Toni Stevenson Offical Website
My first Review
Here is my first book review ever. It was written by Jym Cherry, he is honest in his review and I love that. It will help me with my upcoming books. Thank You Jym.
Toni Stevenson's Kazmer is a gothic horror tale that seems informed by movies and television, but that is to be expected from a young writer and Ms. Stevenson does use some of those influences with wit.
Bella Smith is a teenage girl living at home with her father and brother, and home is on the edge of a cemetery. One night Bella is out in the graveyard and she sees a shadowy figure that freaks her out. It doesn't seem human to her. The next day she decides she needs proof of the apparition so enlists her brother Kenny to go along. After failing to capture the ghost either on a picture or video, and taking their father to the graveyard and nothing happens Bella and Kenny enlist friends Gwen and Shannon to go with them. When the apparition appears Gwen confronts the entity and suffers for it and seems to be possessed by it or by the spirit of a dead girl named Alice.
Kazmer is a pretty solid horror story Stevenson builds upon the elements very nicely. Each visit to the cemetery draws them farther into the mystery of the dead girl and how it relates to the apparition. Ms. Stevenson also has a great ear for how teenagers talk and act. Sometimes, sneaking out windows and telling parents what they want to hear about going to a friends house.
The problem is that Kazmer loses it's focus and it can't decide whether it wants to be a horror story, a sword and sorcery story, or some hybrid of the two. If she's trying for the hybrid the two halves of the story need better integration of the elements. As the story peaks and you feel the climax building the ending suddenly seems rushed and underdeveloped and lets down the reader from the horror story that was building and drawing them in. All the tension that was building is gone, the story of Alice becomes an afterthought and isn`t used to full effect in the final battle with the apparition, Kazmer. The resolution is very anticlimactic leaving the reader wondering "is that all?"
Toni Stevenson's Kazmer is a gothic horror tale that seems informed by movies and television, but that is to be expected from a young writer and Ms. Stevenson does use some of those influences with wit.
Bella Smith is a teenage girl living at home with her father and brother, and home is on the edge of a cemetery. One night Bella is out in the graveyard and she sees a shadowy figure that freaks her out. It doesn't seem human to her. The next day she decides she needs proof of the apparition so enlists her brother Kenny to go along. After failing to capture the ghost either on a picture or video, and taking their father to the graveyard and nothing happens Bella and Kenny enlist friends Gwen and Shannon to go with them. When the apparition appears Gwen confronts the entity and suffers for it and seems to be possessed by it or by the spirit of a dead girl named Alice.
Kazmer is a pretty solid horror story Stevenson builds upon the elements very nicely. Each visit to the cemetery draws them farther into the mystery of the dead girl and how it relates to the apparition. Ms. Stevenson also has a great ear for how teenagers talk and act. Sometimes, sneaking out windows and telling parents what they want to hear about going to a friends house.
The problem is that Kazmer loses it's focus and it can't decide whether it wants to be a horror story, a sword and sorcery story, or some hybrid of the two. If she's trying for the hybrid the two halves of the story need better integration of the elements. As the story peaks and you feel the climax building the ending suddenly seems rushed and underdeveloped and lets down the reader from the horror story that was building and drawing them in. All the tension that was building is gone, the story of Alice becomes an afterthought and isn`t used to full effect in the final battle with the apparition, Kazmer. The resolution is very anticlimactic leaving the reader wondering "is that all?"
