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dukesangel002's review against another edition
5.0
This was a scary, thrilling, creeptastic read! Timothy and Abigail team up on a school project, and after a scary nightmarish event in the basement of the museum, and an encounter with a tall creepy man in an overcoat, their lives begin to spiral out of control. Timothy and Abigail have to face some of their worse nightmares. Timothy's friend and one of the teachers at school are having nervous breakdowns after seeing things that can't be explained, and it all seems to be pointing back to Abigail. Only thing is, if Abigail is doing it, she doesn't know how, and she surely doesn't know how to stop it.
Timothy was a great male main character. He was smart and funny. Even while scared and vulnerable he was still strong. He was a great and loyal friend from beginning to end. Abigail was quirky and strong-willed, and great counterpart to Timothy. I especially loved Abigail's grandmother, this frail old woman was amazing and could still kick-butt in her own way!
Dan Poblocki did a great job of bringing all of the nightmares to life and making this book creepy and still fun at the same time. It was intense and kept me on the edge of my seat from the first page to the last. Normally I can figure out the mysteries in a book before they were revealed and that just didn't happen with this one. I loved the way it was all wrapped up, even when I thought I had the ending all figured out and new curve ball was thrown at me!
I recommend this one to anyone who loves a good YA, thriller, mystery, or horror book. Just make sure you have all the lights on as you read it ;-)
Timothy was a great male main character. He was smart and funny. Even while scared and vulnerable he was still strong. He was a great and loyal friend from beginning to end. Abigail was quirky and strong-willed, and great counterpart to Timothy. I especially loved Abigail's grandmother, this frail old woman was amazing and could still kick-butt in her own way!
Dan Poblocki did a great job of bringing all of the nightmares to life and making this book creepy and still fun at the same time. It was intense and kept me on the edge of my seat from the first page to the last. Normally I can figure out the mysteries in a book before they were revealed and that just didn't happen with this one. I loved the way it was all wrapped up, even when I thought I had the ending all figured out and new curve ball was thrown at me!
I recommend this one to anyone who loves a good YA, thriller, mystery, or horror book. Just make sure you have all the lights on as you read it ;-)
dtaylorbooks's review against another edition
3.0
I’ve had this sitting on my shelf for a few years now. I don’t remember where I got it from. I want to say PaperBackSwap but my copy is an ARC so I want to say that’s not accurate but it wouldn’t be the first time someone’s broken that rule on that site before. Since I’m reviewing a pile of horror books for Funtober I slid this one off the shelf and started reading.
I have to say I’m not all that impressed with it. I think it had solid potential, especially based on the blurb, but once the horror’s source was discovered it just became rather silly to me and I couldn’t stay invested in it. Nightmares coming to life are scary. Being destroyed by something that isn’t real and only you can see is terrifying. Having the evil sourced through a magical jawbone kills that buzz. It just becomes too much of a stretch for me to stay on board with and I start checking out as I read.
The surname July is rather grating so every time it came up in the story it made me flinch a little. Timothy’s a pretty decent character and is struggling with growing away from his life-long friend and dealing with his soldier brother who was injured except his parents forbid him from talking about it with anyone so actually dealing with it becomes an issue. Throw in all of this stuff that starts happening to him and he ends up with quite a bit on his plate that he ends up dealing with surprisingly well. Bigger people would have crumpled under that kind of pressure but he really stuck in there. I liked his perseverance and his strength but it was a faulty strength. He had moments of weakness that really put him into some dire straits so it wasn’t an unrealistic strength he had and it made him more relatable.
With Abigail you just kind of skim the surface with her. She makes a subtle shift of growth toward the end but for the most part she’s the same reclusive, temperamental character from the beginning. Yes, she’s being haunted by a couple of tulpa-type dream creeps so understanding for that. But she has a bad habit of shoving help away instead of embracing it and it causes some issues instead of solving them but, of course, everything ends up working out in the end.
