The Waking Dark

by Robin Wasserman

The Waking Dark is “a horror story worthy of Stephen King” (Booklist) and “a book you won’t soon forget” (Cassandra Clare, author of the Mortal Instruments series)—perfect for readers of Gillian Flynn and Rick Yancey.
 
They called it the killing day. Twelve people murdered, in the space of a few hours, their killers also all dead by their own hand . . . except one. And that one has no answers to offer the shattered town.
 
Something is waking in the sleepy town of Oleander, Kansas—something dark and hungry that lives in the flat earth and the open sky, in the vengeful hearts of its upstanding citizens. As the town begins a descent into blood and madness, five survivors of the killing day are the only ones who can stop Oleander from destroying itself.
 
They have nothing in common. They have nothing left to lose. And they have no way out. Which means they have no choice but to stand and fight, to face the darkness in their town—and in themselves.

“Suspense, chills, gasps—all that and a gem-like writing style that will make you shiver with beauty and horror. A book you won’t soon forget.” —Cassandra Clare, author of the bestselling Mortal Instruments series and Infernal Devices trilogy

“Twisted, pulse-pounding, shocking, and very, very scary. With The Waking Dark, Robin Wasserman conjures vintage Stephen King as she peers into the dark heart of a nightmare America, where violence and evil lurk behind the golden glow of small-town life, and new terrors arrive by the hour. A superb horror story that is by turns visceral and lyrical, heartrending and heart-stopping.” —Libba Bray, bestselling author of the Gemma Doyle trilogy and the Diviners series
 
“This book has the combination of mystery and fright that I love. So many twists and shocks, I nearly jumped out of my chair several times! Trust me—this is a true chiller. Not to be missed!” —R. L. Stine
 
“A thriller dark and beautiful and—yes—achingly romantic at every unexpected twist and turn. Astounding.” —Lauren Myracle, New York Times bestselling author of The Infinite Moment of Us and Bliss
 
“Wild, nihilistic madness that will get true horror fans raising their pitchforks and torches in frenzied glee. Wasserman writes as if hooked up to IVs of Stephen King and John Carpenter's spiked blood.” —Daniel Kraus, author of Rotters and Scowler

"Great dialogue and intriguing subplots add to the action-packed story . . . the suspense doesn’t let up until the final pages." —School Library Journal, Starred Review


From the Hardcover edition.

Genres: Horror, Young Adult, Mystery, Thriller, Fiction, Science Fiction, Audiobook

465 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 10, 2013

About the author

Robin Wasserman is the author of the novels MOTHER DAUGHTER WIDOW WIFE (June 2020) and GIRLS ON FIRE. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Tin House, The Los Angeles Review of Books, and several short story anthologies. A recent MacDowell Colony fellow, she is also the New York Times bestselling author of more than ten novels for young adults and teaches in the low-residency MFA program at Southern New Hampshire University.

Reviews

[karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

wow. so this lady is basically the george r.r. martin of YA.





it's a rough ride for the YA-fans who have stuck to Susane Colasanti and Sarah Dessen up until now. i would recommend some sort of transition-novel if you are going to make the leap from sweetie-pie contemporary YA romance novels to… this.

this book has one of the main protagonists kill a baby on page 28.

just so we are all on the same page.

oleander, smalltown kansas is the setting of this multi-voiced narrative about a day when several people went mad with violence, each going on a killing jag that ended with them taking their own lives. except for cass, the aforementioned baby-killer. she lived through her defenestration with no memory of what she had done. since then, her family has cut off all ties with her, leaving her to rot in an institution and moving away from oleander and the memories of the violence that occurred. also in the novel's character-lineup is a religious zealot who witnessed a crucifixion/arson scenario on that day, a boy who lived through a drugstore shootout, a trailer park girl whose family is well into the meth trade, except for the ones who were stabbed to death during the killing day, and a closeted jock who watched his lover get intentionally hit by a car and smooshed up against a tree.

so… damage all around. rounding out this group is an eight-year-old boy, the brother of drugstore shootout survivor who has his own problems, and the sister of the baby cass killed. there are other secondary characters, but those are the main foci.

and not all of them will make it out alive, despite having lived through so much horror already. because this book is cruel.

some time has passed for oleander since the events of the killing day. life goes on, people deal with the repercussions of the day in a variety of ways, and while no one has any answers about what happened to make people go crazy, it becomes just another slice of small-town lore and dusty gossip.

until, because the town has not suffered enough, a tornado strikes.

much of the town is destroyed, and some of the most extensive damage is to a mysterious facility on the edge of town, and after the tornado does its thing, people in town start behaving strangely again with all the rage and the lack of impulse control. to make matters worse, suddenly they find themselves without communications, and the town is quarantined by soldiers with guns.

oh, dear.

so we have a perfect storm of awful: lack of information, rage, meth, confusion, frustration, limited resources, in many cases a lack of parental figures, and growing alarm and violence. in many ways, it is like Under the Dome. except interesting and not all bloated. it's also kind of like A Prayer for the Dying and Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead, or Dark Inside, but even darker and killier.

this book is a really fun ride. i have some quirked-eyebrows at the explanation for the events, but not enough to dampen my enjoyment of it. it's a fast-paced little shocker of a book, and you have to admire the balls on this lady to have written a novel for young adults with this much graphic violence and cavalier character-disposal.

that's all you get for me. it's is an incredibly dark and twisted little piece of cake.



read the book!!

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[Emily May · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think it's time to admit a sad truth: me and Robin Wasserman are simply not meant for one another. It's tragic to have to acknowledge this when most of my GR friends seem to be in the middle of some epic love affair with her books. But I had my problems with The Book of Blood and Shadow - I tried my best to love it but felt like I was banging my head against a brick wall - and even this latest venture into the world of creepy horror and general mindfuckery couldn't convince me to join the fan club. I don't think it'll be easy to explain why, because I do believe Wasserman is a strong writer on many levels... but I'll do what I can.

Things always start good between us. I open the book and find myself immediately transported into the time and place where the story finds its setting. The author is a master of atmosphere - whether it be the dark, secretive streets of Prague or a creepy little American town that is evidently plagued by something more monstrous than we can even imagine. Her writing is solid and beautifully descriptive. Her characters are complex, driven by emotions that simultaneously scare us and earn our understanding. If you're like me, then you begin a Wasserman novel believing it's going to wind up on your all time favourites list. And then something starts to happen. I begin to notice it about a quarter of the way in and become sure of it by the time I've read a third of the book.

The descriptive style that was oh-so-lovely at the beginning becomes tiring. The in-depth exploration of the characters which you thought was really clever before starts to hurt your brain. "Plot!" I feel myself screaming "Where are you?" The writing style weighs down each sentence, each paragraph, each chapter and makes the story drag. The author spends SO MUCH time creating a setting and an atmosphere before the story starts to progress. She spends so much time building a complex portrait of the characters before any answers start to be given. And some of you will love this. I know some of you already do and, believe me, I can see why. But I like my stories as much as I like my characters and writing. There's really only so long I can go without one. I personally prefer novels that integrate character development and atmosphere building with the main plotline, not those that set it all up at the beginning and only then proceed to tell a story.

I want to stress that my feelings towards books like this portrays my own personal dislike for novels that are told in a certain way. It's affected my enjoyment of almost universally liked books such as The Book Thief and Code Name Verity. For that reason, you should probably disregard this review if you're a fan of really creepy, small town horror stories. Wasserman owns the creepy in this story. I truly admire her for not easing up on the grit, gore and adult themes just because she's writing for young adults - she's not afraid to go there and, for me, that's a big compliment to give to any author.

