I took a two week staycation recently where I was able to read about a dozen books. Some were short, but a few had a little kick to them. Such as Teen Killers At Large V03. The Teen Killers Club series
Lily Sparks created a modern day Bonnie and Clyde, with kill switches implanted in the necks of people, hackers, billionaires, rough family dynamics, and a bunch of killers under the age of 18. This novel was probably the weakest of the three only because it had to wrap up two slowly paced books about a group of teens who are being trained to be assassins due to their personality trait of being a “Class A” psycho/psychopath. There was a lot of stuff to wrap up, unpack and pull together. Now, we know from day one Signal is innocent of the crime she was convicted of, so a big part of three is if she gets her day in court to show she is innocent. And of course, books one and two are filled with finding out who the real killer is, finding the real killer, losing the real killer’s confession and figuring out who is running the show in the first place so that is harder than it looks. Then there is the finding who is behind the camp, the experiments on the kids, and who is running the show. In theory this was a good premise, if not a bit far fetched (I mean really? Hormonal, mentally crazy and/or abused teens as killers? Yeah that can’t go wrong). This volume of the TKC club is like the others: slow and kept adding more kindling without much heat coming out to the plot. My biggest issue with things is our main character, Signal, tends to be a bit of a “damsel in distress” and thinks she can change the “bad boy” with love (even if he might be one of the only ones with real “murders” and not self-defense kills to his name). The ending felt rushed and left the door open for a book four, or a new spinoff series.
Then a bit shorter and not a novel, but graphic novel, was The Fourth Closet: Five Nights at Freddy’s (Five Nights at Freddy’s Graphic Novel #3) by Scott Cawthon, Kira Breed-Wrisley, Diana Camero, and Christopher Hastings. If you like the game Freddy books and graphic novels are based on, you then should read this trilogy and/or the graphic novels. If you are looking for something to start your Freddy journey, this might not be it. There are several novels and graphic novels and series within them. They feel like the modern Fear Street series of my teens by RL Stine (which were teen, romantic, coming of age, thrillers). Since I have not read the novels, I am curious if the novels flesh out the bumps I have with the graphic novels. This is because the story is missing pieces. Like who is Freddy. Why are they being possessed? What happened to Sammy? And who is Sammy in the first place? Even books one and two don’t fill in blanks. When we get to the climax, there is a lot of juxtaposition and little results. Like what is going on with that ending? And while this is a thriller/horror book, volumes one and two hadn’t skimped on the “icky” but were mild compared to this volume. There is a whole scene that I was WHAT THE MONKEY TOOTS? Yeah, I know kids see worse, but that was a bit gratuitous.
Just know with both of these series they can be mature, and if you figure out WHY my nephew likes this villain (see picture with blonde girl), please explain it to me! Now, I like a good bad-guy as much as the next person, but we are talking about the nephew who found the live action Grinch spooky!