The Fear Street Saga #2: The Secret by R.L. Stine

Tagline: …Where the terror began.

Back tagline: Buried Evil.

Summary: What is the secret of Fear Street?
Why has its horror lasted for so long?
Ezra Fier wants to find out. He searches for the answer among the rotting bones in the ghostly town of Wickham. But he finds only betrayal and death.
Elizabeth and Kate are in love with the same boy. How can they know that they too are caught by the evil that will haunt this family forever?

First impressions: Another boring, melodramatic cover, but the blurb gets my attention! More betrayal and death sounds amazing, and hopefully it delivers as much if not more than The Betrayal. Also, who the hell are Elizabeth and Kate? Let’s find out!

Recap

Roll call:
Ezra Fier – Edward Fier’s son, now a father-of-three on his own quest for revenge.
Jonathan Fier – Ezra’s oldest child who doesn’t understand his father’s mission.
Jane, Abigail and Rachel Fier – Ezra’s wife and two daughters.
Delilah Wilson – Jonathan’s love interest.
Elizabeth Fier – The main protagonist in a new generation of Fiers.
Samuel, Katherine, Simon and Kate Fier – Elizabeth’s parents and siblings who round out the nicest Fiers we’ve ever met!
Franklin Goode – The last of the Goode family who turns the new generation of Fiers’ lives upside down.

We begin with an updated Fier family tree [I would love to know what exactly a 100-year break means. Wouldn’t that suggest that there were no Fiers for 100 years, in which case, how did they come about again?]:

Village of Shadyside, 1900

We’re back with Nora Goode, who’s taking a short break from her endless writings about the Fier curse, determined to write it all out tonight. She hears footsteps approaching and shoves the papers and pen into a drawer, not wanting anyone to see it until it’s finished…

Wickham Village, Massachusetts Colony, 1737

12 years after Ezra Fier returned to Matthew Fier’s farm and found nothing but bones and the clawed, blue-stoned amulet, he arrives at Wickham with his wife Jane and three kids; 12-year-old Jonathan, eight-year-old Abigail and four-year-old Rachel. Ezra rejoices at the sight of the ‘Village of Wickham’ sign, eager to finally get his revenge after all these years. Jonathan, on the other hand, is confused by his father’s quest for vengeance, unsure who George Goode is or why the Fiers have spent the last six months in this horse-drawn wagon searching for him [You’d think Ezra would have explained all this to his family already, right?].

For exposition purposes, Ezra mentions how he’s ‘”searched for the Goodes through five colonies”‘ with no luck [What? At the end of the first book, when Ezra found Matthew’s little journal thing in 1925, it said Wickham was where it all started, so why wouldn’t Wickham have been the first place he looked? On another note, Jonathan was born in 1925, so was that before or after the Ezra was at the farm? Did he really settle down and have a family just to drag them along to his revenge plot?]. As the Fiers venture down the road towards the village, seeing no other people which Jonathan thinks is strange, they eventually pass a fancy-looking carriage tied to two decaying horses on the ground, and to the family’s surprise, the carriage has passengers:

Three women were inside, dressed in gowns of fine silk and white lace caps.
Jonathan stared hard at the women. Their faces.
The faces were purple, nothing but bone and chunks of decaying flesh, poking out from beneath their fancy caps. They’re dead, Jonathan realized, covering his nose with his hand. And they’ve been dead a long, long time.
Rotting corpses, going nowhere in a fancy carriage.

[♫ Rotting corpses, going nowhere in a fancy carriage ♫ those would be some gr8 lyrics] Jane has a bad feeling and wants to turn back, but Ezra just stares at the stinky, rotting bodies for a while before driving the horses forward, stopping at the village commons. Wickham is just as empty and devoid of life as the road into it, which Jonathan is surprised by [God knows why, do you think if there was anyone here they’d just leave rotting bodies out in the open?].

Unable to keep his questions in any longer, Jonathan finally asks why they’ve come here and why Ezra’s seeking out the Goodes. Ezra decides his son is old enough to know the truth and takes him for a walk, passing by a dead man locked in the stocks, and tells Jonathan all about how Benjamin and Matthew Fier were righteous men who burned the Goode witches at the stake.