[Khanh, first of her name, mother of bunnies · Rating 3 out of 5]

Actual rating: 3.5

Names have power; to name something is to domesticate it, or to try. Naming a tornado would be like naming a shadow. What happened in Oleander that day was simply the storm. A cloud that faded back into sky before it had a chance to enjoy what it had wrought.

There are a lot of books that toss about their supposed similarity to Stephen King without ever approaching it. And then there are books like this one, which makes no such fantastic claims, in which I clearly see the influence of our revered master of horror. This book does a better job of recreating and replicating the feel, the atmosphere of a Stephen King horror novel than any young adult novel I have read since John Saul's earlier works.

I would describe this as "Stephen King for teens." It didn't send chills down my spine. It didn't give me any nightmares (thank you, Pennywise). But it made me gag in some parts, and I seriously would not want to step foot in Oleander. Never ever ever. Creepy little place.

The premise is deceptively simple, the execution (no pun intended) is far more complex. Right off the bat, we are immersed in a mass killing, one of many to come in the deceptively sleepy little town of Oleander, Kansas. Warning: if you have a weak stomach for violence, you might want to put this book down. There is no flinching here where it comes to ruthless and wanton destruction of people and property. The killings (and there are many, many of them) are described matter-of-factly, unflinchingly, no-holds-barred. Within one day, in separate events, 12 people are killed. A child is smothered to death. A man is nailed to a cross and set afire in a church. Many people are gunned down in a drugstore. A young man is mowed down by a car. Most of these acts were committed by reasonable members of the community, the sort of which you would whisper "He never seemed the type...but you never know, do you?"

One year later, a storm comes to town, literally and figuratively. It rips the the town apart physically, and leaves something behind within the hearts and minds of the people in town that is less visible, but no less insidious.

Oleander becomes, more or less, an anarchy. Reason and rationality has no room here, as the town is cut off completely from the outside world. They are under quarantine, by government orders. The internet is down, phone lines are down. Nobody goes, nobody leaves. Oleander becomes a world within itself. And chaos erupts.

...Oleander’s era of democracy had drawn to a close.
This was how she learned of the town’s rampant “disorderly conduct,” law and order giving way to anarchy: people walking off their jobs, crimes committed in broad daylight, an armed pied piper herding packs of feral children into the woods, their parents not much seeming to care.

Is it evil? Is it demonic possession, is it God's punishment upon sinners, as the town's charismatic and ambitious Deacon would have them believe? Is it something else? That's what the survivors are trying to figure out.

Above all else, this book excels in creating an utterly credible, eerie small-town atmosphere. Honestly, this is where my Stephen King feels come in. Stephen King has typically used a setting of a a small Maine town, and we get such a clear feeling for the atmosphere of place in his books. I get the exact feeling reading about Oleander, its present, its past, its beating heart.

Oleander is a small town like any others. It is a quiet place, a typical Midwestern town. Football reigns as king. It is solidly middle-class America with a largely ignored white trailer trash underground populace. I could describe it more, but I think the book itself says it best. There is absolutely nothing I can say, I am rendered absolutely speechless at how brilliantly portrayed Oleander has been written in this book. The town itself is the star of the novel. If left unrestrained, I could quote half the book for the sheer brilliance of the descriptions of Oleander, but short of doing that, I shall leave you with this little snippet from Chapter 2:

In blood as in drought or in poverty or in flame, Oleander was Oleander, and there were still crops to be sown and meth to be harvested, pies to be baked and pigs to be prized, bargains to be hunted and farms to be foreclosed, cherries to be popped and hearts to be broken, worship to be offered and sinners to be shamed.

After the recent tragedy in Oleander (and there has been more in the past), the town grieves, but life goes on.

The new Oleander bustled and shone, its determined noise drowning out any echoes of the past. Grass and flowers and trees sprang from fallow ground. The scents of corn and life drove out the lingering smoke, and finally, the fire and its carpet of bones could be safely buried in the past and allowed to slip through the cracks of collective memory. But the earth had memory of its own.

Until the storm starts.

The plot is well-written and kept me guessing; I truly had no idea as to which direction the book was going to take. The events after the tornado, the slow building of chaos and insanity are subtly done and well-described. We feel the gradual building of tension, the feeling that something is just not right, and it's more than just your average post-traumatic chaos. The story is dark, you feel the wrongness of the things that transpire within the people involved, even as they do not seem to realize it themselves. It is not exactly horror, but the darkness, the intensity was so well-written. And some scenes really did make me gag a little bit. Let's just say I have a little issue with corpses, and this book just dredges them up. Again, no pun intended.

Even if it is well-written, the plot got boring in some parts. There's only so much murder and mayhem I can take before I get really, really bored, and this book verged into the "enough already!" territory for me. I want more of a plot, and the plot itself unfolded rather too slowly for my tastes. I have a feeling that a significant part of the book (and it is a very long book) can be cut down without downplaying the message and the urgency of the chaos that is unfolding within Oleander. I didn't have a problem with the plot twist; things didn't transpire as I expected, but it's all good.

The book has five main characters, and we hear the narration from all of their points of view. It got to be a bit much keeping track of 5 different characters and their stories, but no, it doesn't stop there! We also hear snippets from other side characters as the story progresses, from Baz, the alpha-male douchebag of a star football player. From Deacon Barnes, the fiercely ambitious religious fanatic who is one of the leader who step up to take control of Oleander after the quarantine. From Charlotte King, the religiously fanatical mother of one of our main characters. From "Mickey," the wimpy town mayor.

It all got a little too much to handle to keep track of everything and everyone. And there are a. Lot. Of. Characters.

This book is well worth a read; it might not be a great book, but it's certainly better than any other attempts at YA horror I've read this year.

[Giselle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Whoa, this was psychotic! Definitely the most violent YA book I've yet to read! This is both a warning and a promise. ;)

Another of Robin's book, The Book of Blood and Shadow was one of my favorites of last year. It was raw and intense, kind of insanely so, so I knew - and hoped - to expect the same kind of brilliance in this one and am happy to not have been let down. The Waking Dark does not lose any time to show you what you're getting into. Within the first couple of chapters the sheer madness of what is happening grabs you with its two fists and shoves you inside this story in full force. What I first noticed in this book is how there is not one main character, this is the story of the whole town. We jump from one narrator to another until we get the 360 of what is happening in Oleander. Even though we get about 7 or 8 (or more - I didn't actually count) narrative voices, I never felt thrown around or overwhelmed, though I didn't particularly form a deep connection with anyone either. Still, I wouldn't have changed it as I found it so incredibly unique and enthralling. I loved seeing everyone's point of view of this horror, especially since they are all surprisingly distinct. Eventually we do focus on a particular group of people who become the main cast.

Dark, atmospheric, with a solid plot that reflect on the true violent nature of human beings at its worst, The Waking Dark is not recommend for those who don't like unrelenting horror - think Stephen King (though not as gorily detailed). This book is filled with incredible violence; kids killing kids, adults killing kids, adults killing adults - you get the drift. The town of Oleander has been affected by some type of… virus? They don't know what, but it has turned the whole town into a well of morbid insanity. Nobody knows why, but they have been quarantined, meaning no one can escape this evil. Even the good guys feel an urge to kill, too. You're not even safe from yourself! Imagine putting all the world's murderers on an island with no order, no rules, no laws. It's a truly terrifying with suspense that builds so tightly you want to explode. But there is nowhere to go! Part of the main cast includes a little boy who's just so sweet and innocent you go crazy with worry for what could possibly happen to this little guy at every page. Because emotions aren't spared in this book. If Robin decides a character will die, she doesn't blink.

