Tuesday, June 22, 2021

Book Review: The Mary Shelley Club

I feel like I'm dropping the ball left and right. Sorry, blog. Whomp, whomp. I'm really going to try to pull it together here for this week. I have so much going on but I also have a ton of book reviews coming up, so let's get to it. 

The Mary Shelley Club - Goldy Moldavsky

New girl Rachel Chavez is eager to make a fresh start at Manchester Prep. But as one of the few scholarship kids, Rachel struggles to fit in, and when she gets caught up in a prank gone awry, she ends up with more enemies than friends.

To her surprise, however, the prank attracts the attention of the Mary Shelley Club, a secret club of students with one objective: come up with the scariest prank to orchestrate real fear. But as the pranks escalate, the competition turns cutthroat and takes on a life of its own.

When the tables are turned and someone targets the club itself, Rachel must track down the real-life monster in their midst . . . even if it means finally confronting the dark secrets from her past. 
I'll be honest and tell you that horror isn't my genre. I am scared of all things, which is strange because I love true crime podcasts and shows, but I am scared of the dark and I don't want to personally be scared. 

Obviously, totally logical. 

With that, I'm not sure this is one I would have purchased for myself but it was the young adult After School Fight Club box selection from Once Upon a Book Club, so I went into this not super sure how I was going to like this. I'll tell you that for awhile I almost DNF'ed it because I felt like I needed more action, but I kept going and that's basically when the book really took off and I'm so glad I stuck with it! 

The book begins with Rachel, doing some homework at home alone. She sees a bizarre masked figure outside, which clearly is setting off alarms in her head. It would lead to the heavily traumatic thing that becomes the catalyst for her going to a new school, being the weird girl and having a hard time fitting in. One night at a party everything changes and a new secret group of students takes notices of her and soon enough, she's invited to be in The Mary Shelley Club, a group who plan elaborate scenes that are meant to scare the Jesus out of fellow students for revenge. All is well until things begin to go wrong and Rachel realizes that things from her traumatic past are haunting her now and she doesn't know if it's connected or someone being particularly cruel for fun. 

You GUYS. The twist on this one?! LOVED IT SO MUCH. The cover compares this to Scream and Gossip Girl, and I don't know how much I would agree with Gossip Girl, but it for SURE has Scream vibes. FOR SURE. I mean, I could almost see this playing out on the screen. I have to also say that the book ends in a way that it opens it up for a sequel but I really hope it doesn't because I think part of the scary element of this book is that there isn't really an end, does that make sense? The open-endedness of this is terrifying when you really think about it and it just really sealed the deal for me on this and I loved it. 

I would 100% recommend this if you like young adult, if you have an appreciation for horror films (heavily referenced throughout the book, since that's basically what the group is centered around), and you were a fan of Scream. I think you are going to like this one a lot, and that's really saying something because this typically isn't the book I go for, but I'm really glad that this was the pick for this box. I so highly recommend the Once Upon a Book Club box if you're looking for a good box. I have loved every box I have gotten so far, and the books have all been great. If you use my link, you get $5 off your first box (I do, too!). 

This post contains affiliate links.

1 comment:

Why Girls Are Weird said...

Well I love horror, and the Scream franchise is one of my favorites, so it sounds like I need to check this out.