He explains William Goode believed them innocent [And rightly so] and tracked down the Fiers years later, taking advantage of Mary’s innocence and murdering Benjamin and Ezra’s mother before driving the rest of the family mad.

Jonathan finally understands his father’s burning passion for vengeance, but ‘No member of the Goode family had ever appeared during Jonathan’s life to seek revenge against the Fiers. So why was Ezra keeping the evil feud alive?’ [It’s a never-ending cycle of revenge!]. Still believing there’s life somewhere in this ghost town [What specifically is it about the dead bodies everywhere that’s telling them that?], Ezra and Jonathan head to the tavern to ask some questions, but it’s just as abandoned as everything else. There’s a pile of dust-covered letters on the bar which Ezra looks through, stopping halfway through at one in particular before telling Jonathan to find the magistrate’s house and see if he’ll talk to Ezra.

Ezra decides the grandest-looking house must be the magistrate’s and lets himself inside when no-one answers his knocks on the door [No-one in this town is alive, Ezra, who is going to answer?]. He calls out to any occupants, but there’s still no answer so he searches the house, finding an office where the corpse of an old man sits at a desk.

His screams bring Ezra running into the house, who sends Jonathan back to the wagon to wait for him to return. Jonathan does as he’s told, wondering what to tell his mother when she asks what they found since he doesn’t want to scare her with the horrible truth that ‘Wickham was dead, a town of rotting corpses’ [Only took about five bodies and two dead horses to make you realise lol].

He tells his mother the truth anyway, that everyone here is dead, and Ezra quickly returns too, explaining the plague must have gotten everyone, but they’ll soon see if it got the Goodes as well. Then he guides the horses out of town, stopping at a farmhouse belonging to the Goodes. Ezra enters the house after no-one answers his knocks, and Jane instructs Jonathan to follow him, with Abigail slipping down from the wagon too before Jane can stop her [Cheeky gal].

The inside of the Goodes’ home is surprisingly neat and tidy, as if the people who lived there had left’, unlike the rest of Wickham. There’s clearly no-one home, but Ezra announces he will not rest until he’s witnessed their rotting corpses for himself and searches the property from top to bottom. His search yields no results and he soon returns, purple with rage:

“They are gone!” Ezra screamed. “A plague has killed everyone in Wickham—but the Goodes have escaped!”

[Goode for them!] Jane comes running into the house with Rachel and begs Ezra to leave, but Ezra orders her to be silent and demands obedience from the whole family – ‘”obedience and nothing else!”‘ [Gross, I hate him]. He decides a clue to where the Goodes have fled to must be somewhere in the house and declares this the Fiers’ new home for the time being.

The family settles in nicely to their new home, finding everything they need, and Jonathan seems to grow more and more resentful of his father who continues to think of nothing but revenge. He notices, however, that Abigail seems to be the only one to make Ezra smile, such as when she shows off a pretty blue dress Jane had found for her in a wardrobe [OK, so poor little Abigail’s definitely gonna cark it soon :(].

Three weeks after moving in, Ezra decides to take Jonathan to some of the other farms in the area down the road, which they know are occupied due to smoke coming from the chimneys. The first farmer refuses to talk once Ezra mentions they’re looking for the Goodes, but at the second house, the man confuses Ezra for a friend of the Goodes, revealing George was the ‘”child of a witch”‘ [I guess it’s technically true since William Goode dabbled in the dark arts, right?] whose evil brought a plague to the village that he then escaped. Ezra assures the man he wishes nothing but harm to the Goodes, but the man wants them off his property and warns them against asking about the Goodes again. Ezra reckons this is further proof of the Goodes’ evil and wonders what the remaining villagers are hiding.

One morning sometime later, Jane allows Abigail the day off from her chores and instructs Jonathan to watch over her. Unfortunately for him, Abigail wants to explore the village and won’t take no for an answer, despite Jonathan’s protests. At the village, they find the skeleton of a dead puppy baking in the sun [Stine loves to kill animals!] and Abigail wishes to bury it. They retrieve a shovel from inside a cottage, finding another human skeleton inside as well, and bury the puppy beneath a tree. Abigail chants the words she’d seen on the back of Ezra’s pendant, as oblivious to the meaning as Jonathan is [Does Ezra know what it means? If he does, surely that would suggest to him that his family aren’t the innocent victims he believes them to be?], and when they return home that night, they keep their frolic in the village a secret.