From start to finish this book holds merciless terror and panic. The reason behind the violence is interesting, if a tad unexplored, but Robin adopts a writing style that grips you with breathless anticipation and keeps you engaged with bloodiness throughout. It's like the accident you can't look away from!

--
An advance copy was provided by the publisher for review.

For more of my reviews, visit my blog at Xpresso Reads

[Ashley (gotbookcitement) · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's a part of me that goes, what did I just read? But there's another part of me that really enjoyed this. First and foremost, this is a weird book, but it's weirdly enjoyable. I feel like this book is its own original creature. It doesn't feel like a YA book at all. It was odd, different, and fun to read. The whole book is full of craziness and questions. I just had to keep reading to find out what was going to happen in the end. I would recommend this book to readers that love horror and want to read a little something different. This book will take you on one crazy ride, and while you'll question your sanity the whole time, you'll have fun.
One thing I really enjoyed was the setting. I used to live in Kansas, so it was kind of fun remembering my years there. There were points when I thought the author must have lived in Kansas or had some kind of Kansas connection, because she did a good job of capturing the feeling of flat, endless prairie. She also mentioned familiar things like one of the teams there and some slang specific to the area. In the end though, there were some details she included that didn't quite fit with Kansas. Like the fact that Kansas has these endless corn fields, they don't. Kansas grows a lot of wheat, barley, milo, and other types of grain crops. Nebraska and Iowa are more known for their corn crops. Anyway, it was just fun having a book set in Kansas.
The whole feeling of this book is a slow descent into madness. The whole time I was questioning just what was really going on. The people in this town were slowly losing their minds. There were just so many shocking, jaw dropping occurrences. This was a horror novel that took its time and brought you into the madness gradually. I really enjoy horror books like that. They make me feel much more unnerved and freaked out rather than a quick jump scare or excessive gore. I felt this was a really enjoyable horror novel. The author credited Stephen King with being an inspiration and I could definitely feel it. I guess I need to go out and read some Stephen King.
The overall reason of what was happening to the town was interesting too.
All in all, I really enjoyed this book. It gave me a terrifying and gratifying horror experience. I've now read two Robin Wasserman books, this and The Book of Blood and Shadow, and enjoyed both of them very much. I'm excited to read more of Robin Wasserman's books in the future. She offers interesting, different stories. This is one crazy ride and I highly enjoyed it!
BOOKCITEMENT LEVEL 4/5
A slow descent into madness.

[Wendy Darling · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well, this book is just crazy. CRAZY GOOD! :D

Review to come. But man, oh man--don't miss this one if you're a fan of Stephen King. One of the few cases where that comparison in the marketing materials is not just an empty promise.

[AH · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Waking Dark Whoa! What a way to start a book! A bloody multiple murder in a convenience store in a small Kansas town (what is it about these small Midwestern towns?) starts a chain of events that only get amplified by a huge F5 tornado that rips through the town. What follows can only be described as murder, mayhem, and a general bloodlust. The town is quarantined and there’s no way out…
 
If you love Stephen King’s earlier horror books, then The Waking Dark may be for you. Don’t read it at night; it is way too scary for that. The Waking Dark is the kind of book that is almost impossible to put down. Set aside some daylight hours to read this book. This is one intense read.  
 
One of the reasons I loved this book was the attention given to character development. I think this is what sets this book apart from other young adult books in this genre. The characters are well-fleshed and each brings their own background into the story.
 
I loved the teenagers in this book. They all had such interesting backgrounds and they each represented a different aspect of teenage life. There’s Jeremiah West, or West as he is called. West is a manly football player with a secret love. He is definitely conflicted about his love for Nick and takes precaution to hide this relationship. Cass is West’s casual platonic girlfriend. Cass is set to become the class valedictorian until a horrible babysitting incident. Daniel is the Preacher’s son and he must watch his father battle addictions and other personal demons. Daniel is by far one of the more interesting characters as he is a father figure to his younger brother Milo. Jule Prevette is the niece of the local meth runner gang. No one messes with her family. Jule lives in constant fear of her junkie mother’s parasitic boyfriends. Then there’s Ellen King, an angelic girl who talks to God until her downfall. Now her background is very interesting. Lastly, there is Grace Tuck who holds an understandable grudge against Cass.
 
The Waking Dark is a dark and creepy book about a town that’s gone horribly wrong. Be prepared for a bloody thrill ride.
 
I’m glad to have discovered this author and I am looking forward to reading more of Ms. Wasserman’s books in the future.
 
Rating: 5 stars
 
Thank you to NetGalley and Random House for a review copy of this book. 
 
Review posted on Badass Book Reviews.

[Bonnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

My rating: 4 of 5 stars
A copy of The Waking Dark was provided to me by Netgalley/Knopf Books for Young Readers for review purposes.

The killing day.
The day the devil came to Oleander.
That day.

Oleander, Kansas is a small, quiet town that was never cause for much attention... until the killing day. The day when twelve people were killed in a few short hours by the hands of their friends and neighbors. Once all surrounding them were dead they then killed themselves having outlived their purpose. One survived to tell her tale, but she remembers nothing of the horrors that she dealt out. When the town is placed under quarantine after a horrific storm does further damage to the town, a darkness wakes in the citizens. The deacon decides this is the perfect opportunity to cleanse the town and the remaining citizens begin to take the law into their own hands.

This book is insanity incarnate. It's dark and distressing. It's maddening and stupefying. It's one of the most horrific books I've ever read. It was fantastic. I have never been left more shocked and appalled by a single chapter and that's just what Robin Wasserman managed to do. The Waking Dark is horror, but it's not exactly scary. The madness that consumes this small town is more vexing and mortifying than anything and showcases perfectly the mentality of a small town and what can happen when it all goes wrong.

The story is extremely character driven and is told from several different points of view with very distinct characters so it didn't cause any confusion as its fantastically written. It's a sordid tale told over the span of a few short weeks with enough violence to last a lifetime. The Waking Dark has drawn comparisons to Stephen King and Gillian Flynn, I believe for good reason. Having read both authors I feel that they both possess a subtle eeriness in their writing, a creepiness and unflinching details that sneaks up on you and takes you by surprise.

I feel it must be said that this is one of the most violent and mature YA books I've read and is definitely not meant for a younger crowd. It involves infant murders, detailed meth use, crucifixion and people being burned at the stake (and that's not even half of the craziness that goes down in these pages). This is not for the faint of heart.

There is so much to say about this story, but so much that needs to be experienced firsthand. I have to say though, I was extremely pleased at how the violence was maintained throughout the story because I figured it would letup at some point, (nope) but I expected it to end in a manner as shocking as the first chapter but it was a bit too tidy of an ending for my liking. Nevertheless, I am most impressed with this author and will be seeking out her past works.

[Louisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not for the faint-hearted. Don't read this over any kind of meal. Holy crap, this has got to be, hands down, the most ballsy, graphically violent, gory and Stephen King-esque YA I've ever read. Two thumbs up, Wasserman. You've successfully erased my lingering doubts from The Book of Blood and Shadows. Killing a baby in the first chapter?!

