For fans of Pseudonymous Bosch, Coraline, and Septimus Heap comes the first book in the award-winning, New York Times bestselling Books of Elsewhere series.
This house is keeping secrets . . .
When eleven-year-old Olive and her parents move into the crumbling mansion on Linden Street and find it filled with mysterious paintings, Olive knows the place is creepy—but it isn’t until she encounters its three talking cats that she realizes there’s something darkly magical afoot. Then Olive finds a pair of antique spectacles in a dusty drawer and discovers the most peculiar thing yet: She can travel inside the house’s spooky paintings to a world that’s strangely quiet . . . and eerily sinister. But in entering Elsewhere, Olive has been ensnared in a mystery darker and more dangerous than she could have imagined, confronting a power that wants to be rid of her by any means necessary. With only the cats and an unusual boy she meets in Elsewhere on her side, it’s up to Olive to save the house from the shadows, before the lights go out for good.
The Shadows drops readers straight into a deliciously creepy story where the reclusive owner of a mysterious mansion has died and the Dunwoodys move in, unaware of all the secrets and danger that the old house possesses. Things start happening right away, as Olive begins exploring her new home, and surprises continue to appear in every chapter. Readers are introduced to a secondary magical world of paintings, where can things move and yet always stay the same, as well as to a cast of endearing characters—and a few terrible villains. The book is the perfect mixture of dark and quirky, making it spine-tingling but not so scary readers will have trouble sleeping or walking through their own dark homes.
Olive eventually wraps up most of the problems of the mansion, leaving the story satisfyingly complete. There are just enough loose ends to entice readers onto the next book, but continuing the series is unnecessary for those who enjoy standalones. Personally, I think Olive and her friends (whom you’ll have to read The Shadows to meet!) are more than enough reason to keep reading.
Reading updates
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Started reading
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18 May, 2012:
Finished reading
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18 May, 2012:
Reviewed