Dread Wood: New for 2022, a funny, scary, sci-fi thriller from the author of Crater Lake. Perfect for kids aged 9-12 and fans of Goosebumps!: Book 1

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This is Killick’s best book yet; think ‘The Breakfast Club’ meets ‘Stranger Things’, making great use of her talent for comic dialogue and her astute eye for just the right kind of scary for this age group. There are some pretty serious issues that they are grappling with: bullying, poverty, disability, and living up to parental pressures. Overall, this is a fast-paced book that I loved so much and can't wait for the next book in this series.

The start of the book is really exciting and grabs the reader because of the mysterious first chapter.Despite this being a horror, there were several comedic moments throughout that brought a lighthearted feel to a terrifying situation. A locked gate and a groundskeeper who doesn’t want to let you out are as good a narrative device as any other. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice.

The creep factor gradually builds into the nightmare these teens must work together to defeat and save one another's lives, and the life of their teacher. L. Stine, this book creeped me out just as much as Stine's legendary Chicken Chicken and reminded me of Christopher Pike's Spooksville. They help us to know which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site.Somehow, I misread the blurb of this story completely and went in expecting a ghost story, not a sci-fi featuring REALLY BIG SPIDERS. Naira, is the hard-working princess of the group who is under pressure from her mother to do well and excel in life. Not only did the group of children in this story get detention, but they got a Saturday morning detention, which turns out to be a day from hell. The characters are all flawed, but with well examined reasons and the book teaches us about friendship and forgiveness. There’s also a light touch as it handles child poverty, bullying and disability, and I really liked the way that our main characters acknowledged and tried to make amends for their mistakes.

I love watching her groups of characters find increasingly inventive ways of dealing with the situations they find themselves in.

There were times within the story when I started to get scared for our foursome, and I was worried about how things would pan out for them.