Abigail and Jonathan continue to visit the lifeless village whenever they can, with the little girl determined to bury all the dead animals they can find. One day, they find the skeleton of a little girl and decide to bury that too, so Jonathan fetches a crate from the tavern to use as a coffin while Abigail searches for a good resting place. When he returns, he follows the sound of Abigail’s laughter around the back of the magistrate’s house, shocked to find her playing with another little girl [A g-g-g-g-g-ghost?!]. The girl darts behind a tree as soon as she sees Jonathan, who wonders where the hell she’s come from. Abigail calls out to her new friend, Hester, explaining he’s just her brother, and walks around the tree to get her, but the little girl has completely disappeared [Yep, that’s a ghost! Ooky spooky!].

On another adventure in the village, Jonathan finds Abigail playing with Hester in the graveyard. As he watches from afar, not wanting to startle Hester again, he sees the mysterious girl tug the lid off a coffin in an open grave and step inside before reaching up and pulling Abigail in too [!!!]. Jonathan dashes over and yanks the laughing Abigail from the coffin and starts dragging her home, unable to shake the feeling that something isn’t right [Yeah, Hester is dead! And is probably planning to kill you guys too! She must be one of those pesky Goodes!].

Sometime later again, Jonathan and Abigail are watching over Rachel for the day at home when Ezra strolls in and asks Abigail to join him on a walk, since he likes her company [God, poor Jonathan and Rachel lol].

Jonathan watches through the window as they begin their leisurely stroll, surprised to see Hester running up to them. Curious, he ventures out with Rachel to eavesdrop just as Ezra asks Hester where she lives and who her parents are. The blonde girl simply answers ‘”Nearby”‘ [In the Graveyard in Wickham is what I’m hearing] and ‘”Mama and Papa”‘ respectively before Abigail steps in to assure Ezra that Hester’s a good girl [Abigail, you’re eight-years-old you don’t know shit].

Hester then asks if Abigail can come to her house for a play [Oh no], something which Jonathan strongly advises his father against allowing. Abigail really wants to go however, excited to have a friend her own age, and since Jonathan’s ‘father could deny Abigail nothing’, Ezra permits the play date and sends his eldest daughter to her imminent doom [I’m just assuming, but surely I’ll be right], instructing her to be back in time for supper.

Of course, Abigail’s not back in time for supper [Poor, innocent Abigail ;(], and the Fiers grow increasingly worried until Ezra decides to go look for her, lantern in hand because it’s dark now. Jonathan follows after him against Ezra’s wishes, staying a good distance away to avoid being seen, and as Ezra begins to walk toward the farmhouses down the road, a little girl’s giggles are carried to him by the wind. The men follow the sound to Wickham, both eventually realising it’s not Abigail’s, but Hester’s [!!!]. They continue to the graveyard, Jonathan still staying hidden from his father, where Ezra stops at a gravestone, which by the light of the lantern, Jonathan can see belongs to none other than Hester Goode [Oh shit]:

Hester was dead.
But still she called.
“Can Abigail come to my house?”
Still she called. Called from the grave.
Abby’s little playmate, giggling and calling from the grave.
“Can Abigail come to my house?”
Slowly Ezra moved the lantern to the right.
His hand trembled. He nearly dropped the lantern as it cast its light on another grave.
Freshly dug.
With a new headstone.
The light fell across the inscription on the gray stone.
It read: “Abigail Fier.”

[That poor little girl 🙁 And it’s all Ezra’s fault!]. Jonathan reveals himself and helps his father dig up the fresh grave, revealing a lifeless, blue-faced Abigail resting in peace inside a coffin. A distraught Ezra curses at the Goodes, declaring they’ll burn again for what they’ve done, and the two Fier men hold each other and cry as Hester’s voice continues to gleefully chant about Abigail visiting her home [Not the time, Hester!].

