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A review by disconightwing
Blackbriar by William Sleator
2.0
Blackbriar is the classic (children's) horror story about a young orphan who moves into a haunted house.
I'm sure if I had read this when I was the appropriate age to enjoy it, my rating would be a little different, but as it is I'm having a really hard time with it. It's also possible that it's just a bit too outdated, for lack of a better term. Things change, and it might have been scary when it was published, but now it's just… campy.
Danny lives with one of the employees of the school he attends, but she isn't his guardian. She convinces him to move out of London and into a country house several hours away. She seems way too flighty to even be allowed around children, even in that time period—she takes this kid out of London and into the country without informing his legal guardian or the school he attends… or anyone else, come to think of it… and when he suggests to her that this might be a bad idea she kind of shrugs it off and says "by the time anyone figures it out, we will be long gone!"
…Okay?
Anyway, the biggest disappointment for me in this whole novel was that it's supposed to be a ghost story. Throughout the whole book it was obvious that no ghosts were appearing, nor were they going to appear. The so called "paranormal" happenings in the book were obviously not paranormal at all and that really disappointed me. There were a few "witches," which weren't witches at all but just a bunch of adults playing pretend, and even that didn't show up until the very end of the book.
Now that I think about it… this might have scared me a little when I was five.
I'm not sure that I liked any of the characters, except maybe Lark. Philippa (the secretary) came off as extremely creepy, first by basically kidnapping this kid and then by running all of his friends off, so that she was literally the only person in his life. Danny was just a crabby, lazy boy.
The ending of the book made very little sense to me, too. There was resolution, but it was crammed into the last few sentences and the last page covered a long span of time. I HATE it when books do that. Include an epilogue if you must, but don't cram years of adjustment into three sentences and tie everything up into a neat little bow, please. It just looks like you got tired of writing the book and wanted to move on.
I'm sure if I had read this when I was the appropriate age to enjoy it, my rating would be a little different, but as it is I'm having a really hard time with it. It's also possible that it's just a bit too outdated, for lack of a better term. Things change, and it might have been scary when it was published, but now it's just… campy.
Danny lives with one of the employees of the school he attends, but she isn't his guardian. She convinces him to move out of London and into a country house several hours away. She seems way too flighty to even be allowed around children, even in that time period—she takes this kid out of London and into the country without informing his legal guardian or the school he attends… or anyone else, come to think of it… and when he suggests to her that this might be a bad idea she kind of shrugs it off and says "by the time anyone figures it out, we will be long gone!"
…Okay?
Anyway, the biggest disappointment for me in this whole novel was that it's supposed to be a ghost story. Throughout the whole book it was obvious that no ghosts were appearing, nor were they going to appear. The so called "paranormal" happenings in the book were obviously not paranormal at all and that really disappointed me. There were a few "witches," which weren't witches at all but just a bunch of adults playing pretend, and even that didn't show up until the very end of the book.
Now that I think about it… this might have scared me a little when I was five.
I'm not sure that I liked any of the characters, except maybe Lark. Philippa (the secretary) came off as extremely creepy, first by basically kidnapping this kid and then by running all of his friends off, so that she was literally the only person in his life. Danny was just a crabby, lazy boy.
The ending of the book made very little sense to me, too. There was resolution, but it was crammed into the last few sentences and the last page covered a long span of time. I HATE it when books do that. Include an epilogue if you must, but don't cram years of adjustment into three sentences and tie everything up into a neat little bow, please. It just looks like you got tired of writing the book and wanted to move on.