I really don’t mind out-there horror but the book really starts losing me when the evil’s source is a ridiculous talisman that would otherwise be nearly impossible to obtain but somehow ends up in the wrong hands and brings back the dead. I think the concept is neat, that the jawbone needed to be charged and a sacrifice was needed in order to do it and it raised a rotting corpse monster from the dead in order to suck the life out of the sacrifice but I keep really getting hung up on that damn bone. It’s just so impossibly out there that no one should really have access to it in the first place. Unless it’s the curator that’s handling the thing but in this case that dude’s no where near the shenanigans. So it makes it hard for me to suspend my disbelief for that element of the book. Too bad it’s a major piece of it.
THE NIGHTMARYS had its moments but it really bordered more on middle grade than YA (probably upper middle grade or lower YA depending on how you looked at it) so the tone wasn’t really working for me and some of the scare factors weren’t all that impressive. Like I said, it had its moments. There were a few creepy parts that hinged more on ambiance and unseen horrors than the obvious that I preferred to being chased by something but it was more about the obvious than not so it didn’t keep my interest.
I think someone younger would dig it more but it really wasn’t my kind of horror. I did think it was going a different way than it did based on the blurb so that plays into it a little bit but not a ton. I just wasn’t digging the story.
2 1/2
I have to say I’m not all that impressed with it. I think it had solid potential, especially based on the blurb, but once the horror’s source was discovered it just became rather silly to me and I couldn’t stay invested in it. Nightmares coming to life are scary. Being destroyed by something that isn’t real and only you can see is terrifying. Having the evil sourced through a magical jawbone kills that buzz. It just becomes too much of a stretch for me to stay on board with and I start checking out as I read.
The surname July is rather grating so every time it came up in the story it made me flinch a little. Timothy’s a pretty decent character and is struggling with growing away from his life-long friend and dealing with his soldier brother who was injured except his parents forbid him from talking about it with anyone so actually dealing with it becomes an issue. Throw in all of this stuff that starts happening to him and he ends up with quite a bit on his plate that he ends up dealing with surprisingly well. Bigger people would have crumpled under that kind of pressure but he really stuck in there. I liked his perseverance and his strength but it was a faulty strength. He had moments of weakness that really put him into some dire straits so it wasn’t an unrealistic strength he had and it made him more relatable.
With Abigail you just kind of skim the surface with her. She makes a subtle shift of growth toward the end but for the most part she’s the same reclusive, temperamental character from the beginning. Yes, she’s being haunted by a couple of tulpa-type dream creeps so understanding for that. But she has a bad habit of shoving help away instead of embracing it and it causes some issues instead of solving them but, of course, everything ends up working out in the end.
I really don’t mind out-there horror but the book really starts losing me when the evil’s source is a ridiculous talisman that would otherwise be nearly impossible to obtain but somehow ends up in the wrong hands and brings back the dead. I think the concept is neat, that the jawbone needed to be charged and a sacrifice was needed in order to do it and it raised a rotting corpse monster from the dead in order to suck the life out of the sacrifice but I keep really getting hung up on that damn bone. It’s just so impossibly out there that no one should really have access to it in the first place. Unless it’s the curator that’s handling the thing but in this case that dude’s no where near the shenanigans. So it makes it hard for me to suspend my disbelief for that element of the book. Too bad it’s a major piece of it.
THE NIGHTMARYS had its moments but it really bordered more on middle grade than YA (probably upper middle grade or lower YA depending on how you looked at it) so the tone wasn’t really working for me and some of the scare factors weren’t all that impressive. Like I said, it had its moments. There were a few creepy parts that hinged more on ambiance and unseen horrors than the obvious that I preferred to being chased by something but it was more about the obvious than not so it didn’t keep my interest.
I think someone younger would dig it more but it really wasn’t my kind of horror. I did think it was going a different way than it did based on the blurb so that plays into it a little bit but not a ton. I just wasn’t digging the story.
2 1/2
bucknaas's review against another edition
3.0
This is the second book of dan ive read and this one scared the hell outa me. Even more than the first one
iamastraythought's review against another edition
4.0
It was great but I expect nothing less from Dan Poblocki.
iilex's review against another edition
2.0
I've been reading a lot of middle grade horror/ghost stories lately and Dan Poblocki's books looked right up my alley. You have to admit - the cover art is pretty amazing. Unfortunately, the story itself...wasn't so much.