This more than sums up the sheer madness of how people so terrifyingly prove to be its own worst enemy:

"...It's not like having some voice in your head telling you to do bad things. It's like... being yourself. But more than you ever were. It's like everything you want and everything you feel is suddenly right, as long as it's ugly. And everything you want is ugly. Everything you are is ugly."

[Christina (A Reader of Fictions) · Rating 3 out of 5]

I absolutely adored Robin Wasserman's The Book of Blood and Shadow, which blended horror, paranormal, historical and contemporary fiction into something dark and beautiful. As such, I had very high expectations for The Waking Dark, which were partly met but not wholly. The key thing to know about The Waking Dark is that it is a horror novel, pure and simple, though calling the novel simple is rather misleading.

The Book of Blood and Shadow began with blood and murders. The Waking Dark tops that, opening with twelve deaths in five outpourings of seemingly random violence, each witnessed by one teen who survived. For the most part, The Waking Dark follows these five teens: Daniel, Jule, Ellie, West, and Cass. Wasserman uses a third person narrative style that does occasionally drift to other characters temporarily, but 95% of the book is about these five.

The Waking Dark follows along a basic horror story arc. The murders occur, but then life settles a bit and normalcy seems to return, only not quite. Something dark lurks beneath the surface of the people of Oleander, Kansas. It's almost as if the id is taking over, people's basest and most secret desires taking control; instant gratification mattering more than social mores. Wasserman's tale is unrelentingly dark and creepy.

The large cast of characters is both a boon and a drawback. None of them quite get enough characterization for me to be wholly invested in them, a fact exacerbated by not ever getting to see them before the Killing Day, as the day of the opening comes to be known. However, the large cast is an intriguing one. Daniel's the son of a drunk, who calls himself the Preacher, and judged by the town for that. Jule, short for Juliet, is part of the infamous Prevette family, meth heads, meth makers, and meth dealers, and she's trying to figure out if she can be free of that taint. Ellie is driven by her faith in Christianity. West is a popular football player, trying to hide that he's in love with a boy. Cass is popular and smart, babysitting kids (and she hates kids) in order to save up enough money to escape Kansas for college. There aren't many YA books written about kids like these, except maybe those like Cass, so reading about them was refreshing.

The best aspect of The Waking Dark is Robin Wasserman's writing which is positively beautiful. That woman can turn a phrase. This raises The Waking Dark above the average horror offerings. She does use the horror to make commentaries on human nature, war, and faith. She manages to make the novel quite meaningful, though the plot is something straight out of a horror film, sort of like The Bible Belt Goes Bananas.

As may be obvious, what I didn't care for was the plot. The whole thing just seems way too absurd to me. I feel like this could have been a great idea, but the explanation for how this madness came to the town strikes me as utterly ridiculous. Not buying into that, it's really just violence for violence's sake, which is all very well, but horror really isn't my genre of choice.

Horror fans, get thee to a bookstore, because Robin Wasserman's The Waking Dark is a creepy thrill ride full of death and blood from the first page to the very last ones. Even if you're not much for horror, The Waking Dark may be worth it for Wasserman's beautiful prose.

[❤Ninja Bunneh❤ · Rating 3 out of 5]

If The Mist, Storm of the Century and Under the Dome had one big orgy, out of that love fest would come The Waking Dark.
We have:
Small unassuming town - check
People killing for no apparent reason - check.
Storm rolling through the town causing massive destruction - check
Obligatory sudden government quarantine with no explanation - check
One or more religious zealots - check

Sadly, none of this:


Anywhoo, that's the gist of The Waking Dark. It's honestly nothing I haven't seen before, but at the same time it's an enjoyable creepy read.

3 chocolate chip cookie stars

[Rachel Bea · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book became a chore to read, which was hugely disappointing because I really liked that it was unlike most other YA books. It's totally bleak and violent, and maybe if I had read it at another time I would have liked it more. There are a ton of characters, and almost none of them get more than a page or so at a time. The different perspectives was interesting at first, but there was so much going on I started to think that I didn't care about any of them. This is a book I'd probably want to read again and pay better attention to (to be honest I started skimming and hoping it would get to the point and I'd be told what the hell was going on with the town) but for right now I wasn't feeling it and basically gave up.

[Rose]

I was actually enjoying this book a lot and had to return it to the library before I could finish it, but now I don't even think I can pick this up again. I'll sit on my hands about it, but right now, it's probably going to be a "no."

[Beck · Rating 2 out of 5]

I went for a neutral rating with this one because I don’t even know where to begin with this book. The Waking Dark is a bloodbath, living up to it’s dark, twisted potential. But even with the high volume of action and bloodshed, I was left bored to tears for the first 80% of the novel, and when the action began to peak, I hardly cared because I hated each and every character except for two (and there were about 3,890.)

The Waking Dark starts with a really unnerving, creepy bang. The Killing Day. Suddenly, completely normal people have turned on their neighbors and friends and, for no apparent reason, commit atrocious murders. A man shoots up a convenience store. A woman stabs her boyfriend to death. A boy is run over by a lunatic driver. A young girl kills a baby. It’s deeply fucked up, not going to lie. No one really knows why this happened, so they kind of just let it go. All the murderer’s turned their weapons on themselves, except for the baby killer, Cass, but she’s locked away in an institution so no one really thinks about her anymore. Left in the Killing Day’s wake is a strange group of individuals who, after a killer tornado flattens the town, are the only ones the others can depend on.

Having such an interesting, diverse cast of characters would seem like a great opportunity for dynamic interactions. Instead, everything kind of played out in a very cliched way. I was never, not once, surprised by the characters’ actions. Only disappointed. Every single one of them were basically horrible human beings – even the ones who, on the surface, seemed like they were supposed to be likable, took a turn for the worse at some point in the story. Daniel, a survivor of the convenience store shooting was okay, I guess, but he was so goddamn bland and boring, I just couldn’t take it. Jule is the youngest in a family of meth dealers and drug addicts, and though she is sympathetic at first, being the victim of multiple forms of abuse, she eventually succumbs to the drug that tears apart her family. West, a footballer player and all around golden boy is a little more interesting, due to the fact that he is hiding his homosexuality from everyone in his life, comes off as surprisingly one-dimensional. To me, his only purpose was to be the gay character, and ‘gay’ was the only thing he was. Everything about him – even the goodness in him – seemed to revolve around this one characteristic and that’s just so disappointing.

The most interesting character, to me, was Ellie King. She is very devout in her Christian faith, and even though she has a sort of dark background, I fully sympathized with it, and it only added more depth to her, for me. She was so steadfast in her faith and her determination to right past wrongs. She was the only character who stepped up and had the strength to do the right thing when it was most important. The only other character who rivaled Ellie was Gracie, the sister of the dead baby boy. Her struggle with her rage and anger and sense of abandonment were tangible and palpable. I felt for this poor girl on every level, and rooted for her throughout the whole book.

One positive thing I do have to say is that Wasserman was not afraid to go all out in The Waking Dark. This is the darkest, most violent and gruesome book I have ever read. It forces you to take a good, deep look at humanity. It asks you terrifying questions that you’re not sure you really want to answer. The Waking Dark truly does dissect humanity, leaving its innards exposed on the operating table for all to see. There is a lot of death – and worse – and so this isn’t a book for the fainthearted.

