The Sacrifice Box

Starred review from June 4, 2018
During the summer of 1982, five unlikely friends—Sep, Arkle, Lamb, Hadley, and Mack—stumble upon a strange stone box, and to memorialize their time together, they each agree to leave something important to them inside it. They establish three simple rules: “Never come to the box alone. Never open it after dark. Never take back your sacrifice.” Four years later, none of the original group has remained friendly. But when dead things begin to reanimate, and those sacrificed items make a surprising return, the group realizes that someone has broken the rules, and it’s up to them to fix things. Stewart (Riverkeep) again creates an atmospheric coming-of-age story with brilliantly executed elements of horror and comic relief. He weaves in moments of laugh-out-loud, almost absurdist humor to balance the story’s most frightening aspects, all the while carefully structuring a tale about growing up and leaving childhood behind. Ages 12–up. Agent: Molly Ker Hawn, Bent Agency.

June 15, 2018
Five Scottish teens tied together by a childhood summer are haunted by a broken promise and an ancient ritual. In 1982, brainy Sep, who is deaf in one ear, had one glorious summer with sporty Lamb and Mack, mouthy Arkle, and oddball Hadley (Lamb and Hadley are girls). After discovering a mysterious stone box, they cemented their friendship by each placing a sacrifice inside, inspired by a ritual that came to Sep in a dream. At the start of school, they return to their old friends (or lack thereof, in Sep's case) and forget their promise to one another. Four years later, Sep, bullied by Arkle and his friends, is close to finally achieving his dream of escaping their small island community via a boarding school scholarship when the others return to him. Strange, scary things are happening--things related to the box, possibly because someone has broken one of the three cardinal rules. The third-person narration primarily follows Sep but includes moments focusing on other characters to show the powerful reach of the box as the horror and violence escalate (sensitive animal lovers in particular should take caution). For the teens to set things right, first they must come to terms with all the ways they went wrong. Diversity in the community includes Hadley's Korean mother and an Italian fish-and-chip shop owner.Moody and atmospheric, with sardonic humor; a meaty slice of horror. (Horror. 13-adult)

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July 1, 2018

Gr 8 Up-It's the summer of 1982, and five close-knit middle school friends make a vow to one another, sealed with treasured childhood relics in a sacrifice box. It's a promise that kids in their town made back in the early 1940s-never come to the box alone, never open it after dark, and never take back your sacrifice. Four years later, the friends are all attending to the same high school, but have gone their separate ways. September, the main protagonist, is focused on academics and is trying to get into a boarding school on the mainland. He wants to study to be an engineer, and he's more worried about his mother's health and their financial situation than he is about his friend circle. People make fun of Sep, but he keeps his nose in his books and his ears tuned into his Walkman most of the time. But then darkness comes to the island, and people start getting hurt and even killed. Sep and his friends realize that something has gone wrong with the sacrifice box; someone has broken the promise. This is an intense, descriptive, and intellectual thriller that will appeal to older teenagers who enjoy horror and suspense novels. Sep in particular is a fascinating character with whom the readers will feel a connection. VERDICT A strong choice for horror shelves.-Margaret A. Robbins, University of Georgia, Athens

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 1, 2018
Grades 9-12 When Sep and his friends threw objects into the sacrifice box four years ago, it was supposed to solidify their friendship forever. Now, in 1986, they've drifted apart, but that's the least of their problems: among many other strange occurrences, the objects from the box are reappearing in unsettling ways, and the box itself is creating an army of violent, reanimated creatures. With obvious nods to pulp horror classics, this boasts plenty of genre conventions (and thankfully lacks some of the stale ones), though Stewart gives it a more literary feel with figurative language and a dose of meaty character development. Though occasionally florid, Stewart's lyrical writing is at its best when describing visceral, gruesome horror: his vivid depictions of squelching, decomposed bodies, reeking corpses in a sweltering room, and lurching movements of reanimated creatures will delight fans of body horror. Cinematic pacing will keep the pages turning for fans of the genre, who should be distracted away from plot holes by the ghastly, shambling, necrotic flesh.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)