Even if I haven't been thrilled with all of them, almost all of the middle grade books I've been reading lately have been fairly well-written (and some were crafted extremely well). The Nightmarys had really bad writing, in my opinion, and that was the main problem with this book. I found myself having trouble understanding what was going on while reading and while I at first blamed it on being tired, I quickly realized the problem was the writing. It's weirdly choppy, contains too many clauses, and didn't altogether make sense. I was surprised that this book could have gotten past an editor and was published by a well-known publishing house. You'd think they'd have fixed a little at least...There were multiple problems going on here. The dialogue was laughably bad and unbelievable. And then we have the plot. The main thread of the story was interesting - involving a cursed relic that allows its bearer to control the fears of others. The problem was that there were so many threads that the story completely unraveled. It was a little hard to follow and I wonder if a kid could actually follow it all either.
One of the strangest things about this book was realizing that the "Nightmarys" didn't fit with the plot at all and were mostly irrelevant. But that's the title! And the cover art! But why would the jawbone from an ancient tribe have seemingly Victorian-type ghosts protecting it? Huh? My first thought was that the title "Nightmarys" must have come first with the story following. Reading the acknowledgement at the end made me realize was that I wasn't far off - the author had a "dream" about ghostly little girls and that was the kickoff for the rest of the story. Apparently his original idea got away from him a little, because if you read The Nightmarys you'll see how irrelevant these ghost girls are. It's too bad, because creepy ghost girls are always interesting. What we have instead is a convoluted ghost story with too much happening all at once.
As you can tell, I was not impressed. The Nightmarys was a lot scarier than other middle grade stories I've read lately, so that was a plus (for me). I don't go into a middle grade horror book expecting or even wanting to be scared, but I'm always pleasantly surprised if the author manages to make a book creepy enough to bother adults a little. It wasn't overly scary or anything, but even I felt a chill creep up my spine at some of the imagery (the prelude and interludes were definitely the best parts here). I can see 11 to 14-year-old boys really eating this up. A sensitive child may be overly frightened, however - so proceed with caution. A teen older than 14 probably wouldn't enjoy this much, so ignore those who have tagged this as "young adult." This is a solidly upper middle grade read. And as for grown persons - I'd skip this. There are plenty of superior middle grade horror stories out there and there's no reason to read this one. It's too bad, because I really expected I'd like this. Oh well. 2 out of 5 stars.
Even if I haven't been thrilled with all of them, almost all of the middle grade books I've been reading lately have been fairly well-written (and some were crafted extremely well). The Nightmarys had really bad writing, in my opinion, and that was the main problem with this book. I found myself having trouble understanding what was going on while reading and while I at first blamed it on being tired, I quickly realized the problem was the writing. It's weirdly choppy, contains too many clauses, and didn't altogether make sense. I was surprised that this book could have gotten past an editor and was published by a well-known publishing house. You'd think they'd have fixed a little at least...There were multiple problems going on here. The dialogue was laughably bad and unbelievable. And then we have the plot. The main thread of the story was interesting - involving a cursed relic that allows its bearer to control the fears of others. The problem was that there were so many threads that the story completely unraveled. It was a little hard to follow and I wonder if a kid could actually follow it all either.
One of the strangest things about this book was realizing that the "Nightmarys" didn't fit with the plot at all and were mostly irrelevant. But that's the title! And the cover art! But why would the jawbone from an ancient tribe have seemingly Victorian-type ghosts protecting it? Huh? My first thought was that the title "Nightmarys" must have come first with the story following. Reading the acknowledgement at the end made me realize was that I wasn't far off - the author had a "dream" about ghostly little girls and that was the kickoff for the rest of the story. Apparently his original idea got away from him a little, because if you read The Nightmarys you'll see how irrelevant these ghost girls are. It's too bad, because creepy ghost girls are always interesting. What we have instead is a convoluted ghost story with too much happening all at once.
