Tagline: Where your worst fears hide.
Back tagline: The past can’t hurt you. It can kill you.
Summary: Almost everyone at camp Silverlake is afraid of something: bugs, snakes, swimming in the lake.
But there’s a deeper, darker fear some of the counselors share. The fear that their terrible secret will be discovered. For seven years, they’ve kept it hidden—ever since that summer when they were campers together.
The summer one camper didn’t make it home alive.
Now someone is using their secret—and their fears—to play a frightening game of vengeance. A game that could turn deadly.
First impressions: I’m really excited for this one! Horror and summer camps go so well together and a group of people being murdered because of a shared terrible secret is one of my favourite plots. I hope some people actually die here! The cover is pretty bland, but I like the title’s font and that snake is fkn adorable. Let’s read!
Recap
Roll call:
Rachel – Our heroine who’s actually pretty great!
Jordan – A bit of a sheep.
Steve – The jokester with a crippling fear of snakes.
Mark – The cold, arrogant one who’s deathly afraid of heights.
Paul – The serious one who always seems to be watching.
Linda – The super friendly, outgoing one.
Terry – The shy, reserved one.
Stacey – The diva who’s terrified of water.
Tim and Michelle – The head counsellors who seem oblivious to what’s going on.
The book begins with a prologue, where some campers are on the final day of Camp Silverlake’s three-day wilderness hike. It’s super early in the morning as six 10- to 11-year-old campers and one counsellor crawl out of their tents, in charge of collecting firewood that morning. They venture into the woods where one boy trips over something and goes tumbling out of view. The other campers find him staring down into the gully, unresponsive, so they follow his gaze:
At the bottom was a fallen tree. Its trunk was huge, partly buried in decaying leaves. A squirrel scampered along its length, stopped, and eyed the campers nervously. They didn’t notice.
They’d finally seen what the other camper was staring at. Slammed up against the trunk of the tree was a body, wearing jeans and a T-shirt. One of the feet was bare. The shirt was royal blue, with silver letters on the back spelling CAMP SILVERLAKE.
[It’s nice to have a prologue that’s not just pure page filler! I’m looking at you, Stine!] We pick up seven years later with a first-person, italicised bad guy POV paragraph commenting on how peaceful it is at camp. Our bad guy was so sure everyone would remember, would feel something about the incident, but they seem happy ‘and they think there’s nothing to be afraid of. It won’t last.’ [I can’t wait!].
We then cut to a campfire where we’re introduced to a bunch of characters [Seriously, way too many in one go] – our heroine Rachel Owens; fellow teen camp counsellors Jordan, Steve, Mark, Paul, Linda, Terry and Stacey; and 20-something head counsellors Tim and Michelle [This is a lot to keep track of straight away lol rip]. Rachel’s a bit tired so Jordan offers her a toasted marshmallow and warns that if she doesn’t have any energy, she’ll never be able to handle the campers when they arrive. They won’t arrive until next week, so it’s up to these 10 counsellors to get Camp Silverlake ready for them.
Rachel looks around at her fellow counsellors long enough to give us a brief description of them [Which I’m sure we’ll quickly forget because there’s so damn many]. Terry is shy and withdrawn, the opposite of outgoing, friendly Linda. Stacey’s a bit of a diva and complains a lot, but she’d stocked their cabin with a shitload of snacks, so Rachel has to admit she’s pretty generous. Mark has pale blue eyes, white-blonde hair [A Point Horror staple!] and seems ‘kind of cold, and a little arrogant’; Steve’s a joker, Jordan’s super nice and pretty cute, and Paul is ‘very serious, always watching’ and makes Rachel a little uncomfortable [Lots of red herrings here]. But these are just Rachel’s first impressions, which are often wrong [Same though], so she hasn’t completely made up her mind about any of them yet [Good thinking, Rachel].
They’d all arrived at the camp earlier that day but it soon became clear that Stacey, Mark, Steve, Jordan and Paul had gone to the camp when they were younger:
They all remembered each other, but they didn’t act like good friends. At first, Rachel thought it was because they lived in different towns, and the camp was really their only connection.
But it wasn’t just that. There was a strange kind of tension among them, even when they were joking around.
[I bet some or all of them caused the boy’s death] Talk soon turns to Mr. Drummond, the super creepy caretaker who’s been with Camp Silverlake for 15 years. Back when she was a camper, Stacey admits the girls ‘”used to scare ourselves to death at night'” by convincing themselves every sound they heard outside their cabin was Drummond. The boys took it a step further, drawing straws to see who’d have to go out to investigate:
“I had to do it once, but after that, we made sure—” Steve suddenly broke off. He’d been smiling, but now the smile was gone. Rachel saw him look around, his eyes darting nervously back and forth.
“You made sure what?” Paul asked.
Stacey cleared her throat loudly. Steve glanced at Jordan. Jordan shrugged and looked the other way.
It was Mark who answered. “We made sure there were always fresh batteries in the flashlight.”
Mark and Steve laughed, but Rachel didn’t think they were really amused. It was like some unspoken message had been passed.
A message to keep their secret to themselves.
