Have you ever read, seen, or even felt like something was too good to be true, or just too good to be… good, and then it hits you: you are reading/seeing a horror scene? Yeah… Welcome to “Never Never” by Liz Butcher.
This is a dark fantasy, criminal, detective type novel and I can put a dash below the word thriller, because as sure as hell the author knows how to scare us and keep us on our toes while imagining all the eerie possibilities EVEN before the actual “detective work” starts out. “Never Never” is creepy as hell, and although there are lots of non-creepy detective police work and interactions, the creepiness doesn’t go away from the background, nor does the anxiety behind all of it all. It’s amazing! Creepy, yet amazing that a writer can actually keep us thrilled throughout the entire novel, no matter how light the scene, and one can only blame those first 6 chapters.
Another thing that we have to state is that Liz Butcher, (quite a name for an horror writer by the way) almost bordered to the GENIUS when she combined several elements that made us, the readers, emotionally involved in the story at once, not only by first scaring the hell out of our wits through the main character’s experiences, then by taking a piece of everybody’s childhood and putting into this haunting piece of story, BUT, by completing the circle by making the case closely related to our main character. I haven’t read much of the Brother’s Grim stories but I’m sure they would be somewhat written like this. Very nice.
The line between reality and illusion is distorted in so many ways, that not even we, the readers, can assure ourselves which is which, not even after reading more than half of the book, as many possibilities are laid upon the table without any of them being excluded or favoured.
Besides scaring the crap out of us, Liz Butcher does an excellent job on hiding details and filling out our list of “to discover things” but giving us plenty to smoothly move on with the novel. As questions build up, we know more and more, and we start getting the picture of what we need to know, like Wendy and the relationship she had with her parents and brothers, the fact that she’s lesbian, which is very cool, and we start getting an idea that there’s a terrible secret behind their family, or the house itself, but what secret is that?
Enjoyable, simple and quick to understand characters pop-in quickly, each with its own brush of traits that mark their identity according to their past and circumstances but always having a strong connection to Wendy, our main character, either on the positive side or the negative, but always with some spice of humour, a good dab of emotion and very distinct roles towards the plot.
The author makes the characters strikingly and instantly enjoyable through their interactions, letting us figure out who is who, in terms of behaviour, through dialogue. Although we are not told, at once, or explicitly, the body “layouts” of the characters, except for the face of Jane, Wendy’s daughter, we are allowed to construct their features by the way they talk, which is fun and neat, because, one would think that the it would make a “missing feature” on the book, but only increases our interactivity with the story and our attention towards it. Nice. And may I add, that Lily is THE perfect girlfriend? Because she is, and maybe, just maybe, Wendy and Lily are turning out to be my favourite lesbian couple.
But love is not what you should expect from Liz Butcher, but instead, creepy, veeeery creepy scenes. I mean, creeepy to the point of you asking: “What in the snowiest of hells was that?”, and something telling you that you don’t want to, but you will, find out, because… unicorns are not as beautiful creatures once they are put on the other side of the spectrum.
The fact that the author did manage the “responsibility” of holding (and ruining) most of our childhood memories, by making out a great story out of such a known tale, (I won’t say which in order not to spoil you fun), made this reading session pleasing and worth the while. I enjoyed it very much and I ASURE you that you will re-think your childhood movies after you read this book. Not on a good sense though.
Oh, and before we close shop, just know that… this will not end well, nor as expected. This book will leave you with goosebumps, and rise every hair on your neck. Nightmares are possibilities here too, so read it, if you so dare.
Welcome to Never Never. Enjoy 😉
Pros:
- Awesome and delightful characters, really fun to read. Specially female characters.
- Insinuations and descriptions that simply flood you with goosebumps and send chills down your spine
- Great tension on the plot and scenes overall
- Very good descriptions of characters emotions, scenes and imagination
- Great character interactions
- The twist on the whole tale was surprising in every sense, until the end
- An ending that will leave you asking yourself: “Waiiit…. WHAT?! Oh… crap!”
Cons:
- The first chapters mostly start with “Wendy”. Which turns itself to be repetitive and somewhat unnecessary
Scribble's Worth 