Recent Reads - Possess

Possess, Gretchen McNeil

 5 of 5 Stars

Buy It: Amazon  /  Barnes & Noble

Genre:   Young Adult, Horror/Paranormal

Pages:   384

Published:   8/23/2011, Balzer + Bray

Why I Chose It:   For my reasons see my TBR post from last Thursday. There's a hardcover giveaway!!!

Synopsis (from Good Reads):     Fifteen-year-old Bridget Liu just wants to be left alone: by her mom, by the cute son of a local police sergeant, and by the eerie voices she can suddenly and inexplicably hear. Unfortunately for Bridget, it turns out the voices are demons – and Bridget has the rare ability to banish them back to whatever hell they came from.

Terrified to tell people about her new power, Bridget confides in a local priest who enlists her help in increasingly dangerous cases of demonic possession. But just as she is starting to come to terms with her new power, Bridget receives a startling message from one of the demons. Now Bridget must unlock the secret to the demons' plan before someone close to her winds up dead – or worse, the human vessel of a demon king.

My Review:  So here is a list of things that definitely did not happen while I was reading Possess:

1) I did not have to sleep with the lights on.

2) I did not fall asleep clutching my rosary & mumbling a prayer.

3) I did not wake up in the middle of the night in a pitch black room to find glowing eyes staring at me.

4) And I certainly did not screech, jump out of bed and knock over my nightstand only to realize those eyes belonged to my cat.

Okay, so clearly all of those things did in fact happen. But it's not my fault. I blame Gretchen McNeil. This book is creepy. Creepy, and engrossing, and wonderful. I couldn't get enough. And this is another book I went into with extremely high expectations so it had to be awesome to satisfy me.

Bridget is an incredible heroine. I can't even explain how much I loved her. She reminded me of myself at that age. You know, if I'd have been a kick-ass teenage exorcist instead of a girl who would've locked herself away if the walls had begun talking to her. She's intelligent, funny, and snarky. I never once found myself questioning her behavior. I could gush about her forever, but I'm going to force myself to move on.

The supporting cast is equally as amazing. Each character fully fleshed out with their own little intricacies and secrets. I adored Matt. He's handsome, charming, and super supportive of Bridget even as she does her best to push him away.

The story line is truly original. It wasn't the same old story with different characters. I was fully engaged, anxiously turning pages to see what would happen next. There are lots of spine-tingling moments and action scenes that had me holding my breath and biting my nails. The book definitely came to a successful conclusion, and as far as I know it's not part of a series, however I'd love to see more of Bridget and her world.

If you're a fan of YA horror or paranormal, or simply a fan of incredible writing, this book is for you.


Note: If you haven't entered my giveaway, what are you waiting for? You need this book. Open until 9/15/2011

---