[No secrets plz gang, I wanna know everything ASAP! Good on Rachel for realising something’s up so quickly too. I think I’ll like her]. The gang decides it’s bedtime and as they make their way back to the girls’ and boys’ cabins, Jordan flirts with Rachel a little. After he says goodnight, she stops walking for some reason and watches him walk away, thinking about how cute he is. Then she realises she’s all alone on the path and starts moving, which is when she hears footsteps coming from one of the baths leading from the cabins to the lodge [!!!]. The footsteps sound too heavy to be any of the others so a frightened Rachel scrambles to the cabin, but in true horror fashion, she trips over a root! She chances a glance behind her and can see a dark, hulking figure moving towards her.
She manages to get inside her cabin and tells the girls that she thinks she saw Mr. Drummond out there. Stacey wants to see for herself and quickly shuts the lights off before peeking out the window. Through the darkened silence, they hear Drummond’s footsteps approaching their cabin. He calls out to them, just wanting to make sure they’re settling in OK, but Stacey still thinks he’s super creepy [Bitch]. The other three girls insist he must be fine if he’s been with the camp for 15 years, and the subject is soon changed to the boys.
Terry and Linda have fellas back home, so Rachel and Stacey have their pick of the bunch [Lucky gals!], although I think we can assume Jordan will be Rachel’s love interest. Stacey explains that Mark’s really smart, ‘”like a genius or something,”‘ and he and Steve are pretty fun, while Paul is sooo00oOoOoo00O0oo0 serious, but admits she didn’t get to know them very well when they were campers [It was also seven years ago, so they may have changed].
The girls fall asleep and sometime later, Rachel wakes up. She hears someone walking around outside, but it’s not the heavy, noisy footsteps of Mr. Drummond – these ones are quieter, more deliberate, like someone sneaking around.
We then get another brief, first-person, italicised bad guy POV wondering if anyone heard him/her walking around outside. He/she had to get outside and think, but decides they’ll need to be more careful because ‘it’s not time yet’, but when the time does come, the counsellors will be screaming [Sounds good to me, bad guy! Get on with it!].
The next morning as Rachel showers, she thinks about the footsteps last night and decides it must be one, or all, of the boys playing a prank [It’s definitely someone, but I don’t think it’s a prank!]. Rachel’s late to breakfast at the lodge, and apparently so was Steve [Who shortens her name to Rach but Ellis has weirdly spelled it ‘Rache’ which is horrible], so Rachel suspects that he’s behind the sounds she heard last night.
After breakfast, the gang is assigned different duties to prepare for the campers, and Rachel gets to set up the lodge’s bulletin board with photos from the camp’s history to celebrate it’s 20th anniversary. As she sorts through them she finds a group shot of Mark, Stacey, Jordan and Steve. She wants one of Paul to go with it, but instead finds a photo of a shaggy-haired boy standing alone on a dock, staring out into the lake. The photo simultaneously makes Rachel smile but feel sad [Maybe he’s the dead camper!] and she decides that such a beautiful picture should be the centrepiece of her display [I don’t think the ex-camper counsellors will like that, Rachel!].
As she pins it to the board, Mr. Drummond walks in and although she feels nervous around him, Rachel introduces herself. He’s not really listening though, because he’s noticed the photo she’s put up. He moves in for a closer look and when he turns around to face Rachel again he looks super angry! He asks if she’s ever been here before and when she answers no, he relaxes and tells her she ‘”couldn’t have picked a better one”‘ [Does the ex-campers secret have something to do with this boy, and does Mr. Drummond know about it?!]. He heads off, leaving Rachel to wonder what the hell just happened. She continues her search for a photo of Paul and has just found one when ‘a piercing shriek shattered the silence of the lodge’ [!!!!].
Rachel follows the screams to the lake, where Stacey’s flailing about in the water. Jordan and Steve are in a boat trying to reach her, but they’ve only got one oar so it’s slow progress. Paul races out there in a separate one and manages to haul Stacey in and bring her back to shore, followed by the other two boys, and it’s revealed she was actually on the boat with Steve and Jordan before Steve decided to throw her into the water. Steve and Jordan claim they forgot about Stacey’s overwhelming fear of deep water [Same, girl] since it’s been seven years, but Stacey’s not buying it and reveals Steve’s greatest fear to the group as revenge – snakes!
Now Steve’s mad that she’s humiliated him in front of the group [Relax, Steve, I don’t think anyone’s judging you lol], but Stacey reckons they’re even for now and heads off to change into dry clothes. The rest of the group scatters to continue what they were doing before the interruption, and as Rachel heads back to the lodge, Jordan comes running after her. He insists he’d forgotten about Stacey’s fear and claims she was laughing and joking around as Steve threatened to throw her in, until he actually did it. Rachel secretly thinks it’s weird that he’s telling her instead of apologising to Stacey, but he just didn’t want her to think he’s a ‘”bad guy”‘ [Which is exactly what a bad guy would say!].
After Jordan asks what she’s holding, Rachel realises she’s still holding the photo of Paul [Really? You forgot you were holding it this whole time?]. She refuses to show him, wanting to keep the ‘”blast from the past”‘ a secret until everyone sees the finished board, but Jordan completely freaks out and demands to know what she means. Surprised by his intensity, she reveals the photo and explains the group shot she’d also found. Jordan relaxes, but Rachel wants to know what he thought she was talking about. He shrugs it off and heads back to work:
Something strange was going on with Jordan. He wasn’t just moody the way some people were. He was moody for a definite reason. She had no idea what it was, but she did know something is wrong.
Stacey was scared of the water, and Steve panicked at the sight of a snake. Jordan was scared of something, too. But what?
