After Obsession

September 19, 2011
Aimee Avery has lived in Goffstown, Maine, her whole life, so everyone knows the story of Aimee's crazy mother, who apparently committed suicide, and how Aimee, while pretty, smart, and athletic, maybe isn't quite normal herself. Alan Parson is a half-Navajo football player from Oklahoma whose mother uproots him to live in a place where there isn't even a football team. When Aimee and Alan cross paths, there's an instant spark and instant fear: they've been seeing one another in their terrifying dreams. In waking life, too, friends and family are behaving out of character, strange noises can be heard at night, and the teens are haunted by the presence of a shadowy, supernatural figure that Aimee first encountered during a séance when she was a child. Aimee becomes convinced that "The River Man" has something to do with her mother's death, but could he be a threat to everyone in Goffstown? First-time collaborators Jones and Wedel introduce some chilling machinations, but Aimee and Alan's relationship covers familiar territory, and the slow-burning tension doesn't achieve the true sizzle of horror. Ages 12âup.