All that said – I was so fucking bored for most of this book. It took me forever to get through. Since I hated the characters so much, I gave zero fucks about what happened to them. The story was vaguely interesting, but so easy to figure out by page, like, 50. The writing was really, really wordy, and sentences took way longer than they had to to get to the point. I dreaded picking this novel up, and even debated DNF-ing more than once. What kept me reading was the need to see the end. I just had to know how our main characters were going to survive this apocalyptic type setting.

I see what good The Waking Dark has to offer. It’s a gritty look at what happens to people when there are no more rules, no more laws. It’s a sick and twisted bloodbath of a book that will have most readers on the edge of their seats. But it wasn’t for me. I’m starting to think that I just simply don’t click with Robin Wasserman’s writing. But if you’re searching for a disturbing, honest glance at the darkness of human beings, look no further than The Waking Dark.

[Isamlq · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think it was Jackman in some interview- Yes, he is valid authority. Wolverine’s abs say so! – who made a distinction between two types of horror in film: the one that’s a bit like Saw, where death is a forgone conclusion and all that’s left to imagine is how bloody/ gory things can get. An odd almost contrary statement was then made where that type of horror was described, “sanitized terror” (I don’t know if I have the words right, but that’s roughly what I recall). Odd, because there was nothing clean about how that dude cut his own leg off, yeah? Except there’s sense in that description, too: it’s sanitized because all the blood and gore were forgone or so obviously going to happen. Death was going to happen, it was simply a matter of how bloody things would get.

Then there’s that other kind: the old school one (No, not of the rubber mold monsters that’s (painfully) obviously fake,) the older than those; the one’s that have your neck hair standing on end because you don’t know what’s happened/ happening. The one’s heavy with silhouettes and shadows, background music, and perfectly times pauses that all propelled the viewer to further imagine what could be next. Imagination was it’s tool… we’d come up the limitless even when… No, especially when it came the terrifying.

Rambling Introductions need a point: this book? This book?! has taken both kinds of horror and crammed as much of both into it as possible. There’s mass killings, murdered infants; there’s bully kids revealing what they’re really capable of; there’s chaos. In short: INSANITY…. And I loved it. The sinister less obvious bit creeps in with how easily it all took place. It’s very Stepford in effect. They all looked on as one horror is heaped on and on and on like it was all, “Next please.” The horrific was acceptable; it’s all so easy in execution and that’s the sanitized horror I’m talking of. So, take a saw to your leg; there’s going to be blood… and that precise things doesn’t actually happens here… there’s still lots of parallels to make! So blood, terror, scary kids then scarier adults: I loved it, even as I was terrified by it.

Bonus (of the delicious variety): I could feel Stephen King all over this. Never mind what could have been chopped up moments with the potential of stopping the flow of terror. The pacing in this was… put To. Die For. Wasserman’s made it her bitch because written as it was, pausing at each moment with that split second of me waiting for that next thing simply raised everything (the sinister, the creepy, the terrifying, and -- this surprised and pleased me most-- even those tender moments in between the said terror/blood/ gore) to something better.

But it’s more than the actual horrific goings-on, it’s the individual kids and their particular stories that added another bonus (of the delicious variety) here. The young ones have been screwed over. Badly. West, Jule, Daniel, Cass, and Grace each stories that add something more. And if that were still insufficient: there’s also the way the same stories get woven together. A Breakfast Club comparison is too obvious a comparison because despite there being a jock, an outcast type, a loner bad-ass type and weirdo in this one, they’re no brat pack (thank gods.)

Hype over this particular title: Completely justified. And with October coming up as it is... well, it’s just is timely, isn’t it? Unless you all are like me, impatient about the next good thing to read in which case: grab a copy of this; get reading.

[Roberta R. (Offbeat YA) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rated 3.5 really.

Excerpt from my review - originally published at Offbeat YA.

Pros: Strong writing and handling of multiple characters. Well-crafted exploration of the hidden violence lying behind people's facade.
Cons: Dark and gloomy. The premise is quite far-fetched.
WARNING! Very mature content, with lots of violence, attempted rape, and even a child smothered on page.
Will appeal to: Those who don't mind dark books. Those who like survival stories and (sometimes deeply) flawed characters.

Robin Wasserman’s Cold Awakening is one of my favourite series ever, and heck, the woman can write - so I was fully prepared to love The Waking Dark, especially since the premise was screaming AWESOME! at me. The fact is, this is hands down the darkest, gloomiest book I’ve ever read…plus, there are other things that dampened my enthusiasm a bit. Hence the 3.5-star rating (originally a 3-star one, but upon rereading, I found myself liking the book more…).
(Also, not all reviews need to be broken into three sections, and that's all right).

SATAN'S PIT

The only possible reason why TWD has been labeled as YA is the main characters' age range (13-17). In fact, this book is, essentially, a journey in the depths of humanity's dark side and latent violence, where - even taking into account the external factor that apparently brought out the worst in everyone - no one is truly innocent. Because the potential was there all along, and only needed to be tapped into. OK, I'm sounding cryptic as heck, so let's put it this way: the whole town of Oleander goes mad. It starts with a few individual, but in the end all the residents (with only the odd exception, that will get explained - or sort of) enter a spiral of full-blown violence. Much later, we'll learn that there's a reason for this...but is there? Can you really blame an external factor, or was it just the kick in the butt those people needed to let their worst instincts take over? It's an interesting question, especially nowadays, with more and more countries electing aggressive right-wing governments that are paving the way for violence and intolerance. What would you do if you felt like your worst deeds could go unpunished? Would your conscience hold up? In TWD, there's a more peculiar reason for the surge of violence (one that I didn't entirely buy), but the result is the same. Give people a push in the right (I mean wrong) direction, leave them to their own devices, and they will destroy centuries of civilisation with a single blow. "Scary" doesn't even start to define it. [...]

Whole review here.

[Dan Poblocki · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this in manuscript form. An exciting throwback to popular, epic horror novels of the past thirty years. Intelligent and literary and scary as hell.

[Kelly · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is solid horror. Solid. My reservations are that I wish it had been longer because I wanted to know more about the characters, and while there were knockout lines, I wanted the writing itself to be a little tighter and emotionally resonant.

They called it Killing Day, when five people started taking out any and nearly everyone in their paths in small Oleander, Kansas. Of the five people who were killing, four were successful at taking themselves out in the end. Teen Cass was not. She lived. But is it really living if her parents desert her and she's got a life sentence for committing a crime that she doesn't know why she committed? Sure, it was an innocent child. But Cass is a child, too.

A year later, things in Oleander aren't better. In fact, things get worse when a tornado sweeps through town, killing more people. Causing more destruction. Now Cass is "free." But she's not really free. She's still under rule of Oleander and it won't be too long before she's perhaps sentenced further.

But this isn't just Cass's story. Wasserman gives us the narratives of MANY of the teens in Oleander. They all come from very different backgrounds -- and what I give her huge props for is that nearly none of these teens are what we'd consider "middle class" kids. At times, juggling all of their stories becomes a little tiresome and problematic because there wasn't quite enough, but part of the point is that some of the characters become much more important to you as a reader. For me, Cass was one of the least interesting of the cast, despite the fact she played a huge role in the initial violence. I found West and Jason to be incredibly compelling, both mourning Nick but for very different (or not!) reasons. Likewise, I found Jules and her background story to be perhaps the most interesting: how do you overcome not only the reputation your family has (earned and deserved as Meth heads and dealers) but also how do you not get caught up in the mess yourself? For much of the story, I found Ellie to be pretty uninteresting, but at about 3/4 through, a big reveal about her past occurs: she had gotten pregnant and prayed for it to go away since abortion wouldn't happen in small town Kansas and being pregnant would ruin her saintly reputation, among other things . Daniel, Milo, and Grace all kind of blurred together for me as a reader, but it was okay.

