mrs. Madison herself brought Bodene back to live with his daddy. And she never, not once, came back to see either of them again."
"Why'd she bring Bodene back, momma?" I asked, the suspense of momma's story taking a firm hold on my imagination.
"Can't say, factually", she replied, smiling brightly at the reaction the story was having on us. "But the whispers that went around the neighborhood all centered on the curse Ebenezer had mentioned. Of course sensible folks dismissed it as just a desperate man's attempt to keep his child. But, still and all, there were the whispers. Bodene came to school less and less over time. Eventually Ebenezer took him out of school altogether", Momma said, before abandoning the wash, walking over to us, and leaning against the patio table. "Shortly after that I stopped seein' him in their yard when I was over here. And then your daddy told me that Bodene had taken to comin' out only at night, prowlin' the street and any unfenced yards he could find like a stray dog".
"Great gosh almighty", Woody gasped in wide eyed amazement.
"To be sure", Momma said with a knowing nod. "After Ethan and I got married and moved into this house with his momma, Bodene had become this secret that the whole neighborhood shared. Anytime there was a rustlin' in someone's yard after dark, they'd tell their children that it was Bodene come to peek in their window and snatch them away. It wasn't long after that that Rommel was to make his first appearance in their yard. You could see him in their backyard runnin' back and forth, pullin' on the chain that held him in place, as he barked at whoever would pass in front of their house". Momma stopped again, and that puzzled look again took hold of her, "And then, the strangest things began to happen"...
From the Back Cover
In the town of HannibleMoe, Mississippi there have been whispers about it for years: Crazy old Ebenezer Madison, what he may or may not have locked away inside the dark recesses of his cellar, and who or what it might be. Whispers over time become legend. Legends over time become the things that go bump in the night. And over time, those things that go bump in the night...become the stuff of nightmares. While investigating the truth behind the legend, 12 year old Jefferson, his spunky little sister Tazzie, and their friend Woody find out that things that go bump in the night have fur, and claws--AND TEETH!!!
"...It's like a crossover of "To Kill a Mockingbird" and Stephen King's "Silver Bullet". It's fast paced and very entertaining" -- Amazon Customer Review
