Publishers Weekly
As Johnson's (The Parallel Universe of Liars) riveting novel opens, readers learn that on Halloween night, three teens took a walk in the woods. One ends up reporting to the police that the other two-Emmet and Niki, a troubled brother and sister-attacked a famous but reclusive writer who lived there. The trio ends up naked, and the brother and sister covered in blood, but the writer is not found. Lonely, nerdy Doug, 15, recants his report of the events, but 16-year-old Emmet is put in a psychiatric hospital while his sister receives treatment at home. In Emmet's letters to his psychiatrist, Dr. Rita Milton, he reveals that 14-year-old Niki believes in "animals changing into people, people changing into animals. She calls it transformation." Niki believes she is becoming a cat and Emmet a hawk. But are the siblings really supernatural, or are they just mentally ill victims of incest? And what really happened that night in the woods? The author plants many seeds, even implicating the psychiatrist (the writer was her patient; the siblings' father, a journalist who abandoned the family, interviewed her). Through Emmet and Doug's letters to Dr. Milton, a story Niki wrote, and clippings from a local newspaper, readers try to piece together the mystery. The remote woods setting provides a fittingly creepy setting. The conflicting versions plus the fact that, even in the end, the truth remains unclear may trouble readers. Overall, mature readers will be drawn into-and chilled by-this suspenseful novel. Ages 12-up. (Oct.) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
School Library Journal
Gr 9 Up-Vaguely reminiscent of The Blair Witch Project, Johnson's novel explores memory, fear, and imagination. Niki, her brother Emmet, and their friend Doug narrate the somewhat fantastical story via journal entries, e-mails, and newspaper clippings. What REALLY happened on Halloween night in the woods when all three teens awakened to find themselves naked and bloody? As the plot disjointedly unfolds, readers gradually learn that the siblings' father left the family two years earlier, supposedly with his mistress. When their mother begins dating the famous, secretive, and somewhat sinister author Nicholas Slanger, he disappears as well. Puzzle pieces begin to fall into place as readers realize that Emmet has since been institutionalized and Niki claims that she is able to transform into a cat, while her brother can turn into a hawk. They both have strange dreams of blood and hunting, but what is the reality? Whose story is reliable when even Doug, Emmet's psychiatrist, and Slanger seemed to turn into animals that fateful night? There are no absolute answers in this powerful and disturbing blend of fantasy/mystery/study of mental illness. Teens will either love it or hate it, but they won't forget it.-Susan Riley, Mount Kisco Public Library, NY Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
Letters, e-mails, newspaper articles, and short-story excerpts piece together a haunting tale of three teens coping with loss and grief. Hard-edged Niki copes with her father's abandonment by believing she and her brother, Emmet, have the power to transform into animals. Classmate Doug sympathizes, and is drawn to the pair as he struggles with his own mother's recent death. After a disturbing incident Halloween night involving the three teens and enigmatic fantasy-writer Nicholas Slanger, Slanger mysteriously disappears and Emmet is inexplicably institutionalized. Rumors that Emmet and Niki have an incestuous relationship begin to circulate; some speculate that their strange, animal-like behavior is a means to escape their own shame. While Doug vehemently denies this possibility, Niki's short-story excerpts seem to support the theory. Emmet, however, credits Niki with a vivid imagination and supposes that her writings are symptomatic of their father's betrayal. The truth is uncertain, creating a memorable read that allows fantasy, mystery, and realistic fiction fans alike to examine the power of love and its connection to vulnerability, loss, and fear. (Fiction. YA)
