Disappearance at Devil's Rock

Sometimes the star system just doesn't cut it. This book is excellent. Would I recommend it? It depends. This is a beautifully written novel about the most horrifying thing a parent could think about. It's so tense that I had to put it down and read something else at night. I felt so strongly for Elizabeth (actually saw through Elizabeth's eyes many chapters). It hurt to read this. It wasn't at all what I expected after reading and loving [b:A Head Full of Ghosts 23019294 A Head Full of Ghosts Paul Tremblay https://d2arxad8u2l0g7.cloudfront.net/books/1415678368s/23019294.jpg 42563937]. I'm not sure I would have read it if someone described it to me. I just picked it up because Tremblay wrote it. This punched me in the gut, “The urge to be the one who disappears suddenly becomes a compulsion. Maybe the people who go away are the ones who are not afraid, not sad, and not alone. Maybe there's a place where they gather and say things like ‘What is to be done with all the silly people we left behind?'“This frantic, tense story is peppered with supernatural (maybe) elements that may be the result of extreme stress. The story gets scarier and scarier and some of the imagery, while not bloody, is not for the cowardly. The story did not go where I expected it to go and lingered on things I am used to a writer glossing over. I found myself losing patience with it every once in a while. Tremblay, for example, completely nails how pre-teen boys speak to one another. It's completely realistic and not something I seek out to listen to. Because I was forced to I felt I suffered under it a bit. This is me pushing past the urge to constantly read stories about people I feel I can relate to and instead reading stories about people. Disappearance at Devil's Rock is not a horror novel, and I think it's important to say it because a reader looking to read one will be disappointed. It is a novel about a horrific situation. With supernatural elements.