Title: Slumber PartyAuthor: Christopher Pike
Publisher: Point
Release: September 26, 1985*
Source: Bought
Buy: (RJ Julia | Point)
A ski trip and reunion for six girls becomes sinister when strange events occur. It was a perfect weekend ... for murder. Lara thought the ski trip would be a blast. The old gang was getting together for the first time in years. But then there's a very unexpected visitor.
I started Slumber
Party the day I got it. Not because it sounded particularly fantastic
itself, but because I’ve read one other book by Christopher Pike, and wanted to
see how much his writing had changed since his debut, Slumber Party. Also, Slumber
Party is super short, so it wouldn’t take too much time away from me.
The story itself kept me guessing the entire time, and even
though I guessed some of the major revelations, I was surprised when everything
was revealed in the end. Slumber Party
really is a thriller, and it certainly was a thrill to read. It’s not so much
that it is an amazing story, but it was fast paced and entertaining, which was
what I was looking for.
Christopher Pike’s writing certainly has changed over the
years. Slumber Party lacked the great
writing that Pike’s newer novels have, and I was really unimpressed by the
writing in Slumber Party. The dialog
is way off, and a lot of the situations presented were too out there for it to
be realistic. Also, there were a few times where I was confused as to what was
going on in the story while reading. For such a short book, that is not good.
One thing Pike does know how to do, however, is build suspense.
The characters in Slumber
Party were really the worst thing about this book. None of them were
relatable, and their personalities just seemed so unreal. Oh, and something
that really bothered me was that they all
hated each other! I don’t know about you, but I’m not one to go spend a
weekend alone with five people I hate. But hey, maybe that’s just me.
If you’re looking for a super short read to take your mind
off of things, Slumber Party will
probably do just that. However, if you want a solid book with great writing,
plot, and characters, hold off on reading this one.
* I read Slumber Party in To Die For, a bindup of two Christopher Pike novels, published on September 1, 2010.
I just reread Slumber Party! I read it for the first time when I was probably ten or eleven and was going through a big Christopher Pike phase, so it was fun to revisit. (Sidenote: poeple worry about the content of YA NOW?? When I was young, all the books were about teens having sex and murdering each other!). I enjoyed it mostly for the nostalgia trip and because it's a quick little bit of fun, but you're right that it's not terribly well-written.
ReplyDeleteI did enjoy the inserted references to cell phones and why they weren't working, because cell phones barely existed when I first read the book but anyone reading it for the first time now would wonder why these kids wouldn't just call the police. It must be a lot harder to write horror stories like this nowadays than it was in the early 90s!