Western Massachusetts, 1743

We jump forward six years, where Ezra tucks in a now-nine-year-old Rachel with a bedtime story, as he always does. And as always, he doesn’t recite a well-known fairytale, but the history of the family curse [Six year of hearing the same thing every night? Gross, Rachel must know it by heart]. Jonathan, now almost 18, hears them on the way to his own room, wondering sadly how Rachel manages to not have nightmares from their father’s stories.

In Jonathan’s room, we learn from his thoughts that they’ve moved into this new home today, their third house in six years after leaving Wickham. Sadly, Ezra is more obsessed than ever with hunting down the Goodes and with each move he’s been positive he’s found them, but alas, he never has. On the other hand, the Fiers have become rich [Not prosperous, but rich! Stine must have consulted his thesaurus for this one!] thanks to Ezra bringing goods to sell in each new town. He’s an incredible salesman and always seems to know what the townspeople need, which is convenient.

Anyway, Jonathan answers a knock at the door and meets Delilah Wilson [Is this another secret Goode?!], a pretty brown-haired young woman who’s brought the Fiers a freshly baked apple pie to welcome them to the neighbourhood. Jane is delighted and invites Delilah in to share a slice with them, and Jonathan heads to the study to fetch his father. Ezra has no interest in meeting the neighbours and kicks his son out of the study, and as Jonathan heads back to the parlour, Rachel sneaks out of her room and follows him in.

It immediately becomes clear that poor, dead Abigail lives on in Jane’s mind as she mistakes Rachel for her dead eldest daughter, and not for the first time. Jonathan reminds his mother that it’s Rachel and the confusion passes, and Jane moves into the kitchen to prepare the pie. Delilah asks where they’ve moved from and Jonathan lists two of their previous towns, but doesn’t know how to explain why they’ve moved so often. Luckily for him, Rachel has no issue explaining the Fier curse to Delilah, starting by pointing at a large portrait Ezra had painted from memory of Abigail and declaring ‘”One of the Goodes got her”‘ [Hahahaha].

Jonathan worries that their pretty neighbour will think they’re crazy and never want to see them again, so he assures Delilah the curse is nonsense and insists their father’s inability to let the feud die is what has caused them trouble, pointing out that his quest for the Goodes has ruled the Fiers’ lives despite the Goodes themselves not doing anything to hurt them [Huh? What about Hester Goode luring your sister to her death? I mean, It wasn’t an alive Goode, but I still think it counts, right?].

Jonathan doesn’t like to think about Abigail and blames his father for her death, believing she’d still be alive ‘if it were not for Papa’s crazy ideas’ and if he hadn’t forced them to remain in lifeless Wickham. Rachel changes the subject, asking if Delilah has any siblings, but it turns out she’s an only child and lives with her father, her mother having died while giving birth to her. Jonathan takes a closer look at her clothes as she talks, noticing the expertly patched skirt and frayed sleeves of her green dress. She’s clearly poor, but Jonathan doesn’t mind because she’s the prettiest girl he’s ever seen [Cute, I like Jonathan. But he’s a Fier, so I’m not liking his chances of a happy life].

A few days later, Jonathan visits town and bumps into Delilah on his way home. She’s just been to visit her father at the church, where he leads a small congregation, to take him some food. She graciously accepts Jonathan’s offer to escort her home and on the way, he apologises for Rachel’s ramblings the other night. Delilah dismisses his concerns, admitting she believed wild stories herself at that age, like insisting all the windows were kept closed at night so a fox wouldn’t come in to steal her [Hahaha cute].

That night in bed, Jonathan can’t stop thinking about the beautiful Delilah and decides he’ll bring her a bouquet of flowers tomorrow [I love him] before a sudden sound in the distance breaks him from his thoughts. He briefly thinks it’s some kind of animal, but he’s never heard such a sound before! It ‘started low but quickly grew in pitch and volume’ and seems to get closer and closer to the house until it’s right outside his bedroom window!

