Sanctum by Madeleine Roux

Title: Sanctum (Asylum #2)

Author: Madeleine Roux

Publisher: HarperCollins 2015

Genre: YA Horror

Pages: 368

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Unread Shelf Project; Unread Shelf Project Reading Challenge - Backlist title; Winter TBR

Dan, Abby, and Jordan remain traumatized by the summer they shared in the Brookline asylum. Much as they'd love to move on, many questions remain, and someone is determined to keep the terror alive, sending the teens photos of an old-timey carnival, with no note and no name. Forsaking their plan never to go back, the teens return to New Hampshire College under the guise of a weekend for prospective students, and there they realize that the carnival from the photos is not only real, it's here on campus, apparently for the first time in many years.

Sneaking away from sample classes and college parties, Dan and his friends lead a tour of their own—one through the abandoned houses and hidden places of a surrounding town. Camford is hiding a terrible past, and the truth behind Dan's connection to the asylum's evil warden is more terrifying than Dan ever imagined.

And with this book, I am officially DNFing the rest of the Asylum series. The first book I enjoyed. It was a YA Horror book with an intriguing setting, plotline, and characters. I couldn’t wait to see what happened next. Well it turns out, almost the exact same things. Our three friends show back up at Brookline after receiving vaguely sinister messages in the mail. Instead of talking about things and attempting to get ahead of the mystery, Abby and Jordan spend half the book not believing Dan (seeing ghosts, hearing voices, etc) and Dan spends most of the book trying to figure out if his friends are actually his friends. that’s what we did in the first book. At this point in the series, I wanted to see a lot more character growth. The lack of growth and unity among the friends distracted me enough that I couldn’t really get into the actual mystery. By the end of the book, I realized that I have no desire to find out what happens to the characters. Three books taken off my UnRead Shelf.

Asylum:

• #0.5 Escape from Asylum

• #1 Asylum

• #1.5 The Scarlets

• #2 Sanctum

• #2.5 The Bone Artists

• #3 Catacomb

• #3.5 The Warden

Next Up on the TBR Pile:

Asylum by Madeleine Roux

Title: Asylum (Asylum #1)

Author: Madeleine Roux

Publisher: HarperCollins 2013

Genre: YA Horror

Pages: 321

Rating: 4/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Perpetual - 365; UnRead Shelf Project

For sixteen-year-old Dan Crawford, the New Hampshire College Prep program is the chance of a lifetime. Except that when Dan arrives, he finds that the usual summer housing has been closed, forcing students to stay in the crumbling Brookline Dorm—formerly a psychiatric hospital. As Dan and his new friends Abby and Jordan start exploring Brookline's twisty halls and hidden basement, they uncover disturbing secrets about what really went on here . . . secrets that link Dan and his friends to the asylum's dark past. Because Brookline was no ordinary mental hospital, and there are some secrets that refuse to stay buried.

That was a quick and enjoyable read. I sped through this creepy young adult horror book in just a few hours. I love a good asylum-based horror novel and this one really did hit the spot. We get some likable characters to follow as they uncover secrets about Brookline and about themselves. The plot is a slow build. We don’t get a ton of action until the last 100 pages, but the tension builds consistently through the first 2/3 of the book. I really fell into the creepy setting and kept want the characters to revisit the basement. Enjoyable read for this week. I will definitely be continuing to read the series.

Asylum:

• #0.5 Escape from Asylum

• #1 Asylum

• #1.5 The Scarlets

• #2 Sanctum

• #2.5 The Bone Artists

• #3 Catacomb

• #3.5 The Warden

Next up on the TBR pile:

Allison Hewitt is Trapped by Madeleine Roux

Title: Allison Hewitt is Trapped

Author: Madeleine Roux

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin

Genre: Zombie

Pages: 352

Rating:  5  / 5 stars

Reading Challenges: Zombie; Mount TBR

How I Got It: I own it!

One woman's story as she blogs - and fights back - the zombie apocalypse

Allison Hewitt and her five colleagues at the Brooks and Peabody Bookstore are trapped together when the zombie outbreak hits. Allison reaches out for help through her blog, writing on her laptop and utilizing the military's emergency wireless network (SNET).  It may also be her only chance to reach her mother. But as the reality of their situation sinks in, Allison’s blog becomes a harrowing account of her edge-of-the-seat adventures (with some witty sarcasm thrown in) as she and her companions fight their way through ravenous zombies and sometimes even more dangerous humans.

I do love me some zombie stories.  I heard such great things about this book.  I finally got around to reading it for the Spring into Horror Readathon hosted by Castle Macabre.  Wait a minute you say... wasn't that last week.  Why yes it was...  However I was driving across country all last week and I've finally gotten settled in enough to actually catch up on my reviews.  SO, here we go.

I have really come to love first person zombie stories.  There's something about fighting right alongside someone that just puts me in a good reading mood. Allison is such a great character.  She has her faults, but they make the reader like her more.  She seems very real.  I particularly liked the fact that she starts her zombie apocalypse as a clerk in a bookstore.  As part of the first big encounter with the zeds, she almost gets turned into kibble because she pauses to grab a few books.  Yeah, that would be me...  From there we go on a whirlwind adventure of survival.  We meet the usual zombie threats.  But we also encounter the human threats.  I really think they're worse than the zombies.  I sped through this novel, on the edge of my seat, holding my breath, to see if Allison makes it.  I won't tell you the ending, but I will say that I can't wait to read the not a sequel-but set in the same world, Sadie Walker is Stranded...