To be published 06/10/2022…
Carl is lost. Without his best friend Jack, he feels unmoored from life. His parents have taken him on a country retreat to help heal his grief, but the old sloping cottage on the moors doesn’t feel like home. Without Jack waiting there, home doesn’t feel like home anymore either. So Carl is lost, but not as lost as the Lost Boy and his dog who wander the moors…
This book was much sadder and much less chilling than I expected. Rather than scary, the constant hinted presence of a ghost seemed almost like a reassurance to the lonely Carl. It was his own memories that were cruel in their haunting of him.
I don’t think I am really the target audience for this book and I think that this prevented me from truly connecting to Carl as a character. However, I could feel his grief quite acutely. From my perspective I would have liked to learn more about April and was disappointed that her story was not given more space.
The bonus content at the end of the book rounded it off quite nicely in my opinion. It didn’t really change how I viewed the overall plot, but it did create a mystical tone which was an interesting way to conclude.
Escape to the Bookshelf 