Terrified, Jonathan stumbles to the window and gazes into the backyard, but there’s nothing out there and the sound has stopped, so he returns to bed. He lays awake all night, waiting for its return, but he doesn’t hear it again and in the morning, it doesn’t seem like anyone else heard it. As Jane prepares breakfast, Rachel heads to the yard to fetch a bucket of water, but her scream brings everyone running shortly after. The poor girl’s clothes are splattered with red and she’s crying hysterically, pointing at the bucket. Peeking inside, Jonathan gags as he sees it’s filled with ‘thick, red blood’.

Jonathan braves a look inside the well too, but it’s full of clean, clear water – only the bucket is filled with blood. Ezra declares that the Goodes have found them once again and must be nearby, either alive or buried, and calls Jonathan foolish when he insists the curse isn’t real:

Still dazed and shaken, Jonathan stared at the bucket of blood. The howl of agony he had heard in the night came rushing back to him.
Who, or what, could have done this? he wondered.
Was it the work of a crazy person? A wild animal?
Or could his father be right at all? Could it really be the curse of the Goodes?

[I get that Jonathan blames Ezra for Abigail’s death because really, it was his actions that led to it, but Jonathan saw Hester and her grave with his own eyes, so how could he possibly believe that there’s no truth to the curse?]. Later, Jonathan visits Delilah’s home and meets her father, who seems quite pleasant. They leave the reverend to finish his sermon and go for a walk, where Jonathan confides in her about the sound he heard last night and the bucket of blood, and wonders if maybe the curse is real after all.

Delilah assures him there must be a reasonable explanation, but neither of them can think of one and she urges him to forget about the curse, to ‘”Let it be your father’s obsession, not yours”‘ [Such a sensible gal!]. Jonathan would have said exactly the same thing before these last two events but now isn’t sure, but he’s glad to have someone to confide in [Don’t get too happy, it won’t last, my dude].

He goes to bed early that night but is awakened later to a creaking sound in the hall. Upon investigation, he finds his mother sleepwalking, calling out for Abigail to come back. Curious, Jonathan follows her down the stairs but stops her as she opens the back door, realising she’s not sleepwalking and knows exactly what she’s doing:

“It is Abigail,” his mother whispered, tears rolling down her quivering cheeks. “She called to me. She is out there, waiting for me.”

Jane insists she’s not dreaming, that Abigail’s in the backyard, but Jonathan peers outside and sees no sign of anyone. He manages to get his reluctant mother back to bed and neither of them mention it the next day. The same thing happens again that night though, but Jonathan hears his father bringing Jane back to bed [Poor Jane 🙁 I feel so bad for the women who marry into the family]. Jane stays in bed for the next few days but continues to roam the house at night calling for her lost daughter, and Rachel suggests she and Jonathan can do something nice for their mother, like plant some roses to grow along the trellis by her window.

Their gardening session is soon interrupted by the beautiful Delilah and they take a rest break under a tree with some refreshing lemon water. Delilah admits she’s been worried about them and wanted to check in [So sweet], and Rachel tells her how their mother believes Abigail is beckoning to her from the garden at night. Delilah suggests that Jane’s just been having the same dream every night, and although Jonathan’s not so sure, he’s grateful that she’s trying to ease their fears. That night, however, Jonathan is awakened himself by a little girl calling out to him:

“Beware, my brother,” the voice said again. “Or your fate will be worse than mine!”
Jonathan sat up. “Rachel?” he called. “Rachel? Where are you?”
“No,” whispered the voice again. “No, not Rachel. I am Abigail.”

Jonathan jumps up and searches the room but there’s not sign of anyone else there, let alone his dead sister. He returns to bed, wondering if his mother’s madness is getting to him now, but Rachel appears at his door, eyes wide with fear, and reveals she saw Abigail outside her window, warning her [!!!]. While she doesn’t remember what Abigail actually looked like, Rachel says the girl she saw looked like the portrait Ezra had painted, white cap with blue ribbons and all, and Jonathan realises that maybe his mother has been telling the truth. But what has Abigail’s spirit come to warn them about [Hester Goode also wore a white cap with blue ribbons so maybe it’s her trying to lure more Fiers to their doom?!]?

