Review: The Turning

Title: The Turning
Author: Francine Prose
Publisher: HarperTeen
Find it Here: B&N, Goodreads, Mysterious Galaxy
Source: ARC from HarperTeen

Jack is babysitting for the summer on an isolated island with no Wi-Fi, no cell service, and no one else around but a housekeeper and two very peculiar children. He immediately senses something sinister-and it's not just the creepy black house he's living in. Soon he is feeling terribly isolated and alone, but then he discovers there are others. The problem is, he's the only who can see them. As secrets are revealed and darker truths surface, Jack desperately struggles to maintain a grip on reality. He knows what he sees, and he isn't crazy…Or is he?

Where does reality end and insanity begin? The Turn of the Screw reinvented for modern-day teens, by National Book Award finalist Francine Prose.

My thoughts:

When I first saw the cover of this book, I thought to myself, “I must know what that book is about because it looks so creepy!” And then that synopsis sounded even creepier! So I went through the proper channels and practically begged for this ARC. I absolutely had to have it!

It was a really quick read which is something I am always grateful for. What kind of threw me off about it is the fact that it is written in letter form instead of chapters and I had a really hard time believing that a high school, teenage boy would write such lengthy letters as these. Some parts of the story were really creepy and other parts were really just weird. And even after it’s all said and done, the whole reason why the children were so weird was never really resolved. Maybe it was and I just don’t remember. It’s not really a book that stuck with me.

When I first started reading The Turning I had no idea that it was a modern retelling of an old classic The Turning of the Screw. I've never read it so I don’t have anything to compare it to but I enjoyed this really odd book. I like how he thought that he was seeing people who he thought were dead but then towards the end it got really weird because he was convinced he was falling in love with one of the ghosts. But overall, I give The Turning a solid 3 hearts for definitely being a different kind of book!