Head counsellors Tim and Michelle return from town with food and supplies for the week as Rachel finishes the bulletin board and as she’s putting the groceries away, the others start to arrive at the lodge. They’ve clearly seen the bulletin board and Mark is pissed while the other ex-campers are strangely quiet. Terry also seems nervous, but there’s no photo of her so Rachel’s not sure why she’d be upset [Maybe she has a link to whatever happened seven years ago, and we just don’t know it yet. Could Terry be our bad guy?]. Rachel wonders why they’re acting like she committed a crime and offers to take the photos down if they hate it that much, but everyone seems to relax and when Linda arrives, they all start poking fun about the way they’d looked in the photos. Rachel’s even more confused now and realises that there’s not just something off with Jordan, ‘but with everyone who’d been at Camp Silverlake seven years ago’ [Well duh, Rachel, that’s been obvious from the start].
As they eat lunch, Rachel quietly asks Terry what was up with everyone’s reaction to the bulletin board, but Terry has no idea either, explaining the ex-campers went quiet once they saw it and headed straight to the kitchen ‘”like a pack”‘ [The secret must be pretty bad for them to suspect every little thing is a reference to it!]. Terry admits she looked upset because based on their reaction, she thought maybe Rachel had done it deliberately, but knows that’s not the case.
With lunch over, the squad decides to check out one of the hiking trails. Rachel and Paul bring up the rear and she asks about his time here as a kid. She wants to know why everyone got so worked up over some photos, and Paul wishes he could tell her, but he’s ‘”not sure”‘. Rachel presses further, so Paul leads her to a nearby log and they sit down as the others continue on, not realising. He struggles to get to the point, but eventually tells her that seven years ago when he was a camper, ‘”something went wrong. And it was bad”‘ – the boy in that picture died [If we didn’t have the prologue, this would be more surprising].
Rachel realises the ex-campers must have thought she was trying to remind them of whatever happened by putting the boy’s picture in the middle, which explains their weird behaviour as well as Mr. Drummond’s reaction. Before she can ask how the boy died, Jordan comes running down the path looking for them. Rachel explains they just took a break but can tell by his reaction that he assumes they were tongue wrestling [Wait, is Paul the love interest?]. Although Rachel really wants to know the details [Me too, girl, but this book is 214 pages long so I think we’ll be waiting a while ;(], she understands it must be hard for the gang to talk about and resolves not to bring it up unless someone else does, and she also plans to take the boy’s picture down as soon as they’re back at camp [You know what this all means, right? Lots and lots of page filler! Woo!].
The group stops for a rest at a clearing that the ex-campers recognise from back in the day, and Stacey and Jordan remember a lookout further up that oversees the valley for miles. They continue on, but this time Rachel and Paul aren’t walking together, much to her disappointment ‘because she liked him’ [So we’re off Jordan now? I think I like Paul better anyway], even though he’s a serious kind of guy, which she puts that down to his sad memories of Camp Silverlake.
Soon, the trail widens into a platform with steep drops ‘hundreds of feet down’ on either side, and Mark, who’s bringing up the rear with Rachel, stops to fix a knot in his shoelace. The others have already followed the trail around a bend, and Mark insists Rachel follow since the lookout’s not far. She offers to help him, since she’s good at knots, but after he snaps at her to go away, she realises based on his pale face and breathlessness that he’s lying about the shoelace and is terrified of heights. Rachel doesn’t understand why he’s making a big deal out of it and angrily tells him to come up with a better excuse, because it didn’t fool her ‘”and it won’t fool anybody else, either.”‘ [You tell him, Rachel!].
Later, the group finds Mark back at the clearing, napping on one of the logs. Rachel’s still annoyed that he snapped at her and asks if he managed to get the knot out of his shoelace [Hahahahahaha I love her], and ‘The look in his eerie eyes was so deadly, Rachel felt like she’d been hit’. As everyone heads back to camp, the girls group together and Terry asks what the shoelace thing was about, because Mark looked like Rachel had spat on him or something [Hahaha gross]. Stacey had told the girls Mark was fun the other night, but Rachel has no interest in getting to know him any further because ‘”He acts so superior, and he is—a superior creep.”‘ [Good one, ‘Rache’!]
She explains about his fear of heights and his lie to cover it, and Linda notes how everyone’s afraid of something. For her, it’s bees; Terry admits to being scared of bees and bugs, and Rachel confesses she gets bad stage fright and can’t stand lots of people staring at her. Rachel then tells the girls that she suspects one or more of the boys were outside their cabin last night, and they decide Steve must be orchestrating a trick on them because ‘”He’s just the type”‘:
“Definitely,” Stacey said. “Don’t forget, I went to camp with him. I remember once when he —” she stopped and bit her lip, her cheeks reddening.
“When he what?” Terry asks.
“Oh, you know…” Stacey made a throwaway gesture. “He put pinecones in people’s sleeping bags, stuff like that.”
The girls decide they need to get the boys before the boys get them, and agree to prank them tonight.
We cut to the italicised bad guy POV again, who reveals they’d made a vow to get revenge, didn’t know what to do until now when ‘they’ve made it easy’ for him/her, presumably because their biggest fears have all been revealed [Death by stage fright sounds interesting… Also, this means that the bad guy must be one of the girls, right? The boys are walking up ahead, presumably out of ear shot, so only the gals now know everyone’s deepest fears! I’m thinking the always nervous Terry, but Linda hasn’t done everything notable yet so it’s most likely her, right?].