The next day, Jonathan visits Delilah who immediately breaks down upon learning of Rachel and Jonathan’s encounters with Abigail [Or whatever spirit it really may be…]. She’s so worried about him and his family, and would never wish them harm, but reveals she and her father are leaving by the end of the week. Delilah seems to think the Fiers’ troubles will cease once she and her father are gone [Which is super suss. Are they Goodes? Is this another doomed Fier-Goode relationship?], but Jonathan’s too busy begging her not to leave to see a potential connection as he realises he’s in love with her. Delilah says it’s for the best that she leaves but won’t explain why, leaving Jonathan heartbroken and wondering ‘Why is she so sad, and so mysterious?”

The next morning, Jonathan’s woken at dawn by a bloodcurdling scream from the backyard and follows Ezra and Rachel outside to investigate after they realise Jane’s missing. All three of them heard the scream, but over the next few hours find no trace of the matriarch or anything else out of the ordinary. After stopping for some water from the well, they find the bucket a lot heavier than usual [Oh shit, you know what that means!], and it takes both Jonathan and Ezra to haul it up:

At the end of the well rope, sprawled over the bucket, was the body of his mother.
Her skin was blue and bloated. Her wet hair plastered against her skull and face. Her soaked nightgown clung tightly to her lifeless form.

[My instincts are telling me Delilah Wilson and her father are really Goodes, and maybe Hester was Delilah’s sister and is now haunting the Fiers pretending to be Abigail]. Later that afternoon, Jonathan’s finally admitted that the curse is real, and suddenly the reason for Delilah’s mysterious desire to leave becomes clear. He dashes over to her house, closely followed by Rachel, and demands to hear from straight from the horse’s mouth the secret he’s already worked out, and she tearfully confirms her lineage.

Delilah explains that the name change was to prevent people from running them out of town, since the news of the plague in Wickham was spreading and word was getting around that the Goodes had caused it. She apologises for not telling them earlier, but she’d been hoping the curse wasn’t real, and suggests the only way to end the feud is for a Fier and a Goode to marry. Luckily for both families, Delilah and Jonathan are in love and he proposes then and there. Delilah’s concerned that the curse could prevent their union, so they decide to head to the church so Delilah’s father can marry them ASAP, sending Rachel home so Ezra doesn’t get suspicious of their whereabouts [Wait, Delilah introduced Jonathan to her father already, so he knows the Fiers live nearby. He’s gotta be the one causing all the drama, right? I refuse to believe he’s unbothered about being neighbours with the Fiers].

In the church, the ceremony is almost over when Ezra bursts in, a rifle in his hand. He’d forced Rachel to tell him what was going on and the little girl is trying to hold him back, but she’s no match for his determination to kill all Goodes. He calls Jonathan a traitor as both men wrestle with the gun, but it’s Jonathan who gets the upper hand and in the struggle, the rifle goes off, shooting Delilah in the stomach [Oh no!].

As Jonathan cradles his dead wife, Ezra retrieves the gun and prepares to kill Reverend Wilson, because ‘”All Goodes will die”‘. The man begs for his life, revealing neither he or Delilah are Goodes [Omg whatttttt? Didn’t see that coming hahaha]. He explains that he and Delilah are just sooOooOo00O0o00Oo0o poor and he really wanted her to marry Jonathan, so when Delilah told him of the feud between the Fiers and the Goodes, he forced his daughter to trick Jonathan into marrying her [Woooooooow]:

“I forced Delilah to pretend that she was a Goode,” Reverend Wilson confessed sadly. “But I knew you would not marry her just because of that. So she made you think your dead sister was haunting you. She made terrible screaming noises at night. Delilah filled your well bucket with chicken blood. She made a cap with blue ribbons on it, like the one she saw in a painting of your sister. And she climbed your rose trellis to appear in your windows at night.”
Ezra lowered the rifle. His face grew red and his jaw trembled as he listened.
“Delilah lured your mother outside with that blue-ribboned cap,” the minister continued in a quivering voice. “She threw it into the well. Your mother leaned over to retrieve it. And—she fell into the well…”
He swallowed hard. “Delilah tried to help her, but she couldn’t reach her.”