This is a very violent, destructive, and challenging-to-read story. But it's not really about what happens or why it happens. It's about the human reaction to devastation and corruption. It's possible there's an explanation for Killing Day and the events following, but it's not necessarily believable either to the readers nor the characters. In many ways, that doesn't matter. What matters is instead the question of what next? If everything is hell, do you try to get out or do you give in to your darkest desires and be motivated that way?

Readers who want dark will find it here, as will those who like their horror to be internally driven by the characters, rather than externally driven by the events surrounding the characters. These are very broken people, even without the world being torn apart around them. Wasserman isn't afraid to offer the darkest aspects of people here, beneath the darkness surrounding them. She tackles drug abuse, political corruption, the ethics of science and medicine, homosexuality and homophobia, mob mentality, and more. It's also a story, in part, about redemption and the ethics of religion and belief (both those things together and separately). Are we removed from a higher being in the face of darkness or are we driven by our beliefs in it? There are no solid answers here because even in the end, no one really is in a great place. There's little hope, even if the ending has some to it. You know that these characters will never shake what happened -- nor should they.

[Kristin (MyBookishWays Reviews) · Rating 5 out of 5]

http://www.mybookishways.com/2013/12/...

The darkness is nearly all encompassing in Robin Wasserman’s latest, THE WAKING DARK. Oleander, Kansas is a very small town, considered quaint by its older residents (and some young ones), but for most of its younger set, it’s a place to escape once they come of age. Unfortunately, the time for escape is coming to an end, and it starts with the killing day. On the killing day, people that seemed sane snap and kill anyone that gets in there way, then themselves, except for one, a girl named Cass. Soon after, a tornado ravages Oleander and among the ruins, the town spirals further out of control, and when military forces move in, five teens will find the survival of Oleander on their shoulders, if they can survive the coming days. Juliet (Jule) Prevette is from the wrong side of the tracks, and part of a family that makes its living producing meth. Violence is nothing new to Jule, but it’s nothing compared to what’s in store. Jeremiah West is on the football team, popular and well liked, but he’s got a secret, and carries despair like a torch after witnessing his friend Nick’s death on the killing day. Daniel’s father is the town drunk and the only thing that really gives him joy is his younger half-brother Milo, and they’ll need each other more than ever when the town goes to hell, and boy does it.

I’ll admit, I had this for a bit and didn’t get to it until Chuck Wendig named it in his Stuff Wot I Liked in 2013 post. Boy, he wasn’t kiddin’. Wasserman’s small town vision is like something out of a Bosch painting and has been compared to Stephen King’s work. I have to agree on that one. In fact, it calls to mind Under the Dome, but with teens for the main characters and minus the aliens. That said, the comparisons are of the best kind, and this is uniquely Wasserman’s story. These teens are connected, but they’re not necessarily friends, and when the shite hits the fan, they have to trust each other, even if they never would have in their former lives. The adults in The Waking Dark behave very, very badly, and indeed, one of the scariest thing in a young person’s life is if the ones they are supposed to rely on the most become the enemy. Now, there is a reason behind this mess, and revealing what that is would be spoiling part of the fun, but Wasserman very slyly explores what it might be like to become completely morally untethered, and it is a nightmarish exploration. I grew quite fond of all the kids, but my favorite is Jule, who pretty much everyone would forgive if she went completely into the dark, but she doesn’t, and that makes her pretty special. Her family is right out of Deliverance, and the horrors of meth addiction are trumpeted loud and clear, as are her life of violence and neglect. Part survival horror, part psychological dissection of small town life, and part unflinching scare-fest, THE WAKING DARK is unmissable for mature teens and adults looking for scares that rise far above the usual fare.

[Branwen Sedai *of the Brown Ajah* · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Maybe you couldn't know how much weight you could bear until you snapped beneath it."

"We're not perfect, any of us. We fight our temptations and sometimes we win. But sometimes...not everyone is strong enough to win. Should we hate them for being weak? Of should we help them? Shouldn't we lend them our strength, give them a chance to do better, to make up for their mistakes? People can change. And people who do bad things can do good things too."

The Waking Dark is a brilliant, terrifying, and truly insightful novel which delves into the darkness of the human soul.

Let me just say, this is not a book for the faint hearted.

There are so many concepts that are handled in this book; drug abuse, attempted rape, homosexuality, religious zealotry, mass hysteria, government conspiracies, and etc. There were so many times that I couldn't believe that I was reading a young adult book. Not to say that the YA genre doesn't handle issues like these, because it does. I've read plenty of deep, insightful YA novels. But this book. This book is different. It is complex in the way that Stephen King or Dean Koontz is complex. I guess what I mean to say is that Robin Wasserman has such an incredible grasp of the human psyche that is just so out of this world and psychologically stimulating that it took my breath away numerous times throughout this book. The characters are absolutely amazing. They are obviously good people, but so deeply scarred and flawed and all you can do is just hope with all of your heart that they all make it out okay in the end.

And they don't. I won't give any spoilers away but in the vein of George R. R. Martin who is notorious for killing off characters....let's just say that you end up worrying a hell of a lot for these characters you come to know and love.

"She was not Joan of Arc; she was not Jesus. She was not stoic, and she was neither silent nor brave. She was seventeen years old, and she was about to be set on fire, and she wanted someone to hold her and tell her it was going to be alright."

See what I mean? This book is brilliant and absolutely twisted. In a wonderful way, of course. I picked this book up because I recently read 'The Book of Blood and Shadows' and loved Robin Wasserman's writing so much that I wanted to continue on with her works. This book was equally mazing, in terms of the writing style. Loved every page of it

If you enjoy terrifying stories this one absolutely takes the cake. It scared the bejeezus out of me so many times I still think it may take me awhile to recover! *laughs* So if you enjoy books like these and like getting the crap scared out of you I would highly recommend this book!

This review can also be found on my blog:
http://ayanami023.wordpress.com

[Maja (The Nocturnal Library) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Robin Wasserman sure knows how to scare a person half to death. As I read The Waking Dark, the evil that jumped at me from every page constantly threatened to overwhelm. This isn’t a book you can finish in a day, it is simply too intense, demanding and sickening at times. Even readers who are fairly desensitized like I am might find themselves troubled by the events described.

It’s obvious that Robin Wasserman owes a literary debt to Stephen King – she even thanks him in the acknowledgements. That slowly rising feeling of dread King is famous for permeates every page of The Waking Dark, making it a far better novel than Wasserman’s previous work, The Book of Blood and Shadows. Although perhaps just a tad too long, The Waking Dark is extremely well structured and excellently paced, with a story that refuses to be left behind and forgotten.

For the people of Oleander, pure evil – or devil, if you will – is not a matter of belief at all. It’s simply a matter of seeing it in someone’s eyes… or even in the mirror. Good people commit unspeakable atrocities at every turn – the very worst part of everyone’s nature has suddenly come out to play. Clearly Wasserman doesn’t pull back punches just because she writes for teens. Her characters may be no more than seventeen years old, but they both suffer and commit horrible acts of violence. And yet, that’s not all that defines them; we see the best and the worst in most of them.

