A Place to Hide

Strange Matter #4

by Johnny Ray Barnes

Trey Porter and his friends have been chased from their campsite by bullies, and are searching for a new one. One that's absolutely bully-proof. They decide on the legendary fort of Widow Hill, a Revolutionary War relic hidden deep in the forests of Fairfield. The path to the fort is not an easy one, however, as someone or something is trying to stop them any way it can. A dark secret awaits Trey Porter. A secret guarded for over two hundred years and desired by every dark creature that lurks in the forest. Trey promises not to reveal the secret. . . over his dead body.

Audio CD

First published January 1, 1996

Reviews

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Got another for the round for ya, whew I am going through these fast. Won’t have as much time for these next week so that’s why I am blazing at the moment. We got Strange Matter so let’s just jump into it.

Trey Porter and his friends are hanging out outside when local bully Waylon burst and his cronies show up. Waylon bugs them a lot and they are getting sick of it. They still wanna camp out and they need a place to hide. One of the friends knows of a legend about an old fort from 200 years ago and they check it out, only to see that the only legend didn’t tell the full story, as there’s plenty of worse things than bullies to hide from.

In what is clearly the theme of this round, this one falls in the middle for the series but is still good. It gets into it right away and is constant action/tension. There’s not much filler or down time here, while giving things enough room to breath. Trey is mostly just there but there is some mild emotion with bad things happening to his friends and some mild moral dilemmas.

It starts out seeming like it’ll be a simple survival story, which I am a sucker for but becomes more when we see what is in the fort. Basically, there’s a guy who is quite old and is protecting something from these lizard people. There’s more to it but yeah we get some wild backstory here. It has some history and tension is added as it goes. It’s able to add more which helps keep you on your toes.

It does struggle near the end as it starts to stretch a bit. The guy guarding this place goes back on forth on how good he is meant to be and it presents an interesting idea with showing you don’t always know you can trust. But it throws that away, including Waylon seeming to soften up. We also get implications that he is facing abuse from dad which is….something.

It’s been a minute so you may have forgotten but aside from a mention in Strange Forces, he later stars in Doorway to Doom which is still one of the best from the series so this set solid groundwork. As for what we got here, the resolution is solid enough but does lack a big wrapup to make the story as satisfying as it could have been.

It’s almost onto something to make it special but it’s not too damaging. It still remains solid enough with constant action and surprises. Strange Matter is just good at keeping things enjoyable and tension, it’s rarely a boring series and that’s why I look forward to it the most. And I’m used to the weird use of caps at this point lol.

So yeah, a lesser entry for the series due to some missed chances but still mostly a fun time. I am wishing for like one stronger entry in this round but I’ll take what I can get. And that’s about it, a more simple one this time.

Next time, we get the final two for the round. We finish up Deadtime Stories (until a couple more get added to archive which is looking slim by now) with Ghost Knight. See ya then.

(As a heads up, with the library being closed most of next week for thanksgiving and me not wanting to read on the phone too much these days, idk if I’ll finish the round before November ends but I’ll try. Also geez it’s almost December)

[Coley Weed · Rating 4 out of 5]

While rated at a 4 stars I would actually prefer to give this book a 4.5 stars because it really is that good. The story follows three boys who are hounded by a group of bullies. This forces them to go deeper into the woods to escape, looking to find a place called Widow Hill and a fort that was storied to reside there. While I expected this book to be on the more frightening side, it actually turned out to be more like an epic adventure story. Magical wishes, monsters, a skeletal soldier, and more are all aspects that make this feel like it was meant for a movie script rather than a kids horror series. While this may not be for everyone I found the story told and the method of telling it to be quite refreshing. The main protagonist encounters many situations and has a great amount of development as a once frightened kid must now take on a 200 year long skirmish.

While often in this genre I cannot stand bullies and their over the top “give me your lunch money” antics, I cannot help but find the recurring bullies in strange matter to be great additions to a books narrative. I feel this may be due to their cartoonish names and actions, never really making them too frightening. The bullies in this are actually the stars of a later book Doorways to Doom which I feel is an amazing sequel to this book. While there is effectively a Jamunji reset in this book, the potential character developments are lost for the bullies. This makes the emotional struggles Waylon deals with in that later book work so well.

My only issue that beings the title to a 4.5 stars is that the Author writes themselves into a bit of a puzzle around the 75% mark. Basically we get to the point where the characters were at the core destination, the fort, then escaping to the waterfall area they were at before. This is all ok but the events that occur there require the characters to go all the back to the fort again. It really felt like unnecessary padding to include another long chase scene and a way for the lizards to get wet. We see this was unnecessary as when they arrive at the fort they immediately go back underground, which is where they effectively already were. Given there was an explanation that all the tunnels were connected it seems odd they would not just go through those tunnels rather than risking the struggles and pain the climbing caused them.

As always Strange Matter brings the pain as they always manage to include dark and dangerous scenes that many other series tend to run away from. A particular scene where we see the already battered protagonist fall and break his leg is portrayed rather brutally, showing the limits of a young boy in the perilous situations of the unnatural. Scenes like these make it difficult to not recommend picking up a copy and reading it for yourself.

[John Banks · Rating 2 out of 5]

This one is the worst of them. But it's still better than most of its contemporaries and is leagues better than today's crop of kids horror fiction.

[Alex Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this book at a shop that usually doesn’t have much in terms of kids horror, with the occasional one or two books that I usually already own. When I saw this, I knew I had to read it as my next Strange Matter (after Second Sighting). The cover screamed Jurassic Park with the artstyle of a cursed, forgotten video game. And… the book fucking rules. Taking elements from The Goonies, Legend of the Lost Legend, and many other stories, this book felt like the perfect, finalized version of what I can only make out to be organized chaos. The story is unbelievably fun, with an all-time high in entertainment value. The plotting department (which is now producing a pattern) continues to make these books read like movies, and it utterly works. There’s well-done chase scenes and action (mind you, I don’t like action in books much), insane stakes, and great characters. Why I described this book as organized chaos is, well, just from a basic summary: Trey Porter must work with the living skeleton of Thomas Middleton—a soldier from the Revolutionary War—to fend off reptilian/raptor-like monsters that were once pirates and unlucky humans, all in hopes of protecting a sphere that has the power to grant almost any wish one is desiring when making physical contact with the sphere. Also, the reptiles hate rain, can turn people into them, and there’s a group of bullies that gets involved in all the madness. It’s chaotic but somehow isn’t overwhelming, and I love it. It takes the mindless essence of Legend of the Lost Legend’s antics but adds a wacky plot and some amazing tension. It works, and the final few pages—before chapter thirty-five—are some of the most dire I’ve ever read from kids horror. No less, inventive bangers or bangers nonetheless just have to come with an issue: the ending. *sighs* I saw it coming but was praying for a neater, less “all for nothing” resolution to the madness. Also, it’s dark—but not in the way alike to Cuckoo Clock of Doom where it works. If you know you know. Overall, 9.5/10–same as I gave Carrie earlier today, but I don’t know which of the two I prefer. This book utterly sweeps and it only makes me more excited to read more of this spectacle-driven series.

[Jaliah]

the book sounds a good book