The Book Report #95
Episode #94
Haunting The Deep By Adriana Mather
The Book
I have a copy of the 3rd-print American paperback. This book was published by First Ember Edition in 2018 and is an imprint of Random House Children’s Books. The book has 361 pages, which includes an acknowledgement and the first chapter advertising one of Mrs Mather’s other books: Killing November.
I also have an ebook version for when I am not at home.
I don’t like the feel of this book. It does feel cheap and limp.
What Did I Think?
Samantha has settled into her new life. Her dad is home and has recovered from his coma. Mrs Merriweather and her son Jaxon make regular visits and vice versa. But she is still recovering from the past events of the previous book and has been hiding away from everyone else who was involved.
As with the first book, Mrs Mather is linked to the history of the plot. The plot of this story surrounds the Titanic.
Unknowingly to Samantha and her group of witches, someone has been recreating the Titanic and collecting all the passengers’ souls, placing them back on this ship. The passengers are stuck in a moment in time, a time loop. A couple of days before the event that originally nearly killed all of them. They have no memory of anything past the day they are stuck in and remember nothing of the day when the time loop starts again.
Bugs Me
This is the thing about these stories that bugs me. You have a bunch of kids who have no clue what they are doing. Or they have some knowledge, but the information they have at hand is limited, and in most cases, the situation has nothing to do with them. And they get pulled in because of reasons. The reason for this story is that Samantha’s great aunt was on the ship. But apart from that, there is no connection, and the reason Sam gets pulled in is that they needed a sacrifice.
The people behind it, alive and dead, have to make a sacrifice every so often to build the magic up until it is complete, and by the looks of it, they could have picked anyone. But of course, the villain at this point decided it had to be Sam.
At the end of most of these stories, it tends to be that the heroes have nowhere near the power to stop the villains, but if they cause enough hassle and chaos and have some story plot luck, they can win the day.
Plot Points
The villains could have gotten away with it so easily if they hadn’t made a big thing about it, for example, turning the school into a themed event about the Titanic, and the rest of the people of Salem would have carried on without knowing.
Sending mysterious packages that send you back to dream of the Titanic and creating a connection with your ancestors.
Sam is pulled onto the resurrected Titanic while she sleeps and is stuck with the memory of only the life she has on the ship. And her memory returns when she wakes up.
The race is on to find who is trying to bring back the ship and capture all of the souls. Prevent the untimely death of Sam before the anniversary of the ship’s destruction comes around.
But before any of that, Sam has to deal with her past adventure and rekindle her friendship with the Descendants. And for some reason, remove a spell that has Jaxon under the control of Niki, his new girlfriend.
Elijah makes his return, even though he never went away. He had been hiding away while still watching everything that was happening and only returned because Sam was in trouble. I am assuming Elijah has seen a lot of things over the years.
But…
Even with all of these sorts of cliches, it is a good read full of adventure and fantasy. The characters are okay, nothing amazing, but you are still drawn in and want to know what happens next. This is an easy read, with nothing too taxing.
Would I Recommend?
If you have read the first book, you will enjoy the sequel. If you enjoy some YA stories of teen angst, mixed with magic, a mild amount of love and fighting the evil doers. This could be for you.
Please give this book a go.
Would you like to purchase your very own copy?
You could try these online stores: Amazon UK/USA. Waterstones. AbeBooks UK/USA, Barnes & Noble, or eBay UK/USA.
Alternatively, you could try your local bookshop or even your local library.
