L'auberge maudite

by Linda Cargill

Sharon's party should have been perfect. The event of the year. After all, it was being held in the indoor/outdoor pool at her mother's exclusive new hotel. It was definitely a party any senior would love to be invited to.

Genres: Young Adult, Horror, Thriller

224 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Linda Cargill likes to pack up her minivan and tour the country every summer. She explores locales with ghostly or supernatural connections. She listens to local legends and lore. She investigates mysteries. Then she shares her findings with her readers in each new young adult suspense novel. Once in awhile she even pens an historical! All her books are pictured on her website http://www.edwardwarethrillers.org. She lives with her husband, Gary, her son, Kenny, her Abyssinian cat, Putlitz, and her Labrador Retriever, Rommel .Lately she's been putting her pen to the Edward Ware Thriller Series. The first three volumes are now out: Key to Lawrence Special Edition, 1935 Plot, and Captive at the Berghof part 1.

Reviews

[Alex (The Bookubus) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pool parties, missing girls, a creepy doll, a love triangle and maybe ghosts? One of the most ridiculous and nonsensical books I’ve ever read but somehow still quite entertaining!

[Michael · Rating 1 out of 5]

Schew! Whatta stinker! One-dimensional characters sprinkled onto a hackneyed plot and a narrative that skidded, skated, and crashed into every brick wall available. This Point thriller was released during the latter end of Scholastic’s heyday of thrillers/horror titles and it certainly shows. And the killer?...yes, even Ray Charles saw that coming.

[Autumn Ketchum · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was…something. I was expecting something very different based off the cover and the synopsis. What we got was a very messy, drawn out story with lots of red herrings (although it’s pretty clear who the villain is). Too many characters, too much filler, not enough thriller. It was entertaining, at the very least.

[Kristin · Rating 1 out of 5]

Agree with the reviewer who said the “plot skidded and skated into a brick wall.” Needlessly complicated there were a lot of loose ends that went nowhere. The writing left something to be desired: a lot of short sentences with subplots that abruptly ended. Not very summery. I wanted this to be more like the movie Swimfan and the pool was not utilized nearly enough especially for a kill scene. Drowning anyone? And the romance ugh.

[Kasey Loftis · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was okay. It was not as great as I was hoping for it to be. It seemed to be a little difficult to find, so I was reallt expecting a great book once I did find it. It was good, but not worth the trouble I went through to find it.

[Erica Leigh · Rating 2 out of 5]

If I have to read one more line about IreneSueAngelVicki again, I’m going to scream.

- I know it’s YA, but the writing felt juvenile/overly simplistic
- There are THREE pool parties and it felt like the author glossed over the first two and skipped over a lot of the actual action
- Way too many characters (indistinguishable from one another 🤪) with names compulsively grouped together. What a weird/annoying writing choice; made me twitch every single time I saw a mention of IreneSueAngelVicki
- An overly convoluted plot without a real storyline

Rounded up for the creepy doll + cool hotel setting + floaty pool head on the cover

[Alice · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pool Party by Linda Cargill is a fantastic story. What would you do if you were accused of something you didn't do? And the only person who can help you is your ex boyfriend who is also accused?

I loved how the police kept the main character and her boyfriend a part. It just added this cool suspense and little plot in the overall story.

I didn't care much for the other teenagers in this book. They were acting weird. This is an old book, written in the 90s and has that 90s feel to it.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bonkers.

I read this for our podcast Teenage Scream, which dissects the best (and worst) of 90s Teen Horror.

https://soundcloud.com/teenagescream

[✿ℎazℯℓ - thℯ ℛock Cℎick ℱairy✿ · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was such a trip! I honestly didn't know who the culprit was until the last few pages!
It's good to know that more of these vintage horror/thriller books can still surprise me. :)

[Paul Kim · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story's plot was quite interesting and the setting and scares did make the book enjoyable to read. However, the book sometimes detracts itself from the haunted hotel to the main characters having trouble adjusting their social lives which was uninteresting that I just want to leaf through the pages till the mention of the hotel occurs. It doesn't make the book bad as it's only part of it.

I could recommend the book if you're up to haunted location plot with an okay mystery for young adult readers.

