Do you have a phobia of creepy dolls? Do you ever see a mannequin in a store and wonder, “did that thing just move?”
Yeah, I didn’t think so. Me either! Not that I would admit anyway! The cover of Sebastian by P.D. Cacek was sufficiently creepy enough to entice me. The premise of a creepy doll story and an eccentric artist sounded like a great combination for a good horror story.
The main character’s (Morgan’s) mother is an eccentric artist – a photographer – who picks up a mannequin from a store that was unloading unwanted items. The mannequin quickly becomes the subject of her photographs and is given Morgan’s hand-me-down clothes and named Sebastian. Morgan wonders if his mother isn’t becoming a little obsessed with the doll, but she is an artist after all. She isn’t crazy. She’s eccentric.
The book involves family drama, a bit of strangeness, more family drama. But it lacks quite a bit on the horror I was expecting. It was still a good book, but I wouldn’t recommend going into it expecting a lot of horror or frights. It will definitely fall short if you expect that. I’ll give this book three out of five stars – good, but it didn’t wow me.
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher, Flame Tree Press, for making this ARC available for me to read in exchange for my honest opinion.
Mysteries and Mayhem 