Helpful Score: 2
Short and Sweet:
Absent is a short, cute read. I'm glad I didn't miss it!
To Elaborate....
Paige has died and now she is stuck in high school forever. What's worse, everyone is saying that it wasn't an accident, that she killed herself. For the first time since she died, Paige has something to fight for. She will not be remembered as 'the girl who jumped.'
Then, Paige discovers by accident that she can possess her classmates whenever she hears a whisper of her name in their thoughts. At first she hopes to use their voices to quell the rumors, but when that doesn't work she decides to go after the source of the rumor itself: the popular Kelsey Pope. But Paige's motives are becoming less about clearing her name and more about revenge and she's keeping her possessions a secret from Evan and Brooke, the school's other 2 ghosts.
I think this book speaks a lot about labels and what people will or won't do to fit into social groups. At the end of the book most of the characters are better off for what they have learned, and I think there are some good messages here. So, why only 3.5 stars? This book was super simple, but hinted throughout the story that perhaps the school was cursed. It kind of psyched me out about what was going on. I thought it was going somewhere completely different with a few characters, but apparently I misread some unimportant elements as foreshadowing.
So for me it was good, but not GREAT! Also, my one real problem with this book is that we don't find out what happens to a character named Harriet. She was a major character for a bit, faded out, came back and then disappeared without mention. Maybe this will be resolved in the final version. (Originally published @ iheartyafiction.blogspot.com)
Absent is a short, cute read. I'm glad I didn't miss it!
To Elaborate....
Paige has died and now she is stuck in high school forever. What's worse, everyone is saying that it wasn't an accident, that she killed herself. For the first time since she died, Paige has something to fight for. She will not be remembered as 'the girl who jumped.'
Then, Paige discovers by accident that she can possess her classmates whenever she hears a whisper of her name in their thoughts. At first she hopes to use their voices to quell the rumors, but when that doesn't work she decides to go after the source of the rumor itself: the popular Kelsey Pope. But Paige's motives are becoming less about clearing her name and more about revenge and she's keeping her possessions a secret from Evan and Brooke, the school's other 2 ghosts.
I think this book speaks a lot about labels and what people will or won't do to fit into social groups. At the end of the book most of the characters are better off for what they have learned, and I think there are some good messages here. So, why only 3.5 stars? This book was super simple, but hinted throughout the story that perhaps the school was cursed. It kind of psyched me out about what was going on. I thought it was going somewhere completely different with a few characters, but apparently I misread some unimportant elements as foreshadowing.
So for me it was good, but not GREAT! Also, my one real problem with this book is that we don't find out what happens to a character named Harriet. She was a major character for a bit, faded out, came back and then disappeared without mention. Maybe this will be resolved in the final version. (Originally published @ iheartyafiction.blogspot.com)
Helpful Score: 2
I got a copy of this book to review through Librarythings Early Reviewer program. Thanks to Chronicles Books and Librarything for giving me a chance to review this book. This was an interesting, engaging and short read.
Paige is dead after slipping off the roof of her high school during physics class. She finds herself haunting the high school with two other ghosts, a girl named Brooke and a boy name Evan. When rumors start circulating that Paiges death was a suicide, not an accident, Paige decides theses rumors must stop. When she finds she can possess her classmates she decides to take drastic measures to correct the rumors.
Paige isnt a nice character. She is selfish and ignorant, and does a number of seedy things as a ghost to take revenge on those who have hurt her. That doesnt mean shes evil...it just means she is a ghost and confused and in pain. She is your pretty typical teenager...except shes dead.
The irony behind it all is that sometimes when she takes over people and makes them do things they wouldnt normally end up doing....welll....their lives actually end up a bit better.
This story however isnt all about Paige and her revenge. Isnt it strange that so many kids have died at one high school? There is something going on at this high school and it is up to Paige and her ghost friends to figure it out before more students die.
This was a quick read. It was engaging and decently written. One of those books that you breeze through and think, huh, well that was interesting. There isnt a lot thats super original here, but it is well done. The book also does a good job of exploring the high school landscape and the cruelties that happen there.
The story touches on a number of teenage issues; suicide, GLBT issues, bullying, and stereotyping. For the most part it does just that...touches...none of these issues are really explored in depth.
Overall a good read. Its super short, but I enjoyed it. Its an engaging story that moves quickly and has a couple good twists in the plot. Recommended to those who like high school haunting types of stories.
