Reviews for Asylum

Horn Book
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Dan and the other students in his summer college prep program are being housed in a former insane asylum. Ghostly clues lead Dan to suspect that the spirit of a long-ago serial-killer patient is murdering again. Some plot twists strain belief, but brief chapters with plenty of cliffhangers keep pages turning. Appropriately unsettling stock photographs are integrated into the narrative. (c) Copyright 2014. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.


School Library Journal
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Gr 9 Up-Dan is thrilled to be spending the summer before his senior year at the New Hampshire College Prep program, where he'll have a chance to meet other studious teenagers. He doesn't mind that his dorm, Brookline, was once an asylum for the criminally insane. In fact, Dan is curious about the institution's history and begins exploring Brookline's old passageways at night. At first, Dan and his best friends at NHCP, Abby and Jordan, think it's fun to sneak around in the dark and look at old patient records, but soon the things they find begin to frighten them. Dan starts receiving ominous notes, and he is plagued by nightmares in which he sees Brookline as if he were really there, all those years ago. When people start dying, Dan is convinced that the killer's identity is buried in his dorm's darkest history and that his own strange connection to the institution may be the key to stopping the murders. Eerie black-and-white pictures throughout the book add to the creep factor of this story, but unfortunately many images are redundant photographs of Dan's notes, while others seem unrelated to the text. The plot drives forward too quickly, with some circumstances and events feeling forced. Dan meets Abby and Jordan on his first day, for instance, and within hours they carry on with the rapport of lifelong friends. Mystery lovers will be disappointed with the lack of answers and explanations here. Hand this one to horror fans who don't mind a few loose ends.-Liz Overberg, Darlington School, Rome, GA (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.


Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Roux's first teen novel uses horror staples--spooky corridors, tight-lipped townspeople and convenient coincidences--to predictable but page-turning effect. New Hampshire College Prep is a haven for gifted students: a place where kids actually want to do their homework. Its Brookline dorm is also a former psychiatric hospital whose past remains prominent not only in town, but in its own abandoned wings. Dan, anxious and awkward, is fascinated by its most infamous inpatient: a serial killer dubbed the Sculptor. His classmates have their own troubles; Abby struggles with family tensions, and Jordan's parents reject his sexuality. When they find old patient records and receive ghostly emails, they begin an investigation that ends in murder. The mock photo illustrations are eerie and occasionally disturbing, depicting the callous treatment methods of Brookline's time. A hollow-eyed, scarred child begs for her own story, as do notes from a surgeon convinced he can eradicate insanity. In contrast, the teens' back stories are more plot devices and heavy foreshadowing than character development, but their friendship is convincingly volatile. Real and ghostly elements mix clumsily and muddle the ending somewhat, but the pictures linger--a tighter focus on the photos' subjects could have made a truly haunting story. Fans of "found footage" horror will enjoy this familiar but visually creepy take on the haunted-institution setting. (Suspense. 14-18)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.


Book list
From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.

Sixteen-year-old Dan Crawford is thrilled to be attending the summer program for gifted students at New Hampshire College, but he's shocked to find that he's been housed in a dorm that was formerly an asylum for the criminally insane. Although Dan's roommate is a bit odd, he makes good friends with attractive, spunky Abby and acerbic Jordan, and together the three investigate things that clearly should be left alone, including the forbidden areas of the building, to which Dan finds himself irresistibly drawn. Roux's cinematic story includes genuinely creepy black-and-white found photographs of decaying abandoned asylums as well as unsettling drawings and altered photographs. The plentiful illustrations both advance the story line and immeasurably contribute to the spooky atmosphere. With its abundant jump scares, horror readers and fans of the TV show American Horror Story will delight in the fast-paced (if predictable) plot. Although it feels a little forced, the diversity among the characters (Asian, Latina, gay, rich, poor, rural, and urban) is a nice touch. Short sentences and many cliff-hangers will appeal to reluctant readers.--Carton, Debbie Copyright 2010 Booklist

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