As they walk back to camp, the girls discuss the details of what they’re labelling Fright Night. Their plan is to dress in dark clothes for camouflage, make weird noises outside the boys’ cabin and when they rush outside to investigate, the girls will sneak in and stuff their sleeping bags with wet leaves, which is… interesting, to say the least [The very least. Also, what if the some of the boys stay in the cabin? What if the boys aren’t outside long enough to get the job done? You can do better, girls!]. Rachel offers to stay at the girls’ cabin in case the boys work out what’s happening and want to get even, but she’s also got a bad feeling about Fright Night.
Back at camp, the group splits up to do their own thing, and Linda and Rachel hang out in their cabin. Rachel admits she likes Paul more than Jordan [:O], but she doesn’t know how he feels because their conversation today was the longest one they’ve had. She tells Linda about the boy who died, and Linda gets the bright idea to dress up as the boy’s ghost [In a bedsheet, mind you] as their prank. Rachel’s disgusted by the idea, and Linda quickly agrees, unsure why she even thought of it [Could Linda be the bad guy, with some connection to the dead camper?! Maybe she was at camp back then too, but went by a different name, or maybe she’s his sister?].
After dinner, the gang’s all hanging out in the lodge and Rachel’s having so much fun with everyone that she declines Jordan’s offer for a walk [Wow OK, I was really wrong about the love interest of this book hahaha rip Ellis tricked me!]. Jordan looks at Paul and then back at Rachel, his eyes darkening like they did earlier on the trail when he assumed they were making out. He moves straight to Terry, and Rachel agrees with Stacey’s opinion that he’s wishy-washy [You literally showed no interest in even having a conversation with him, why would he keep trying to make an effort with you?].
At midnight, Linda, Terry and Stacey head to the boys’ cabin with a bag of wet, decaying leaves while Rachel remains in the locked cabin with the lights out so it looks like they’re all asleep. The plan isn’t supposed to take long – they’ll thump on the side of the boys’ cabin, Linda and Terry will let themselves be seen before running into the woods, and when the boys give chase, Stacey will sneak inside and do her thing with the leaves [OK, the plan sounds a lot better now]. The girls will meet at the shower cabin before returning to Rachel, where they’ll give a specific knock to let her know it’s them.
A short while later, Rachel’s sick of waiting around because they should have been back by now, so she decides she’ll see what’s taking so long, not caring if she ruins the prank [Wow, selfish]. Just as she’s about to unlock the door and step outside, there’s a knock from the other side, but it’s not the secret knock [:O]! She waits for another knock but nothing happens, so she wonders if she imagined it. Taking her chances, she opens the door, but no-one’s out there. She walks around the cabin, but it’s clear she’s all alone here.
By this point, the girls have been gone for half an hour so Rachel heads to the shower cabin, leaving the girls’ cabin door wide open [Why would you do that, Rachel?]. Finding the showers empty, she starts toward the boys’ cabin, but soon she hears some rustling in the trees to her left. She books it back to her cabin, but with the lights still off and the door wide open, she decides to wait in the lodge instead for everyone to come looking for her.
When she’s almost at the lodge, she collides with Paul, who explains the boys were in the lodge for a midnight snack, but he’s the last one to leave. He hasn’t seen any of the girls though, but everyone else arrives pretty soon, laughing and joking. After a little wet leaf fight, they all head back to their cabins but Rachel’s still upset about being left on her own [You volunteered?????]. The girls explain the boys were heading to the lodge just as they arrived at the cabin, so they ran away, splitting up for some reason. Linda doubled back to the cabin and waited while Terry escaped into the woods and Stacey went to the boys’ shower cabin [One of these girls are definitely suss. You’d think they’d all head back to the boys’ cabin or the girls’ showers, where they were supposed to meet afterwards].
As they arrive at their cabin, ‘a howl of fear’ splinters the darkness around them, and it’s coming from the boys’ cabin! As they scurry down the path, it becomes clear Steve is the screamer and they see why as soon as they arrive:
Steve was in the middle of the cabin, sitting on the floor. About two feet away from him, its rattle quaking an ominous warning, was a coiled rattlesnake.
[The cute one on the cover!]. The snake was in Steve’s sleeping bag, and with no-one sure what to do, Stacey and Terry run off to fetch Tim, Michelle and Mr. Drummond for help. Poor Steve is absolutely shitting bricks and the whole thing is horrible to watch, but luckily Mr. Drummond arrives with a shovel to cut the poor snake in half [Did we really have to kill it? >:(]. He exits with both halves without a word, and Steve shoots straight up and lunges for Stacey, aggressively shaking her around because she must be getting revenge for the lake incident. Stacey thinks he’s a total jerk for even thinking she’s responsible, and Mark pipes up that she’s been known to play a prank or two in her time. Stacey reminds him that they all have [A reference to their days as campers, I assume], and after Michelle insists no-one would have put a snake in there, Steve apologises to Stacey and everyone heads to bed.
