Review of The Summoning

My review of The Summoning by Kelley Armstrong is based on a hardcover copy of the book that I borrowed from my local library. The following review is my honest opinion of the work.

Goodreads Summary: "After years of frequent moves following her mother’s death, Chloe Saunders’s life is finally settling down. She is attending art school, pursuing her dreams of becoming a director, making friends, meeting boys. Her biggest concern is that she’s not developing as fast as her friends are. But when puberty does hit, it brings more than hormone surges. Chloe starts seeing ghosts–everywhere, demanding her attention. After she suffers a breakdown, her devoted aunt Lauren gets her into a highly recommended group home.

At first, Lyle House seems a pretty okay place, except for Chloe’s small problem of fearing she might be facing a lifetime of mental illness. But as she gradually gets to know the other kids at the home–charming Simon and his ominous, unsmiling brother Derek, obnoxious Tori, and Rae, who has a “thing” for fire–Chloe begins to realize that there is something that binds them all together, and it isn’t your usual “problem kid” behaviour. And together they discover that Lyle House is not your usual group home either…

The Summoning starts off with a bang. I loved the first line. I was immediately drawn into the story and had to know more about what was going on. The story isn't all action though as it's opening would have you believe, in fact at times it seemed rather on the slow side.

The heroine is Chloe Saunders, a rich kid who wants nothing more than to grow up normal and become a screenwriter and/or director. I liked her well enough though I never completely was able to slip into her shoes. In fact I found myself enjoying the secondary girls a bit more than her.

Simon was a geek. He seemed to me like an outcast and I was constantly wondering why Tori [the popular girl of this little story] was drawn to him. This is one of those cases of the characters that form in my mind not quite matching up to the ones in the story. On the other hand I really enjoyed his brooding brother. Which after you guys read this book, which you really should do, I'm sure you'll figure out why. So hard not to give away spoilers!

What really came on strong for me was the story itself. No, the plot wasn't incredibly fast-moving as in a lot of young adult novels but it had a current that just swept you right into it. The ultimate ghost story, literally. There were loads of plot twists; some of them I figured out fairly quickly, others I expected, and then out of nowhere some of them totally threw me for a loop.

I'm giving The Summoning by Kelley Armstrong a three out of five stars review. All in all I'm really glad that I was given the advice to put the sequel on hold at the library right away because I will be wanting to read it soon.