I’m not usually a fan of multiple perspectives, but in this case, the more characters I got attached to, the more people I had to fear for. Although I didn’t spend much time with them individually, each of the character was extremely well-rounded, with his or her own set of difficulties and issues. Caring for their individual fates, as well as the well-being of the entire town, happened to be much easier than I’d originally assumed.

The Waking Dark is an unexpectedly twisted read that reminds of Stephen King’s best works. I strongly recommend it, especially as a Halloween read. Just make sure to read it somewhere safe and warm, with all the lights on.

[Kat Heckenbach · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm all over the place when it comes to this book. My very first impression when starting to read it was, Wow, this feels just like a Stephen King novel. Which is good and bad. I love Stephen King, so I thought, cool, SK for YA. But not really. It just felt a bit like SK "lite." So, the whole time I was reading I felt like something was missing.

That said, there is a reason SK books are for adults. I'm not talking about the horror element either. I've read much more horrifying and gory books for YA than this one. The "adult" part is the way SK reaches into the characters and pulls out the dregs...I'm not sure how to put this, but it exemplifies an alarming trend in YA fiction. I totally get that teens are worldly, they deal with sex and drugs and such on a daily basis--but this just reinforces the idea that humans are nothing more than base instinct and primal urges. There were graphic near-rape scenes that did very little to actually move the story forward--these were scenes that could easily have been made non-sexual attacks.

It bothered me that every adult in the book was characterized as either a druggie or a drunk or a perv or a whacko. And the entire book felt like an attack on Christians, characterizing them as hypocritical, delusional, and abusive.

The writing was, overall, good. But the story line dragged a lot. There were far too many places where characters kept revisiting the same internal monologues and having essentially the same conversations over and over.

Also, the "reveal" of why the town went nuts was unsatisfying. During the ENTIRE novel, I found myself thinking, "Why is NO ONE searching for answers?" It about drove me nuts. And then when they got them, it was just, hey, blah, this is what we did, and everyone accepted it. The climax of the novel felt anti-climactic.

Anyway, I really wanted to love this book. As it stands, though, I found myself either irritated or bored through most of it. I did like the parts written in Jule's POV, but the other characters never drew me in. And while I found the writing to be solid, the author skilled, I can't recommend the book. I would possibly try another of the author's works, though.

[Kate Welsh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whoa. I . . . just . . . whoa.

I always tell people that Wasserman's previous book, The Book of Blood and Shadow, is like The Da Vinci Code except actually good. Well, this one is like Stephen King's Under the Dome, except better. It deals with some similar themes of power and religion and drugs and evil in an isolated small town, but the overall plot hangs together better in this one, and, more importantly to me, the depth of the characterization made me really care what happened to the teenagers at the center of the story. Wasserman does a great job of seeding the action with genuine character moments that make the horrors of the story resonate even more.

This book is not for the faint of heart, which is either a warning or an encouragement, depending on your tastes. A lot of terrible things happen, and Wasserman is pulling no punches here. There were a few times when I literally stopped, said "Did that just happen?", and reread a sentence or paragraph. But it never feels like bad or scary things are happening just for shock value - it's all earned and meaningful, never gratuitous. And the tone manages to be simultaneously bleak and hopeful, which is one of my favorite combinations.

(Disclaimer: I know Robin and she gave me an ARC, but I wouldn't say I liked something I didn't!)

[Shandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Initial thoughts: That wasn't what I expected, but it was an enjoyable read. Dark, ugly, gritty. Review to come eventually.

Review:

Actual rating: 3.5 These-People-Are-Seriously-Effed-Up stars. No story spoilers.

This is labeled as a YA?!



There is absolutely NO way I'd ever want any young adult in my life reading this book!!!! It's dark, it's twisted, it's ugly, it's full of psychopathic behaviors. It's disgusting. Did I mention it's twisted?!

The first chapter thrust me into this crazy world in a hurry!! Multiple murders were occurring. Multiple bloody death scenes were thrown in my face. I'm not saying this is a bad thing!! I love when a book opens with a bang!!! I certainly felt like this one did!!

While this book wasn't what I expected it to be, I really enjoyed it. I'm going with 3.5 stars instead of more because it wasn't a totally original idea in my opinion, and I feel like the conclusion to it was a bit lack luster. The climax could've been carried out a bit better. Don't get too attached to the characters either because they may not last long. :-p

[Cheryl · Rating 1 out of 5]

Seriously, someone tell me what this book is about. I picked up up for the creep factor that it sounded like it would have. Well it was creepy but not in a scary make the hair on your arms stand up creep factor. It was creepy in more of a gross way. The way that the guys saw the women in this book like they are just to be used like throw away trash was degrading and I was not impressed. In fact, I was shocked that this type of language would be in a young adult book. This is not really the best impression that we want to give to this targeted age group.

Then there is the issue that I cared nothing for any of the characters. Seriously by chapter seven I should feel something for some if not all of the characters. For example there was Jule. How am I suppose to feel sorry for her because her mom's boyfriend is a jerk. Yeah that is bad but when Jule has a nasty attitude then it is hard to find anything endearing about her. I guess I will never find out what caused all the people in Oleander to go crazy and kill each other. Not that I will miss any sleep worry and wondering about it.

[ekaterina · Rating 4 out of 5]

– 3.75/5 stars.

ms wasserman knows what she is doing if i do say so myself; this is horror. it shows us humans in their purest, ugliest, rawest form and what they're capable of doing once they no longer bend to moral and social restrictions.

review to come.

[Brenda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ah. This is the kind of book that when you're done with it, you're satisfied. It makes you want to lean back in your chair and just sit back and bask in the horrendous hell you were just put through. Make no mistake, this book is one helluva ride.

So this book jumped a couple of standings in my queue of books to read because I'd been hearing some good things from GR friends. Most notably, that it is reminiscent of Stephen King. And it was true! It was awesome! I had a brief moment of deja vu; I felt like I was flashing back to my childhood, which was weird. For some weird reason, my parents allowed me to watch and read really disturbing things at ages I should not have been allowed to. I saw The Exorcist, The Ring, The Grudge, etc. all in elementary school/the first year of junior high. I started reading Stephen King at the tender age of 11 or 12 (I can't remember which). I knew that what I was reading and watching wasn't normal. That kids my age weren't filling so much of their time with such dark stories. And so I had this feeling of mischievousness, because I knew that if my parents actually knew what happened in Stephen King books there's no way in hell I would have been able to read them so young.

But I did!

And when The Waking Dark started the action almost immediately, I had a moment of "this shouldn't be marketed to YA readership; it's way too violent." And then I had to recognize how hypocritical I was being. If I could watch horror movies and read horror books before I hit puberty, why can't everyone else? And I retracted my earlier thought that it should be an adult book.

The best part? It really did remind me of Stephen King. In particular Needful Things, albeit without the supernatural element. Really, that was the only surprise for me. I thought there would be a supernatural cause for everything, but it became clear fairly early on that wasn't the case. I don't know if I'd say it's really a mystery, what caused it. Once I ruled out a supernatural cause I came to the conclusion pretty easily. The fun part was watching how it would all hash out, and what would happen to each of our protagonists.

