Pine by Francine Toon Book Review

 

Pine by Francine Toon. Photo: Amazon UK

Undelivered promises of thrills and gothic chills - is this really the future of 'horror' novels? 

I asked for this book as one of my birthday presents this year - my birthday is in October and I thought Pine by Francine Toon seemed like a great bit of horror literature to read in the spookiest month of them all! However, I was sorely disappointed. As a book publicist by day - I should recognize the power of good review quotes from media publications and the sway it sometimes has on readers. I also should have realized how us publicists cherry-pick quotes to put on the cover. All those quotes calling it 'spine-tingling' and a modern 'gothic horror story' were extremely misleading as that's the kind of book I hoped to pick up - but all those promises went completely undelivered. 

The story follows Lauren, a young girl who lives with an alcoholic father who is barely keeping things together. On Halloween night, as the two are driving home a ghostly young woman walks into the road and Lauren seems to be the only one to remember this beautiful woman the next day. What ensues is a claustrophobic story about another teenage girl who goes missing in the small town set in damp Scotland.

I had really high hopes for this book and unfortunately they were not met by a long shot. Again this book is marketed as a horror filled thriller that 'makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up.' That could not be further from the truth. Instead what I read was a sad story of a young girl who lost her mother at a very young age and was left in the care of an inadequate father. Lauren's father, Niall, is an alcoholic who makes many of the women in the town feel uncomfortable. It's kind of disturbing that even his 10 year old daughter wonders if he hurts women when she's not around - I mean what kind of messed up situation is it if a young child has these horrid thoughts about her father. 

The plot really jumped around a bit and the dialogue was quite choppy. It may have just been the author's writing style, but in my opinion it didn't really flow and it felt quite clunky to me. As I previously mentioned, it was a very claustrophobic story - I felt just as trapped in the damp house as Lauren did - but that feeling wasn't enough to carry the entire story.

Readers were promised 'horror' and I keep using that word in quotation marks because if that is what modern horror is then it's just a mockery of the former meaning. There was nothing of classic horror in the book. I assume the publisher tried to push it into the horror market as there was somewhat of a ghost in the novel - but honestly it was never scary and there were no other classic horror genre markers present. 

When the other teenage girl goes missing - an honestly short search party occurs and this is where the probably only thrilling part of the book happens - something reaches out of the dark in a damp basement. 

I won't post any spoilers, but honestly this was more of a crime/thriller book rather than a horror book. Other than the disappearance, it's like 'ooo a mysterious rock circle' and 'oh who cleaned up my room' as if that's what ghosts do. On Amazon - it's called a spine-chilling story, but I read the entire thing at night and slept like a baby afterwards. Not a single part of this story gave me any sort of thrill or chill down my spine.

I really don't know how this book received so many glowing reviews or why it was shortlisted for so many awards. I wouldn't recommend this book as I feel nothing really happened. It's a book about nothing much and it certainly isn't a horror novel - please don't disrespect the entire genre by labeling this boring book that.

Rating: 2/5 Stars

Buy Pine here.


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