Camp So-and-So

January 1, 2017

Gr 7 Up-If a friend went away to summer camp and came back a different person, it might be easy to assume it was because she had made new friends and had had new experiences. But what if there were more sinister reasons? The 25 campers who arrive at Camp So-and-So expect hiking, rowing, and other normal camp activities, but they soon become involved in increasingly weird and potentially dangerous circumstances, and there are no responsible adult figures to be found. The girls, divided into five cabins, must fend for themselves and navigate through a tangled thicket of clues and deadly traps. There is a psychotic murderer to be eluded, a heroic quest to be pursued, the intoxicating promise of true love, and dark forces at work that can split souls. The strong protagonists and supporting characters grow gradually more courageous as they confront every challenge, supernatural and otherwise. The cleverly built structure divides the narrative into acts, and scenes within the acts tell the tale of each cabin separately, until they all converge in one dramatic conclusion. VERDICT A wildly imaginative novel with plenty of twists, this is a good pick for teens who like stories filled with bravery and dark magic.-Emma Burkhart, formerly at Springside Chestnut Hill Academy, Philadelphia

Copyright 2017 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2017
Camp is supposed to be about arts and crafts, capture the flag, and lazy days swimming in the lake, but at Camp So-and-So, nothing is as it's supposed to be, or even as it seems.Several mysteries await the 25 female campers whose parents make the drive up the "unnecessarily winding road" to the five cabins that don't even have walls. They've been tempted with shiny brochures that offer a week of fun and friends, but when they arrive, they're greeted by a problem, the nature of which depends on which cabin they've been assigned to. The mystery about Camp So-and-So deepens the longer the girls are trapped, and trapped they are, a fact that dawns on them as they find little help in the form of adult supervision. McCoy has written a downright peculiar book that manages to deliver a compelling tale of friendship and survival. The characters--which include at least two young black women and two lesbians--are easy to distinguish and follow, even as the narrative is required to dive into different scenes. A self-consciously omniscient narrator is a helpful technique that folds well into the plot. A loose relationship with A Midsummer Night's Dream helps explain the hazier bits, though knowledge of Shakespeare isn't required to enjoy the book. Weird, fun, clever, and different--in a good way. (Fiction. 14-18)

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Starred review from February 1, 2017
Grades 8-11 *Starred Review* All the world's a stage in this clever compendium of horror and fantasy tropes, set at an Appalachian summer camp for girls. Camp So-and-So boasts all of the typical summer camp amenities, but when 25 girls (diverse in background, race, and sexual orientation) arrive for a week, it quickly becomes clear that all is not as advertised. The girls, divided into five cabins, find themselves in bizarre, maybe dangerous situations. Cabin 1 must compete against the unsettling members of a fancy rival camp in a series of seemingly unwinnable tasks, and they're starting to worry about what will happen if they lose. Cabin 2 gets the Friday the 13th treatment when they realize they're being hunted by a former camper, while Cabin 3's adventures take a more fantastical turn as they set off on a quest to break a curse. Romanceand something more insidiousis in the air for Cabin 4 when they find their soul mates in the woods. For Cabin 5, though, survival is the only goal. As each group struggles with their circumstances, it becomes clear that someone is pulling the strings. Tongue-in-cheek quips from an (at first) unknown third-party narrator and nods to A Midsummer Night's Dream tie everything together in this crafty and, yes, campy novel that plays with familiar themes before it subverts them. Pure weird entertainment from start to finish.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)