The protagonists. They were great. I kind of felt as if I was seeing Rowling's The Casual Vacancy list of characters, only all participating in some way or another in a giant bloodbath. We got the girl from the wrong side of the tracks. Multiple people in relationships that didn't want to be with that person. Plenty of self-righteousness. A small town goes to hell. We get people with different personalities forced to deal with the repercussions. Some go crazy, some are forced to band together. It was awesome watching everyone fall apart, in a way that people love watching soap operas. Let's watch everyone else deal with their lives falling apart!

That's exactly what happened. Everyone turns on each other. The R8-G drug was exacting; it left total slaughter in its wake after administered. I think the part that stuck out the most to me (it's not a major part of the book, but it does reveal a little bit) was when a man drags his wife, completely naked, to the middle of town to turn her in for adultery and turn himself in. He murdered and dismembered his wife's lover and left him in a trash bag on the porch, and then brought his wife to the town square so she could be stoned. So there's an example for you of just how far this book goes.

I relished it. In the same way I love Halloween, and slasher movies. It was insane and so much fun. Absolutely a good one to read if a fan of Stephen King.

[Suzanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm kind of all over the place about this book. On the one hand, it's a truly YA brand of Stephen King level horror; and that's a great thing for all those teenagers who ask for something scary and REALLY mean it. On the other hand, it's a truly YA brand of Stephen King level horror; and that's a bad thing because it comes off as derivative. Seriously, it wasn't long ago that I read , and I have read almost everything SK has written going back to the 70s. (Yes, I'm old, but I also started young reading completely inappropriate books.)Wasserman has the claustrophobic terror down pat, and she similarly tells a compelling yarn with some nicely developed characters and a fine appreciation of the human condition in all its depravity and all its transcendence. I think what I missed the most from King's tales was the dark humor that made the overall bleakness just a little more bearable.

Under the Dome quarantined a small town within an impenetrable extraterrestrial barrier while this book stations troops with orders to kill at all points of egress around Oleander, Kansas. Just as in that crucible of a dome, the human elements seem to revert, in many cases, to some baser version of themselves capable of evil deeds. The dome held in vigilante justice with ad hoc deputies from the high school football team. Here, too, football seems to qualify characters for deplorable strong-arm quasi-security tactics on behalf of ruthless leaders looking to capitalize on their isolation from the rest of the world. And in the dome, we have a handful of disparate characters who come together to try to quell the tide of violence and insanity and save the day. Waking Dark distinguishes itself by making all that group--trailer trash from a meth-making family, introverted son of the town drunk and Armageddon-haranguing preacher man, closeted homosexual from the football team, and incarcerated baby killer, etc.--young adults.

That baby-killer probably doesn't sound much like a white hat in the plot, so that bears a bit of explanation. Before a serious twister leveled a good bit of Oleander and acted as a catalyst for the town's lockdown, almost exactly a year before, VERY strange events brought on a bloodbath of a day. Daniel, working as a clerk, survived the town pharmacist shooting up everyone in the drugstore while West, injured football player, saw his secret lover pinned against a tree by a crazed driver. Jule, always seething at being from the criminal Prevette family, witnesses an uncle and aunt both die by the same knife. And the baby killer Cass? She seemed to be under some spell, in a fugue state after which she found herself recovering from a jump out the window and never to recover from what she is shown she has done: smother the baby she was caring for.

It's dark, very dark, and pulls no punches. Is it an intentional homage to the 20th century horror master? I would prefer to think well of it that way. And now I finally know what book to hand to the bloody minded teens that don't want the weak tea versions of horror generally provided for their age group. Welcome to the abattoir, kiddies!

[Gabriel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Books like this one make me feel like an old censor-friendly Fredric Wertham (see Seduction of the Innocent). As an adult, I read it and wonder how something so terrifyingly violent (I mean, Let The Right One In is less gruesome and Stephen King is more tame) can be classified as Young Adult.

It starts simply enough. An eruption of violence sweeps through the town; exemplified though 5 specific events that are centered around our five main characters. The descriptions here are plain enough that I quickly figured out the writing was geared towards younger readers ... but the acts described are more extreme than I would expect in a YA book. We have a teen being rammed into a tree over and over, a grocery store shoot out with a rifle, a baby being smothered to death, a knifing and a real crucifixion.

Here's the real scary thing ... these are the LEAST gruesome events described.

Robin Wasserman's novel than takes a sojourn through POV's - starting first in this omniscient 3rd person that I haven't seen in years, then dipping more and more into the 3rd Person Focused POV that is more common in modern fiction, where it finally settles by the middle - while trying to establish the history (current and ancient) of the town of Oleander. It was during these first two chapters (the eruption of violence and the history) that I wondered if I could deal with the writing style ... and then the book gets dark. So dark that I could only read little pieces of it before escaping to some video game or a movie. Requiem For A Dream is less dark.

What makes the book so effective in its description of violence is how simple the descriptions are in the latter passages. Just enough to let the reader know what is happening ... and then the mind is free to roam. And roam it does quite easily. Forget the faint of heart, even the hardest hearts will have difficulty getting through the different rape scenes (RAPE! In a YA book!), drug use ... you know what, I don't even want to remember what else.

And through it all, we get these great characters who are focused in effective action sequences that drive the book along. If I wasn't so squeamish (and I like Takashi Miike and David Lynch movies), the book would have been finished in a week. Once it gets going, it zips along. The pacing and emotional focus of the story is strong enough that one forgives the cliches (even those that the book makes fun of after stating) and the relatively sudden ending. This book isn't perfect, but it's pretty close.

Just be warned, it makes Battle Royale look like Muppet Babies. If only every gory horror novel/movie was as interesting as this one.

[Jennifer Bacall · Rating 2 out of 5]

*Thank you NetGalley for the ebook version.

The first few pages of The Waking Dark drew me into the creepy and mysterious terror occurring in the small town of Oleander, Kansas. Unfortunately as each new page turned the story became so labored, depressing, convolved and disgusting that I had to force myself to finish it.

The book begins with multiple murders all committed on a single night. The murderers were all normal, respectable citizens and the crimes shook the community to its core. THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN ENOUGH to engage the audience and fulfill readers. Wasserman has a masterful writing style and it saddened me that so many unnecessary, disturbing events and themes were introduced, reducing the story is to a repetitive hammering home of the darkness of human nature. The murders were terrible but then added to that horror: a mystery virus that makes all residents psychotic, a tornado which destroys a huge portion of the town and the town being held hostage by a military company. Throw in some incest, near-rape, hate crimes against homosexuals and an elaborate description of the pure joy that a teen girl experiences when she uses Meth for the first time.

I don’t condone censorship but find myself questioning, who is the market for this book? The characters don’t have the depth and you don’t have the affection towards them that you would in say, a Stephen King novel. The amount of evil and violence in this book is unappealing and because it’s unnecessary to propel the story it feels false. Even fans of the horror genre are likely to be turned off by the number of storylines. On top of the murders, virus, conspiracy, drug consumption, rapes, etc. there is an overbearing message that Christians are at the foundation of the town’s problem. There seems to be “no issue left behind” writing.

Violence can be used effectively and movingly in YA horror novels. The Walking Chaos series by Patrick Ness and Rotters by Daniel Kraus are both incredibly dark and have scenes of extreme violence BUT the violence in these books elicits horror to the readers while further developing the characters and propelling the storyline. In the Waking Dark the violence felt glamorized and at times, strangely sexualized.

I really wanted to like this book. It’s the first title that I’ve read by Robin Wasserman and I greatly admire many of the writer’s who she mentions in her acknowledgments. I’m at a loss with this title.