A. J. Whitten

Scary...definitely!
Gory...yes!
Edge of your seat and can't put it down!
If you can get through the gore, this is an excellent suspense/horror book. The main character is Meredith, a strong female with great insight. She takes the reader along a horror ride into the workings and world of zombies in a way that I have not read before.
Zombies...beautiful?
Adrian is. and what is happening in is basement? Who is the woman living with him? Will Meredith be able to save her sister from a grossly, horrible death or will the zombies win?

Great book for boys as well as girls with strong stomachs!
… (altro)

To write a really fantastic horror driven book I really believe that you have to love the genre. So of course when I heard that A.J. Whitten was a horror movie buff I was excited to read this book! Who better to regale me with truly terrifying thoughts and gory scenes than someone who loves the genre as much as I do? I'll admit that I was a little skeptical about the addition of the Romeo and Juliet theme. How on earth could they tie that in to a book like this? That just made me all the more eager to dive right in.

From the very beginning The Cellar draws you right in. Setting up the family relationship, pitting the sisters against one another, and then bringing in the mysterious Adrien. Let me tell you, from the moment Adrien showed up in the book I knew he was bad news. A.J. Whitten manages to build this aura around him that, without even knowing quite why, you are wary of him. I love that in a good horror book! Adrien's character drew me further in and I knew that I was in for a ride.

Now, here's where I have to interject a little bit about what prevented this book from in my absolute favorites. I was so smitten with everything that was going on, until the history behind Adrien came into focus. I'll try to explain this without giving anything away, but it might be a bit vague. I liked that Adrien had an emotional side to him that made him more human. However, I think that the middle section of the story was kind of slow because of it. I understand that A.J. Whitten was trying to build that human aspect so that Heather's romance made sense, I really do. However I was hoping for more of the horror driven scenes I was craving. I wasn't aware, I think, of how much romance was truly present in this book.

That being said, I'm still going to stick to my guns and say that this book really impressed me! Anyone that can tie together romance and horror has a spot in my heart. Throw in some references to Romeo and Juliet, and I'm sure that this book is going to be a big hit when it finally hits shelves. For those of you who are expecting a more gory and disturbing book (think The Monstromologist), you'll probably enjoy this book like I did but want to go elsewhere for your horror fix.
… (altro)

The reason I wanted to read The Cellar was because it advertised itself as Romeo and Juliet with zombies, only not in a Quirk classics way. That sounded like it could be hilarious. It wasn't for an assortment of reasons. 1: It took itself way too seriously. 2: Having the school do a modern version of Romeo and Juliet does not make this a modernization of said play; the story has to back it up. 3: These zombies are totally not following the rules and are, perhaps, other fantastical creatures. All in all, some seriously false advertising. Now I will expand on these points.

The Cellar is supposed to be a horror, sweet romance and tragic romance all in one. Whitten wants you to go 'Ack!,' 'awww' and 'boohoo.' I did none of these things. There were no joke attempts. How can you have the premise of Romeo and Juliet zombies and not think it should be hysterical, especially if you're completely changing the plot until its unrecognizable as the original play anyway? I think part of why Whitten (another mother/daughter writing team) wrote this book was because they thought it would be awesome to write a story about a sexy zombie. Here is an excerpt of Adrien (totally a zombie) meeting Heather for the first time:

"'You look lost,' a deep voice said from behind her. 'Like me.'
Heather turned, about to blast whoever was bothering her this time. She stopped. Stared.
At the very guy who has moved in next door to her. From far away this morning, she hadn't seen any details, but now—
Oh, now she did.
Up close, he was...gorgeous. Dark hair, a bit long in the back, just enough to curl over his collar, long dark jeans, a black suit jacket, something no other guy would have dared to wear, very A&F-ish, over a white T, untucked. He wore sunglasses—not Ray-Bans, but something very similar and very...mysterious. They reflected back her face, the shock in her eyes." (9)

Holy misuse of punctuation, Batman! These ladies are definitely from the Twilight/Lisa McMann school of writing. Also, is this guy supposed to sound like a stud? Because what he sounds like is a pompous asshat.

In this book, the school is performing Romeo and Juliet. Conveniently, Heather is Juliet and Adrien is Romeo. Because of this, they decide that they are exactly like the bard's star-crossed lovers, especially since her family is against them. Oh noes! Only not really, because of everyone but Meredith ends up supporting them. Mostly its just Heather thinks everyone wants to keep her from happiness. The frame of the story doesn't fit at all, nor does the fact that they don't both die. Fail.

Most disconcerting perhaps were the 'zombies.' Adrien and his 'mother' Marie are obviously something else altogether. Marie has to get herself a new skin with magic and soul-sucking every so often. So, basically, she's a witch from Stardust. Adrien apparently looks perfect and doesn't smell like decay; the only sign that he's not human are the worms in his eyes. Umm, what? For some reason, he really reminded me most of the Oogie Boogie man, thus the song. I think it was the way he commanded legions of creepy crawlies and the way he criticized all of his enemies/prey. Even the regular zombies did not necessarily act like zombies are supposed to. One of them was able to focus on more than commands from its maker or its hunger. Weird and out of character for how the others were. It was a necessary plot point, but I'm not buying it.

So yeah, I kind of hated it. However, fans of books like Cryer's Cross, another incomprehensible horror fantasy, will probably enjoy this.… (altro)