[Stacy Simpson · Rating 1 out of 5]

Another crappy book lol. I wish that they would actually write female girls with a spine i mean jeez😞

[Kirsty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this for Teenage Scream podcast (lovingly dissecting the best and worst of 90s teen horror)

https://soundcloud.com/teenagescream

[Paula Brandon · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sharon Jones has returned to her hometown after a year away and plans to throw a party so that everyone can get to know her again. However, invitations are delivered before Sharon has sent any out, and they have gone to people she didn't intend to invite! Then the pool party happens, at which three high school girls vanish. Sharon and her ex-boyfriend, Dan, somehow become the prime suspects and must try to figure out what is behind the mysterious events.

This is one of the very few remaining Point Thriller books that I have not read yet. This came out in 1996, right at the tail-end of the 90s YA horror boom. By that stage, I had moved on to "stronger" stuff like Mary Higgins Clark (lol) so this was never on my radar back in the day. Unfortunately, like many other late-stage Point entries such as Dance Of Death, Krazy 4 U, Homecoming Queen and Sweet Sixteen this is too mild and underwhelming compared with the books from the line's heyday.

At first, there was some intrigue. I wasn't sure what direction the book was headed in. But for most of the reading time, it just didn't feel like all that much was happening, despite the author throwing in a possible haunting, a creepy doll and an island legend. Most of it is Sharon going, "Do I like Phil or do I like Dan?" while she and Dan are followed around by the police despite the book, and most of the characters within it, making it clear that Sharon and Dan couldn't have been behind the girls' disappearance. Sharon isn't a very interesting or compelling heroine. Things just happen to her and she doesn't move the story forward at all - everybody else around her is.

By the end there were too many inconsistencies and wearisome tropes:



The aforementioned police suspecting Sharon and Dan. There were multiple witnesses able to say that they had no opportunity to commit the crime. Dan wasn't gone for long enough and Sharon never left the party.

Irene is revealed to be an undercover cop. Why she's enrolling in high school when she's apparently on a holiday is not clear. Most ridiculous of all is the fact that she organised the mysterious party at the beginning of the book because Sharon was a suspect. A suspect of what???? No crimes had been committed at that point!

The author throws in a turn-of-the-century local legend almost identical to what was found in her book Hang Loose.

The identity of the antagonist is glaringly obvious. Phil happily hands over a handy explanation for how he did everything whenever Sharon asks a question instead of gagging and tying her up like a normal criminal. The motive for kidnapping and killing four girls is alarmingly thin.

Sharon's own parents seem to think she's guilty. What shitty parents!

Is-it-or-isn't-supernatural malarkey, particularly with the doll. Why didn't she just throw the fucking thing in the trash? Either make your story supernatural or not. Don't play coyly with it. (That's a personal preference for me, however.)



It's a passable story. Not the worst Point Thriller out there. But there's not a lot really going on.

[August Grey · Rating 3 out of 5]

I did read this in my teens, but couldn’t quite remember how it ended. This is a YA horror from the ‘90s and they really were a specific kind at the time. There was this particular vibe, energy, and writing style they all had in common and teenage me was really into it.
Adult me… maybe not so much.
There’s not a whole lot to say about this book, but categorising it as “horror” feels questionable. There’s nothing horror about it. It’s a bit spooky to begin with, but in more of a thriller way, and then it just… drops off. Somewhere in the middle it switches away from thriller and heads into mystery, but never horror.

[Jack Reacts · Rating 3 out of 5]

Full review at: https://www.jackreacts.com.au/post/po...
Snippet: OK, this was wild and I'm not sure how I feel about it. The plot was a bit all over the place, with too many things going on – Dan innocent or guilty; the potential ghost; the doll; girls going missing; the Irene and pact girls situation, Phil, etc. There were just too many ideas that weren't fully realised. In saying that, it wasn't completely horrible.

Check out my full review linked up top for an in-depth recap :)

[Tehnehn Kaijaah Edwards · Rating 3 out of 5]

started off really good and then gradually got confusing. it seemed to me she got bored and just started writing whatever. It was ambitious but she tried t0 do like 8 different twists. Was just really odd how it went off the rails.

[Dimity Hubbub · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 for on-its-own-as-a-book-ness but FIVE for Point Horror-ness. So ridiculous I laughed out loud a few times.

[L · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some ridiculous stuff, as always with Point Horror, but some genuinely creepy bits and a fun backstory.

[Alex · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is another one of those Point Horror books I remember LOVING, but upon re-reading it.... man this was a mess.

[Cara · Rating 1 out of 5]

I would give this 0 stars if I could.

This was probably one of the worst books I've ever read. Bad writing, bad dialogue, bad plot, bad pacing. The whole thing was terrible. Not recommended for readers of any age.

[Carra · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read just for the nostalgia of it - that will teach me. These books are better left in childhood.