As you can tell, I was not impressed. The Nightmarys was a lot scarier than other middle grade stories I've read lately, so that was a plus (for me). I don't go into a middle grade horror book expecting or even wanting to be scared, but I'm always pleasantly surprised if the author manages to make a book creepy enough to bother adults a little. It wasn't overly scary or anything, but even I felt a chill creep up my spine at some of the imagery (the prelude and interludes were definitely the best parts here). I can see 11 to 14-year-old boys really eating this up. A sensitive child may be overly frightened, however - so proceed with caution. A teen older than 14 probably wouldn't enjoy this much, so ignore those who have tagged this as "young adult." This is a solidly upper middle grade read. And as for grown persons - I'd skip this. There are plenty of superior middle grade horror stories out there and there's no reason to read this one. It's too bad, because I really expected I'd like this. Oh well. 2 out of 5 stars.
enchanten's review against another edition
3.0
This book was perched on the library desk and the cover got my attention as i was taking out raised by wolves. The back lead me to believe this would be a gripping creepy tale
the storyline is quite simple and easy to follow. I didnt find the description getting over the top like most horror type books which is good but i didnt find this story gripping. I liked parts of the book but most of the time i was skim reading it because it never had me drawn in.
the storyline is quite simple and easy to follow. I didnt find the description getting over the top like most horror type books which is good but i didnt find this story gripping. I liked parts of the book but most of the time i was skim reading it because it never had me drawn in.
pussreboots's review against another edition
5.0
Awesome tween horror.I took a break from reading off my wishlist to read The Nightmarys by Dan Poblocki. I was drawn in by the cover of these twin girls standing at the edge of a bed. They look like a mix of grudge ghosts and the twins from The Shining. Add to it that they are on the cover of a tween horror book, I had to read it!
The book opens with Timothy worried about his brother who was injured while serving in Iraq. Frustrated with his best friend, he ends up volunteering to working with the new girl, Abigail. That's when things get strange. His nightmares seem to be coming to life and later she explains about her flight from the Nightmarys.
The book though isn't a simple grudge ghost story. There's more of a mystery behind the horror that crosses generations. Dan and Abigail have to work through the clues laid out in an old book and other places to stop the source of the nightmares and, of course, save the world.
There's lots of mixing of reality and illusion, making for some great horror scenes. Although I'm an adult, I found the book creepy and nightmare inducing. There's some hinted violence and gore but mostly things are left to the imagination.
The book opens with Timothy worried about his brother who was injured while serving in Iraq. Frustrated with his best friend, he ends up volunteering to working with the new girl, Abigail. That's when things get strange. His nightmares seem to be coming to life and later she explains about her flight from the Nightmarys.
The book though isn't a simple grudge ghost story. There's more of a mystery behind the horror that crosses generations. Dan and Abigail have to work through the clues laid out in an old book and other places to stop the source of the nightmares and, of course, save the world.
There's lots of mixing of reality and illusion, making for some great horror scenes. Although I'm an adult, I found the book creepy and nightmare inducing. There's some hinted violence and gore but mostly things are left to the imagination.
bookwormyami's review against another edition
4.0
3.5 stars.
This book started out with a spooky scene and that got me hooked, lol. But the further I got into this book it was less spooky and more of a mystery. Which is ok for me because I like mysteries. I had 2 complaints of this book. The first is not a big issue which was that there was a scene that dragged for me. The other thing that bothered me the most, which made me give this rating a 3.5 stars instead of a 4, was that I understood why April was cursed but I don't understand why Timothy was cursed. It was explained in the book but to me it still made no sense. But other then that it was entertaining and it had spooky moments. I would recommend for young readers to read.
This book started out with a spooky scene and that got me hooked, lol. But the further I got into this book it was less spooky and more of a mystery. Which is ok for me because I like mysteries. I had 2 complaints of this book. The first is not a big issue which was that there was a scene that dragged for me. The other thing that bothered me the most, which made me give this rating a 3.5 stars instead of a 4, was that I understood why April was cursed but I don't understand why Timothy was cursed. It was explained in the book but to me it still made no sense. But other then that it was entertaining and it had spooky moments. I would recommend for young readers to read.
donnaisreading's review against another edition
4.0
Stephen King meets Nancy Drew. I REALLY liked it.