Back in the girls’ cabin, the gal pals discuss Steve’s hysterical reaction to the snake. Rachel comments on how embarrassed he must feel, and Terry suggests Steve thinks they’ll all laugh and tease him tomorrow. Rachel notices a little smile on Terry’s face as she says this, the same smile Rachel saw earlier when Steve was accusing Stacey [Very suss, Terry! But Linda admitted to being at the cabin alone, so surely she’s the bad guy]. Stacey wonders if it really was a simple coincidence, since it’s pretty convenient the snake just happened to be in Steve’s sleeping bag, ‘”The one person who turns into jelly when he sees one.”‘ [Good point! Do I smell an involuntary dip in the lake for Stacey in the not-too-distant future?].
It’s time for another bad guy POV, and this time they’re totally frothing over how the snake incident played out. Our bad guy’s been imagining Steve’s scream for years, ‘long lonely years’, and to finally hear it has made it all worthwhile. And unfortunately for the others, our bad guy is just getting started.
The next morning, Rachel awakens to find Linda and Stacey already gone, with her and Terry the last to rise and shine. Terry can’t help wondering if Mr. Drummond could have put the snake in the sleeping, like Stacey suspects, but Rachel insists that ‘”Just because the man’s kind of strange doesn’t make him a maniac”‘ and whoever would do something like that has to be crazy. Terry reckons ‘”a person doesn’t have to be crazy to play a nasty trick'” [Which is true, but like, also a weird thing to say…maybe Terry is our bad guy!], and heads for the showers, leaving Rachel to tell herself that no-one put the snake in there.
Heading to the lodge for breakfast, Rachel bumps into Paul, who’d also slept in. They discuss the snake incident, with Rachel mentioning how Stacey and Terry think the snake was put there on purpose, but she doesn’t think anyone would do something so dangerous. ‘“You can’t be sure what somebody might do”’ says Paul, but before Rachel can ask what he means, Steve arrives and she decides it’s best not to mention the snake around him.
After breakfast, Rachel gets a chance to remove the dead boy’s photo off the bulletin board, but someone’s beaten her to it! And not only that, there’s a bullseye drawn over Steve’s face in the group photo of the ex-campers [!!!]. She’s not too fussed about the missing photo since she was going to remove it anyway, but the target unnerves her because that probably means the snake was put in Steve’s sleeping bag deliberately [I’m still thinking Linda, she’s the only one that hasn’t seemed suss so far].
After cleaning all the cabins, the gang rows across the lake for a picnic and Rachel somehow gets stuck in a boat with Mark, who she’s still not very happy with. She also can’t stop thinking about Steve’s photo, and sensing her anxiety, Mark wonders if she’s afraid of the water like Stacey. He wants to know her deepest fears, but Rachel gives him nothing, not enjoying how pleased he looks at the thought of her discomfort. She wonders if he just wants to get her back for what happened on the trail, or could he be behind the snake and the target? Then Rachel remember how Terry smiled at the thought of Steve being teased – could Terry get a kick out of other people’s fear? What scares Rach the most now is that if someone is behind the snake, it means ‘that person was playing a game that could turn deadly’.
Reaching their destination, the gang enjoys a picnic before frolicking in the water, but soon Tim and Michelle head back to camp to make some calls and do paperwork [Boring]. The rest of them decide to explore the woods here, but Stacey opts to stay behind and work on her tan [Say your prayers, Stacey]. Instead of sticking together in the woods, for some reason everyone goes their separate ways until Rachel’s left alone with Paul. They’re sick of walking though, so they find somewhere to rest and talk.
After realising they’ll be attending separate colleges in the same vicinity [Couple goals!], talk turns to camp life and Rachel tells Paul about the target on Steve’s face, her suspicion of the snake incident being deliberate, and how the dead boy’s photo is missing. She asks how he died and we learn that the boy, Johnny, was quickly singled out at camp, teased and pranked relentlessly. Paul and some other boys had tried to get people to back off, but they weren’t in Johnny’s cabin or camp group, so they couldn’t do much [Did the counsellors just let all this bullying happen?!]. Steve and Mark were the worst of all, but Stacey got in on the action too, and although Jordan never started the teasing, he always went along with it. Johnny was in a cabin with those three boys, so I guess the poor kid could never escape the bullying. Anyway, Paul was one of the campers in the prologue that found Johnny’s body, and it’s suspected that for whatever reason, Johnny left his tent that night and got lost, falling down the gully and breaking his neck:
“I always wondered —” Paul broke off and got to his feet.
Rachel looked up at him. “You always wondered what?”
“Nothing. I just wondered why he left the tent that night,” Paul said.
[At least Paul wasn’t a bully, so I approve of him and Rachel. Hopefully the others get their comeuppance if they were as bad as Paul says >:). Of course, he could easily be lying about his participation…]. Rachel’s sure that’s not what he was really about to say, but doesn’t want to pry any further since it’s obviously an uncomfortable topic for the new love of her life.
After everyone returns to the beach, the heat prompts them to go for another swim before heading back to camp, and that’s when they realise Stacey’s not with them [I probably would have realised straight away since that’s where she’d said she’ll be the whole time, but okeh]. Assuming she may have gone into the woods to search for them, everyone ventures in again to find her, except for Rachel who’s enjoying the calming waters of the lake [Wouldn’t wanna interrupt you’re leisure time their, Rache].
After drifting further from shore than she’d realised, Rachel notices one of the older wooden boats they’d taken here floating further out and taking on water. She assumes it had gotten damaged on some of the jagged rocks when they’d secured it earlier, and must have come loose and floated out [The first part makes sense, but someone definitely pushed the boat out]. Planning to tow it in before it sinks, Rachel heads for it and that’s when she spots Stacey inside, looking like ‘she’d just woken up and discovered her situation’! She realises Stacey must have fallen asleep in the boat, where it was more shady than the beach, and been awoken as the water began to slosh in.
