Dispirited

I've been following Luisa Perkins for quite a while...I don't recall exactly since when but I believe a mutual blogging friend introduced us to each other.  Once she asked me a question about a Dutch word which she needed for her novel.   NaNoWriMo was still hugely popular back then so half of the bloggers claimed to be writing novels, so I wasn't too impressed.   I enjoyed helping though and e-mailed her an invented word and its background & context in Dutch. But then I got curious and I googled her....ha, Luisa M Perkins really is a published author whose books you can buy.  Awesome!

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[fast forward multiple years]

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Luisa posted early this year enthousiastically that some publications were planned:  among others 'Dispirited'. When I complimented her on the stunning cover picture, I found out this was in fact the book I had once helped searching a word for. And a few weeks later I found it in my mail.  Aaaaaah isn't that cool!  She's such a sweetheart.

Even bigger surprise....Look inside...look! That's me.    Smiley indeed.

So , then I had to find out quickly what the book was about and hope that I'd like it.  Seriously, it'd be a bit awkward to be acknowledged in a book that I disliked.

"Dispirited" is categorized as dark young adult literature and deals with a little boy that has somehow found the skill to leave its body but can't return because his body has been invaded in the mean time. "Cute idea" , was my first opinion, that should keep me entertained .  I didn't really expect more than a nice entertaining story.

I was rather surprised about the thrilling plot full of dark fantasy elements that managed to drag me in.   As adult reading "young adult" literature, I felt nevertheless creeped out by the villain and was crossing my fingers for the characthers well-being.  Certainly the main characters are teenagers, experiencing school struggles, the difficulties of a newly composed family, first love, etc... These are things that are not part of my world (anymore) and some of their challenges (drugs & porn) were only pointed to implicitly as not to offend any reader. But this setting didn't stop me getting dragged into the fantasy story and find myself walking with Cathy through Kashkawan struggling to find a solution for the events.

Cathy, whose mother just got remaried and whose family moved, meets the little boy Blake and he takes her to a historic mansion in the village. But there's something strange about Blake and the house isn't what it seems to be either. Can she share this with her stepbrother who acts stranger each day or should she tell her new friend Rich?  Who can help when she's overwhelmed with all the events that she cannot grasp herself?


If you want to find out yourself and get dragged in a thrilling fantasy story , I'm happy to borrow the book, but even better: you can buy it here :)