Thursday 28 April 2016

Review: HEX by Thomas Olde Heuvelt

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The incredible, horrifying thriller from Thomas Olde Heuveult, the Hugo award-winning author of 'The Day The World Turned Upside Down', perfect for fans of Neil Gaiman, Adam Nevill and Stephen King.

Whoever is born here, is doomed to stay until death. Whoever comes to stay, never leaves.

Welcome to Black Spring, the seemingly picturesque Hudson Valley town haunted by the Black Rock Witch, a seventeenth-century woman whose eyes and mouth are sewn shut. Blind and silenced, she walks the streets and enters homes at will. She stands next to children's beds for nights on end. So accustomed to her have the townsfolk become that they often forget she's there. Or what a threat she poses. Because if the stitches are ever cut open, the story goes, the whole town will die.

The curse must not be allowed to spread. The elders of Black Spring have used high-tech surveillance to quarantine the town. Frustrated with being kept in lockdown, the town's teenagers decide to break the strict regulations and go viral with the haunting. But, in so doing, they send the town spiraling into a dark nightmare.
 



Stories like these are what nightmares are made of!! No seriously! This book has given me nightmares. Wow. Many years back I used to be obsessed with Stephen King books, I would literally binge read those. But I haven't touched scary books for some time. There is one that has always stuck with me and that's Pet Cemetery, I tell you what, Hex is like Pet Cemetery on crack cocaine. And I mean that as an absolute compliment. Scary movies have gone down the hill for many years, for some reason gore and blood seem to be the theme of most, while I don't think this is enough. You need a story line that will get to your head and refuses to let you go. Hex does just that.

Hex is the story of Black Spring, a small town with a big secret. For many centuries a witch is haunting the town and all its people. She can appear anywhere and just stands there for long period of times. Her eyes and mouth have been sewn shut, which is possible the only reason she cant harm anyone. The town has many rules, to keep their secret, but the main one is to never open her eyes and mouth. To keep track of the witch they even have their own app, hex, where sightings are always posted immediately. And they have cameras all over town to never loose her out of sight.

A group of young lads want things to change, they are fed up with being trapped in the town and keeping the witch secret. Together they make a plan to out the witch and the town. However nobody expected for things to suddenly change dramatically. While the witch has her patterns that she always follows, for the first time ever those change and with it so does everything and everyone else.

This book is incredible. Its  scary and chilling and it gets under your skin. I cant believe it even made me dream of this witch. I can already feel it clinging to me and I know I wont be rid of it for some time. It was impossible to put down, it made my skin crawl. What an incredible author, one that has managed to convince me to go back to a genre I haven't read in some time. If there is more books out there as good as this one, I need to find them.

Thank you to Bookbridgr and Hodder & Stoughton for my copy in exchange for my honest review.

Hex is out today and I really think you need a copy!



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