Rachel calls out to Stacey, who begins to stand up as she sees her approaching, but Rachel orders her to sit down again. Stacey quickly starts screaming as the front of the boat tips further below the water, and Rachel realises she’s tugging at something before she hears her words clearly:
“My foot! Rachel, I can’t get my foot out!”
Then Rachel understood. When Stacey stood up, she must have stepped right on the weakened part where the water was coming in. Her weight had driven her foot through the wood, and now she couldn’t get it loose.
She was trapped in the sinking boat.
[That’s convenient for our bad guy!]. Rachel swims as fast as she can and dives under the boat where she manages to pull the damaged board down enough for Stacey to remove her foot. She surfaces just in time for the others to arrive on the remaining boats and they all head back to camp, towing the damaged one behind them. Rachel showers and collapses on her bed, sleeping until dinnertime. She heads to the lodge, where she overhears Stacey demanding they call the police.
Head counsellor Tim thinks Stacey’s jumping to conclusions and heads off to do admin stuff just as Rachel enters the room [I can’t decide if Tim and/or Michelle are suss or not. They’re pretty nothing characters, but feature just enough to be potential bad guys]. Rachel asks what’s going on, and Stacey explains that with first Steve and the snake and now her and the lake, somebody’s clearly out to get them. Rachel’s all like ‘”You’re not making any sense”‘ [How, Rachel? You’ve been thinking the snake was deliberate for a while, especially after the target on Steve’s face?], so Stacey points out that the boat was tied up when she got into it, and it certainly didn’t untie itself. She admits it probably got torn up on the rocks, ‘”But somebody untied it, that’s for sure.”‘
Stacey thinks Mr. Drummond’s behind it all, but Paul in particular doesn’t believe Drummond’s the monster Stacey insists he is [Just because he’s a hulking giant and kind of creepy, doesn’t mean he’s trying to kill you, Stacey! Although it would probably serve her right with how often she’s ripping into him]. Terry specifies how the culprit it is using their greatest fears against them and a horrified Rachel realises the only people who knows all their worst fears are each other [As if the bad guy would be anyone else, Rachel. Come on]. Everyone was separated last night during Fright Night, and they all split up again in the woods today, so any of them could be responsible. Rachel gets up to take her plate to the kitchen, stopping by the bulletin board in the entryway as she does. Just as she suspected, the group shot of the ex-campers now has a target over Stacey’s face too.
Time for another bad guy POV, who confirms he/she ‘got lucky with the boat’ and had no idea it was damaged. He/she also thinks it’s so weird to hear everyone discussing who’s behind it when ‘I’m the one they’re talking about’. It’s too soon for a reveal though, because the bad guy’s not finished yet [Nowhere near finished, if you ask me! Everyone’s still alive >:(].
That night, Rachel screams herself awake from a nightmare where she’s trying to rescue Johnny, the dead camper, from the boat Stacey was trapped in. The commotion rouses the other girls, who ask who Johnny is, since she was screaming his name. Rachel explains he’s just a camper that died, but Stacey has no interest in dredging up the past and angrily demands they all go back to sleep [Fuck off, Stacey].
After breakfast the next morning, the gang sets out do their tasks for the day when Paul stops Rachel for a private chat. He’d also seen the target on Stacey’s face, but presumably they’re the only two who’ve noticed because no-one else has said anything. Rachel informs him of Stacey’s outburst last night and admits she wants to tell everyone about the targets, but doesn’t know who to tell. Realising she’s suspicious that one of the counsellors is our bad guy, Paul warns her to ‘”Just be careful””. Something about his tone makes Rachel think he’s warning her, rather than simply expressing concern, and wonders if he’s the one behind it all [If this was Fear Street, it’d be more plausible]:
He couldn’t be the one, Rachel thought as she walked away. She liked him too much. Oh, sure, that was a great reason.
[I love the self awareness here hahahaha. Rachel is great]. Somehow [Wishful thinking I guess, because there’s not a clear pathway] Rachel reaches the conclusion that there’s ‘probably no connection between the snake and the boat and the boy who’d died seven years ago’ [Both victims bullied Johnny… that’s the connection, Rachel. What other motive is there? This might be the fastest I’ve gone from “this protagonist is great, hehe” to “This protagonist is an idiot”]. She then decides Paul must have been warning her because there is no connection, which means all of them are targets [Rachel, please. You’re probably a target now because you’ve unintentionally brought Johnny up so often that the bad guy must think you know something more than you actually do!].
After cleaning one of the shower cabins, Rachel heads to the rainy-day building where Stacey is supposed to be. She wants to make sure Stacey doesn’t think she’s bringing up the past purposely to make the old campers uncomfortable, but instead she finds Jordan in there alone, playing Nok-Hockey [Is that the same thing as air hockey?]. He vaguely suggests Rachel’s playing games [I guess Stacey’s already blabbed about last night] and is clearly in one of his moods, so Rachel’s glad she never got to know him better, like he’d wanted [Still can’t believe Ellis tricked me into thinking he’d be the love interest]. He doesn’t know where Stacey is though, and he’s pissed Rachel off enough that she storms away.
