19 April 2015

Supervision (ARC Review)

Supervision | Alison Stine
Published by: HarperVoyager, April 9th 2015
Genre: YA, Paranormal, Gothic, Ghosts
Pages: 400
Format: Ebook
Source: HarperVoyager, via Netgalley

Something is wrong with Esmé. 

Kicked out of school in New York, she's sent to live with her grandmother in a small Appalachian town. But something is wrong with the grandmother Ez hasn't seen for years; she leaves at midnight, carrying a big black bag. Something is wrong with her grandmother's house, a decrepit mansion full of stray cats, stairs that lead to nowhere, beds that unmake themselves. Something is wrong in the town where a kid disappears every year, where a whistle sounds at night but no train arrives. 

And something is wrong with the friendly neighbor Ez's age with black curls and blue eyes: He's dead.




ummed and ahhed about Supervision for a few days before I eventually went ahead and requested a galley. Those days, I was being dumb, because this book has found a permanent place on the shelf of my heart (that's a thing now.)

Supervision started off a bit weird. I didn't like Esme, mainly because she acted really stupidly in venturing into a subway train tunnel because she saw a bit of graffiti. This is explained later in the book, so I shouldn't have judged so harshly. Once I got into this book, with the ghosts (who are sweethearts) and the setting (which is so fricking vivid) I adored it. It's just such an absorbing story, and manages to easily combine ghost story, murder mystery, and self-discovery. I loved the journey Supervision took me on, and Esme was such a good character when I finally got to understand her.

I am so glad I read this book. There are books where you can't say everything is perfect, you know there are maybe things wrong with it, but you get rose-tinted vision and fall headfirst into love with it. Supervision was like that for me. If you like adorable ghosts (A la Noah Czerny) and perfectly written settings, I can't recommend this book enough.

A bonus note: The MC is Chinese-American. And Invisible - I can't believe I forgot to mention she's invisible.

Characters ★
Setting/world building ★
Writing ★★

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