By: A.J. Gnuse
Synopsis
From the book dust jacket:
Elise knows every inch of the house. She knows which boards will creak. She knows where the gaps are in the walls. She knows which parts can take her in, hide her away. It’s home, after all. The home her parents made for her, before they were taken from her in a car crash. And home is where you stay, no matter what.
Eddie is a teenager trying to forget about the girl he sometimes sees out of the corner of his eye. But when his hotheaded older brother senses her, too, they are faced with the question of how to get rid of someone they aren’t sure even exists. And as they try to cast her out, they unwittingly bring an unexpected and far more real threat to their doorsteps.
Written with grace and enormous heart, Girl in the Walls is a novel about carrying on through grief, forging unconventional friendships, and realizing, little by little, that we don’t need to fear what we do not understand.
My Thoughts
Paranormal is not usually something I read, but this one sounded really interesting. Since I don’t read scary novels, I was a little apprehensive when I started this one. No need. It most assuredly was not scary at all. From the beginning I assumed Elise was a ghost. Then, when it began to sound like she wasn’t, I was very intrigued and interested in how it was going to play out. I don’t feel it played out well. For one thing, the idea of a young girl living undetected in the walls of someone’s home was just too unbelievable. I have no problem setting aside a bit of reality for the sake of a plot point, but this was the entire plot and just a little too much for me to ignore. Just too unbelievable. Then the story takes a dark turn when the hunter enters the picture. Again, just too unbelievable. Also, it did not make sense as to why the hunter was so obsessed with catching Elise. His motives are never fully explored and this definitely could have used some kind of explanation. The ending was unsatisfactory as well. I have a hard time imagining anyone would just stand there looking at the Lego figure instead of trying to catch up to the person that left it for them, especially knowing that person had lived in the walls of your home. For me, this book was rather disappointing. Maybe I need to look deeper. I don’t know. Did you get something from it that I missed?