While this post is up much later than I had originally planned (yay technological difficulties!), I am thrilled to be today’s tour stop for The Shadow Keepers by Marisa Noelle.
The Shadow Keepers
Author: Marisa Noelle
Publication Date: 30 July 2019
Genre: YA Fantasy/Horror
Publisher: Magnolia Press
Sixteen-year-old Georgia Boone has seen the shadow creatures in mirrors and other reflective surfaces since she was six-years-old. But no one–not even her brother, the person she’s closest to in the entire world–believes her. She is all alone in the hellish world where crow-like creatures hunt her everywhere she goes
When an afternoon of shopping ends in violence and blood, Georgia is sent to the UK’s most prestigious mental health hospital: Brookwood Hospital. There, she’s forced to face her fears and answer the question:
Are the shadows real, or is this all in her head?
At Brookwood, the shadow creatures are more present than ever. Each day they grow stronger. With the help of a mysterious boy who lives inside the mirror world, she might be able to prove that she’s not hallucinating and stop the shadows from destroying the human world.
Whew boy! Do you remember as a kid when you used to sit around with your friends and tell each other urban myths and try to scare the living hell out of each other? Well the one that always got me as a kid was Bloody Mary. To this day, mirrors give the creeps when I look at them in the middle of the night when I’m home alone. Marisa was able to take all of those fears of mirrors to the next level with the monsters that she created.
Following an accident that left a girl permanently scarred, Georgia’s mother and stepfather send her to a group home that is dedicated to mental rehabilitation for 90 days to work on her fear of mirrors. Little do they know that Georgia isn’t afraid of mirrors. She’s terrified of what lives in the mirrors…the monsters in the shadows.
While in the mental institution, Georgia begins to trust her roommates June and Liz, and she realizes that she needs the two of them to to survive the shadows as well as uncover the secrets that lie in the group home. Every time the girls get closer to the truth, more and more secrets are unveiled.
I loved the light that Marisa shed on mental health as a whole in this book. Some of the girls suffer from mania (such as June) and OCD, while others have more debilitating diseases such as ‘helmet Annie’ who repeatedly runs into a wall at full force. I never felt that these girls were added to the plot just to “check a box” or have their illnesses dictate their entire lives. Rather, I thought that highlighting these different illnesses really highlighted the diversity of the girls in the home.
Overall, if you love a quick read packed with twists and turns that are dripping in atmospheric suspense then definitely pick up this book. I don’t suggest reading this one at night and then looking into mirrors afterwards, but hey, if you want to live life on the edge, who am I to tell you otherwise.
Thank you to the author and Magnolia Press for providing an eARC. This did not influence my review. All opinions are my own.
Pre-order your copy of The Shadow Keepers here!
Marisa Noelle is the writer of middle grade & young adult novels in the genres of science-fiction, fantasy & mental health. The Shadow Keepers is her first novel. The Unadjusteds is due outin November 2019 & The Mermaid Chronicles – Secrets of the Deep at the end of 2019. When she’s not writing or reading or watching movies, she enjoys swimming. In the pool she likes to imagine she could be a mermaid and become part of some of her make-believe words. Despite being an avid bookworm from the time she could hold a book, being an author came as a bit of a surprise to her as she was a bit of a science geek at school. She lives in Woking, UK with her husband and three children.
The Reading Chemist 