Tighter by Adele Griffin

SYNOPSIS:When 17-year-old Jamie arrives on the idyllic New England island of Little Bly to work as a summer au pair, she is stunned to learn of the horror that precedes her. Seeking the truth surrounding a young couple's tragic deaths, Jamie discovers that she herself looks shockingly like the dead girl—and that she has a disturbing ability to sense the two ghosts. Why is Jamie's connection to the couple so intense? What really happened last summer at Little Bly? As the secrets of the house wrap tighter and tighter around her, Jamie must navigate the increasingly blurred divide between the worlds of the living and the dead.

Brilliantly plotted, with startling twists, here is a thrilling page-turner from the award-winning Adele Griffin.

MY REVIEW:Tighter is supposed to be a loosely based on The Turn of the Screw by Henry James.Well I have not read it and I still have no idea about the storyline of that book but I liked Tighter a lot.It has a complex plot and none of the silliness that one finds in a young adult book nowadays.The book is absolutely thrilling and engrossing.It keeps you on tenterhooks and you keep on wondering what will happen next.The ending of the book is shocking.The way the paranormal activities are dealt with in this book is amazing.Eerie,creepy and exciting at the same time. The apparitions felt real and omnipresent It almost seemed like Little Bly was haunted.The brilliance of Adele’s writing lies in the fact that you would never guess that the narrator of the book is mentally unstable.The narrator of the book and protagonist Jamie has problems with pills(she enjoys taking them) which made me quite anxious for her,especially since she was entrusted with the responsibility of babysitting a kid,Isa.But she is such a strong powerful narrator that I actually believed all the things that she would say even though she was not in her right mind.Jamie is a round character and well developed.Even the other characters are well fleshed out.Adele Griifin did not hesitate in giving the nitty-gritties about Isa and Milo,the two children.People might find Connie,the housekkeper irritataing,but I felt that she was quite wise and stable.And what can I say about Adele’s writing?Simply superb!She mesmerizes the readers in such a way that you will find it difficult to break away from the suspense of the book.Her narration is smooth and clear.And though the book deals with difficult issues it is engaging and entertaining nonetheless.My only problem with the book is that it winds up pretty quickly.It takes Adele Griffin a lot of time trying to establish the story but she wraps it up too quickly.I wished that the ending could be a little longer.It was exhilarating and refreshing and it will come as a breath of fresh air to those who are sick and tired of reading mushy romantic young adult novels and want something more mature than that.

MY RATING:5/5