Shadow Walkers

by Nina Romberg

A group of runaway children seeks shelter in an abandoned mental hospital, where they form a secret club to protect the innocent, but the possessed building tranforms the children into beasts, bringing out their darkest instincts. Original.

Genres: Horror

302 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 1993

Reviews

[Jack Tripper · Rating 3 out of 5]

[Here's a better image of the 1993 Pinnacle mass-market. Cover artist unknown, alas.]

The setup here was what intrigued me: a bunch of runaway kids decide to live in a secret, abandoned old mental institute deep in the woods, vowing to protect each other and be a family. Only, the hospital may not be quite as safe they'd thought. An evil presence there is turning them against one another, and it's up to 11 year-old Sadie to figure out how to save them without leaving and finding help, as that would result in them all being separated and placed into foster homes.

This reads very much like a young adult novel, and considering the burgeoning YA horror scene of the early 90s, I'm surprised it wasn't marketed as such. I nearly set it down after a couple chapters, but once I got into the proper mindset, it was a pretty fun read. There were a few parts where author Nina Romberg deals with social issues -- especially sexism -- in a way that was a little too on-the-nose for me, but it didn't really suck me out of the story. The plot went in an entirely different direction than I expected from a "haunted insane asylum" tale, and it always kept moving.

This appears to be somewhat of a side-sequel to Romberg's earlier The Spirit Stalker, as there are repeated references to earlier events that line up with that book's back cover synopsis, but there's no need to read them in order. While this one wasn't quite the hidden gem I was hoping for, it's still a fast, entertaining read, with several tense (though not "scary") moments and a main character I empathized with and rooted for despite the simplistic writing-style.

Decent entry-level horror, but veterans of the genre might want to proceed with caution.

[Wayne · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked this book up because I saw it was published by Pinnacle books. Them and Zebra, in my opinion are two of the best for horror and action novels. Unfortunately for me, this one is an exception to that rule. Very little to speak of here. Two stars is being nice on my part.

One of the problems with this is that the author never breaks any new ground. It sets itself up fast, then its girls vs. boys. No suspense. No action. Just boring pot boiling. Also, there is so much retreading of dialog that it gets tiresome. Every other page, it seems, the author tells us that the girls are crying or holding back tears. Their eyes are wet with tears. They were holding back tears. Tears were flowing. Get the picture? Then, all we hear on every other page is Wonder Woman. Thats all they talk about. Amazons. Wonder Woman again and again. Maybe I should change my rating to one star. Not good.

[Kyle Brooky · Rating 2 out of 5]

Orphans living in an abandoned asylum begin to be possessed by an ancient evil. Sounds like an awesome premise right?

Too bad Nina Romberg goes nowhere with this. After a long but well done setup where we learn our characters and setting it suddenly becomes "the boys are bad, the girls are good" for the rest of the book. That's it. There is only some slight talk of a shadow walker by an old woman who briefly explains what made them evil. Other than that we just get the boys machismo and the girls trying to rebel. Rinse, repeat. No monsters in the woods as the cover would have you believe.