Rachel heads back to her cabin to change out of her dirty cleaning clothes and finds a surprise waiting on her bed for her – the dead rattlesnake, coiled around a butcher’s knife [How sweet!]. She almost vomits before searching for something to put the dead snake in, settling on a paper bag sticking out from under Terry’s bed. Just as she’s grabbing it, Terry walks in, demanding to know what she’s doing. Rachel explains she just needed a bag for her present, and Terry calms down before also being dramatic about the dead snake [It’s dead, calm down].
With the snake and knife in hand, Rachel finds Mr. Drummond in the storage cabin and tells him about the gift. He’s confused, since animals can’t get the bin lids open, and offers to dispose of it, but Rachel doesn’t mind doing it herself, especially since she hasn’t ruled him out as a suspect. As he finds her a shovel, Rachel spots a rifle hanging on the back wall [I’m sure it’ll make another appearance soon]. Then she buries the snake in a little clearing in the woods.
After lunch, Terry waits for Tim and Michelle to leave [They’re previously shown to not have the patience for the teens’ conspiracy theories] before telling everyone else about the dead snake. Stacey welcomes Rachel to the victim club, but secretly, Rachel feels like this incident was different. Terry must feel the same way, because she declares it felt more like a warning, and Rachel wonders if Stacey and Jordan put the snake there as a warning to keep quiet [But all she knows is what Paul’s told her anyway]. If they are behind it, then there must be something else they’re trying to hide [Like inadvertently causing Johnny’s death or something].
Back to the bad guy POV, who admires the dead snake/knife trick [So I guess Stacey and co did do it?] and notes that it’s getting easier, pretending to be scared all the time like the others, and the end is near!
Back to Rachel, who’s heading to the lodge with Terry and Linda to meet everyone else for a hike. On the way, they discuss who could have put the snake in Rachel’s bed, and Terry suggests it might be Johnny’s ghost haunting the place [Terry’s too obvious to be the killer, but it kind of feels like she’s planting certain thoughts in the group that would make things more confusing to figure out… Like, if Rachel starts thinking a ghost is behind everything, she won’t be suspecting the real bad guy. Maybe Terry’s just quirky and not like other girls].
The gang takes a different trail this time, clearing it along the way, eventually coming to rest at a clearing where they compare blisters and scratches from moving fallen branches. Morale is high, and even Stacey’s attitude has improved. Unable to decide if the trail goes left or right out of the clearing, since both ways are covered by fallen trees and the like, Mark, Jordan and Linda go one way while the others choose a different direction. Soon it becomes clear that Rachel’s group is on the right trail, but Linda’s screams for help send them doubling back to the clearing and following the direction she took with Jordan and Mark:
Suddenly, without warning, they were out of the trees and teetering at the top of a wall of rock, its rough surface stretching almost straight down to a dried, rocky streambed at least thirty feet below.
Linda’s stuck on a ledge about halfway down nursing an injured ankle, and Mark’s on another ledge not far from the top. His fear of heights has kicked again and the poor boy’s paralysed against the wall! Jordan had gone searching for the others for help and hasn’t returned, so Steve heads down to get Linda while Paul retrieves Mark. Jordan arrives once everyone’s back at the clearing, but doesn’t have an answer for why he went running off [Did they really expect him to be able to help an injured person and another that’s paralysed with fear all by himself at the same time?]. Mark admits he tried to help Linda, but his fear overcame him and he just froze. Linda apologises for getting snappy with him about not helping her, but Rachel can see in Mark’s eyes that he’s both humiliated and angered by Linda’s sympathy.
Another bad guy POV tells us it’s almost over, and he/she can’t wait to ‘see their faces change, hear them scream and beg and cry’ once all is revealed [Make it quick, this book’s gone on long enough].
Back at camp, a storm’s a-brewing [Because of course it is] as the boys and girls head to their respective cabins. Terry looks like she’s holding back a smile when she points out how sorry she feels for Mark, who didn’t say a word on the way back [The bad guy POVs make sense with Terry’s behaviour, but surely she’s just a red herring? She makes the most sense, but if this book is following the usual trope of the least suspicious person being the bad guy, it’s gotta be Linda, or maybe Tim or Michelle], but Rachel doesn’t want to talk about his humiliation and leaves for the showers instead.
Afterwards, she heads for the lodge where the gang’s preparing dinner, and Paul shows her the target that’s appeared over Mark’s face in the group shot now. Even though Linda was the one that got hurt, Paul reasons that ‘”somebody must have enjoyed the situation and drawn the circle”‘. Everyone else has seen the targets now, so tensions are even more high. Stacey’s sick of the whole situation and wants to leave, but Tim and Michelle have taken the only car to town to get more batteries for the flashlights in case the power’s knocked out, so she storms into the main room instead, followed by Linda. When the others walk in with dinner 20 minutes later, Stacey tells them Linda went for a walk to check out one of the trails they haven’t cleared yet to see what shape it’s in:
“In this weather?” Terry asked. “There’s a storm going on.”
“Well, she said she liked it,” Stacey said. “What’s the big deal?”
Terry frowned at her. “The big deal is there may be lightning. And she’s out there in it.”
[OK, Linda is definitely our bad guy lol. Who the fuck goes to investigate an uncleared trail at night during a storm? It’s obviously a cover story for something more sinister]. The gang heads out to find her, with Terry staying behind in case Linda returns, and Rachel decides to check the cabin in case she went there. Paul instructs her to meet them at the main trail with Linda if she finds her, otherwise Rachel should just wait at the cabin [Why should she wait though? Like, why not go back to the main lodge with Terry, or meet them at the trail regardless?]. Before they split up though, Paul gives her a quick kiss on the lips [Cute, Finally!].