Paige is dead after slipping off the roof of her high school during physics class. She finds herself haunting the high school with two other ghosts, a girl named Brooke and a boy name Evan. When rumors start circulating that Paiges death was a suicide, not an accident, Paige decides theses rumors must stop. When she finds she can possess her classmates she decides to take drastic measures to correct the rumors.
Paige isnt a nice character. She is selfish and ignorant, and does a number of seedy things as a ghost to take revenge on those who have hurt her. That doesnt mean shes evil...it just means she is a ghost and confused and in pain. She is your pretty typical teenager...except shes dead.
The irony behind it all is that sometimes when she takes over people and makes them do things they wouldnt normally end up doing....welll....their lives actually end up a bit better.
This story however isnt all about Paige and her revenge. Isnt it strange that so many kids have died at one high school? There is something going on at this high school and it is up to Paige and her ghost friends to figure it out before more students die.
This was a quick read. It was engaging and decently written. One of those books that you breeze through and think, huh, well that was interesting. There isnt a lot thats super original here, but it is well done. The book also does a good job of exploring the high school landscape and the cruelties that happen there.
The story touches on a number of teenage issues; suicide, GLBT issues, bullying, and stereotyping. For the most part it does just that...touches...none of these issues are really explored in depth.
Overall a good read. Its super short, but I enjoyed it. Its an engaging story that moves quickly and has a couple good twists in the plot. Recommended to those who like high school haunting types of stories.
Pitch-perfect YA novella which, for once seemed to manage to be suitable for a mature teen, while offering something worthwhile for an adult reader. (Me, that would be me.)
Williams has done a clever, artful, beautifully written job of depicting the Hell that is high school -- well, as this is a YA book, and we have to watch our language, perhaps not the H-word, but definitely Purgatory or Limbo -- 17-year old Paige, the protagonist, is dead, the victim of a recent stupid, pointless accidental fall from the school roof. She joins two other former students who came to sticky ends on school grounds, in addition to the very confused ghosts of every frog that has ever been done to death in the school's biology classes. (A wonderful, hilarious touch, which Williams plays to great effect.)
Williams' has carefully thought through her concept: there are rules, and the three dead teens (and the frogs) must abide by them. As spelled out in the blurb on the cover, Paige discovers a work-around that allows her to communicate, sort of, with the living-- but it takes thought, and some frustration to achieve. In Williams' version of the Afterlife, like Life itself (and, come to think of it, high school) you have to know the rules if you're going to try to break them.
Williams' tone is flawless -- the voice of a smart, snarky teen, who is having to come to terms with her heartbreakingly abbreviated life, the mistakes she made, and all the things she's never going to get a chance to do. Watching friends -- and frenemies -- get on with their very living lives. It made me laugh out loud. And it moved me to tears.
And just at a point when you might start thinking, well, this is nice, but is it going to go anywhere -- it starts to go somewhere, very neatly and economically. And at the end, mysteries are solved, truths are faced ... to say anymore would be spoiling something that is relatively slight, but definitively worth reading.
Sorry, I'm not going to part with this one -- I'm saving it for my granddaughter, and I look forward to the day when I can share it with her.
Williams has done a clever, artful, beautifully written job of depicting the Hell that is high school -- well, as this is a YA book, and we have to watch our language, perhaps not the H-word, but definitely Purgatory or Limbo -- 17-year old Paige, the protagonist, is dead, the victim of a recent stupid, pointless accidental fall from the school roof. She joins two other former students who came to sticky ends on school grounds, in addition to the very confused ghosts of every frog that has ever been done to death in the school's biology classes. (A wonderful, hilarious touch, which Williams plays to great effect.)
Williams' has carefully thought through her concept: there are rules, and the three dead teens (and the frogs) must abide by them. As spelled out in the blurb on the cover, Paige discovers a work-around that allows her to communicate, sort of, with the living-- but it takes thought, and some frustration to achieve. In Williams' version of the Afterlife, like Life itself (and, come to think of it, high school) you have to know the rules if you're going to try to break them.
Williams' tone is flawless -- the voice of a smart, snarky teen, who is having to come to terms with her heartbreakingly abbreviated life, the mistakes she made, and all the things she's never going to get a chance to do. Watching friends -- and frenemies -- get on with their very living lives. It made me laugh out loud. And it moved me to tears.
And just at a point when you might start thinking, well, this is nice, but is it going to go anywhere -- it starts to go somewhere, very neatly and economically. And at the end, mysteries are solved, truths are faced ... to say anymore would be spoiling something that is relatively slight, but definitively worth reading.
Sorry, I'm not going to part with this one -- I'm saving it for my granddaughter, and I look forward to the day when I can share it with her.