The cabin’s empty, and although it’s not raining yet, the wind is super strong and there’s lightning in the distance. As Rachel waits, bored and impatient, a gust of wind blows through the open shutters [Why aren’t they closed already?] and sends loose paper scattering across the floor. As Rachel gets up to close the shutters, she almost slips on a bit of paper. As she picks it up, she’s absolutely shocked when she realises what it is [Ohhhh, the shutters were open for plot reasons. Of course!].
One last bad guy POV has the bad guy impatient to get things over with, ready for the perfect ending [At first I was confused because I thought we were reading the letter hahaha].
Back to Rachel, who recognises the paper as the same kind that Linda [Classic! I knew it couldn’t be Terry. Has Point Horror ever made the most obvious suspect the bad guy?] has been reading letters on, apparently from her boyfriend, but this ain’t no man’s handwriting! It’s rounded and childish, like that of a boy, and it’s signed Johnny [!!!!]. The letter details how Mark, Steve, Stacey and Jordan have been bullying him and he wants to come home, even though there’s only five days left of camp [Would Linda have even gotten this letter before camp finished?]:
Tomorrow we go on the big hike. I have to be in the same tent with those guys and I know they are going to do something to me. It will be the worst. I’m not kidding. They told me.
[Poor Johnny 🙁 These guys sucked then and they suck now]. Rachel finds the photo of Johnny from the bulletin board alongside more letters in Linda’s duffel bag, and they all mention the four plebs’ bullying, but there’s never any mention of Paul or any counsellors, so Rachel wonders if Johnny was warned against telling them [My heart :(]. Realising Linda was Johnny’s sister and is now out for sweet, sweet revenge, Rachel stuffs a letter in her pocket and sets out with a flashlight to find the others.
It’s finally raining by this point [Just to heighten the drama even more], and Rachel hurries to the main trail before setting off on the unexplored one, following the path the others had cleared. Soon she hears voices and shuts of her light, creeping closer for a better look. Steve, Stacey and Mark are at the bottom of the gully next to the tree where Johnny died, which Rachel recognises from Paul’s recount of Johnny’s death, while while Linda, Paul and Jordan stand at the top. Linda’s brandishing the rifle from the storage cabin, aiming it back and forth between the groups and demanding to know the truth about what happened.
The captives explain that on that fateful hike seven years ago, they drew straws to see who would go outside the tent to make sure Mr. Drummond wasn’t out there. Naturally, it was rigged so Johnny would lose, and they sweetened the deal by promising to stop the bullying if he went outside and looked [Those little shits]. Rachel then realises it must have been one of them who put the dead snake on her bed, trying to frighten her into keeping quiet about Johnny [Even though she didn’t know… lol]. As Rachel watches, Linda turns her attention to Jordan:
“Johnny wrote me about you. He said he thought you wouldn’t bother him if the others didn’t. You just went along, didn’t you?”
Whichever way the wind blew, Rachel thought.
“They took the lead and you followed,” Linda went on. “It was easier that way. You didn’t have to think about what was right. It would have been too hard. You just followed the crowd.”
Linda goes on to explain there’s no room for Jordan’s wishy-washiness here and he must take the lead and choose who dies – Paul, or Stacey, Mark and Steve [Oooh, good plan, Linda!]. Jordan struggles to make a decision, so Linda kindly offers to kill him instead, aiming the rifle at him as she advances closer. Rachel realises it’s now or never and hurls the flashlight – it doesn’t hit Linda, but it does stop her long enough for Paul to overpower her and snatch the rifle.
Defeated, Linda sobs that she wouldn’t have shot them and only wanted to scare them, so they knew how it felt. Mr. Drummond suddenly appears, having seen Rachel going into the woods earlier, and takes the rifle from Paul, explaining he never keeps it loaded. He comments on how nice Johnny was [So he was watching the whole scene, like Rachel? Wonder why he didn’t try to stop it, especially if he knew the gun wasn’t loaded] before leading Linda away. Jordan helps Stacey, Steve and Mark out of the gully and the foursome clings together as they head back to camp. Rachel and Paul bring up the rear, with the book ending as the storm begins to die down [Ohhhh, the storm was a metaphor for the climax! I get it].
Final thoughts:
It’s no Lights out, but it was still a fun read. The mystery was there, and I was never absolutely certain Linda was the bad guy until towards the end, which is always a plus. Some actual deaths would have been nice though. The bullies got off way too easily and I think it would have been a better idea to have Steve and Stacey both die, since a snake bite and drowning could both be seen as tragic accidents. Maybe Mark could have fallen from a cliff, too!
I liked Rachel as a protagonist – she was a believable heroine and her self-awareness was a nice touch. Linda’s motive was understandable, but I don’t understand why she just wanted to scare the bullies; they basically killed your brother, go all out, girl! There was probably a few too many characters though, and the book could have been a lot shorter, but at the same time I enjoyed being in the Camp Silverlake world and was almost sad when it ended.
I’m looking forward to reading more from Carol Ellis, but hopefully she actually kills some people in her other books. Fingers crossed!
78 revenge plots that involve simply scaring your victims out of 99.