[Wowee, that’s a good little plot twist!]. He admits they just wanted to get the Fiers desperate enough to agree to a marriage, but the joke’s on the Reverend because Jonathan asserts that he would have married Delilah regardless of her last name [Just another pointless casualty of the curse :(]. A mournful Ezra flees the church screaming, but is quickly run over by a hose-drawn wagon [Hahahahaha]. Before he succumbs to his impending death, he hands over the amulet to Jonathan and instructs him to use it to avenge his death. Jonathan’s got other plans though, deciding ‘the curse dies with my father’ [I’m gonna call bullshit, because we’ve still got a third left of this book and there’s one last book to round out the trilogy!].

Since no minister will give him a funeral and no graveyard wants the insane man buried there, Jonathan has Ezra cremated and stores his ashes in an iron strongbox. He then places the amulet inside, too, and buries it outside under the same tree he’d sat under with Delilah and Rachel sipping lemon water, satisfied that the curse is finished and ‘The Fiers and the Goodes will suffer no more’.

Shadyside Village, 1900

Back to Nora, who holds her breathe as the footsteps pass [Lol I forgot about that] before picking up the pen and continuing her story [Poor thing must have carpal tunnel by now!]:

“Jonathan Fier hoped he could bury the curse along with Ezra’s ashes,” she wrote. “And it seemed to be true. The evil stayed buried for one hundred years. For one hundred years the Goodes and the Fiers lived in peace.
“In fact, the feud was forgotten. Children grew up hearing none of the horrifying stories. They knew nothing of the curse upon the two families.”

Until Jonathan’s great-great granddaughter ‘innocently unleashed the evil once again’, that is! [Oh, so that’s what the 100-year break means. A break in the curse, not a break in the family tree. Still, weird thing to include in the tree then lol].

Western Massachusetts, 1843

We pick up with 16-year-old Elizabeth Fier digging beneath the apple tree on the Fier farm, which has been in the family for 100 years and allowed them to live prosperous lives [I guess we had to have the word pop up somewhere, right?]. The apple tree has died recently and Elizabeth plans to grow a garden there in its place. Naturally, she stumbles across the iron strongbox and it easily opens thanks to the hinges rusting off. She finds a layer of ‘coarse gray dust’ covering the bottom [Ezra’s ashes lol, gross] along with a curious amulet [Oh shit].

At dinner, she shows the amulet to her family – mother Katherine, father Samuel, and siblings, 17-year-old Kate and 18-year-old Simon [The original Simon Fier!]. No-one’s ever seen anything like it, wondering why it was buried, and Elizabeth decides she’ll wear it as a good-luck charm [Good luck with that, hun].

As soon as she puts it on, however, her nick tingles and her eyes burn, and when she opens them again, she’s surrounded by fire! It’s just a vivid daydream though, brought on by her hunger, she assumes, and she soon forgets about it as the family tucks into their turkey dinner [Gobble gobble!].

Over the next few weeks, the amulet becomes Elizabeth’s new favourite piece of jewellery, which she never takes it off. The family is sitting down to dinner one night when there’s a knock at the door. Elizabeth answers it and comes face to face with a dirty, ragged drifter. He stares at her amulet [He’s a Goode!] before asking if there’s any food to be spared, which he’ll happily work for, and Samuel Fier invites him to eat dinner with them since there’s plenty to go around.

The drifter is ever so grateful and introduces himself as Franklin, but they can call him Frank as he considers them all his friends now [Wow, clingy]. Over dinner, the friendly Fiers ask him about his life, and Frank reveals he used to live on a farm with his parents and six brothers, but he lost it all, so roams around picking up work and food wherever he can. Once he’s full, he offers to complete any task they wish in return for their kindness, but the good-natured Fiers won’t hear of him working for his supper and insist he has a nice hot bath instead.

Afterwards, Elizabeth’s pleasantly surprised to see that not only does Frank scrub up nicely, with combed hair and some borrowed clothes from Simon, but he’s also at least 10 years younger than she initially believed, ‘closer to twenty than thirty’. Elizabeth thinks he’s super handsome and can’t wait to find out more about him, and as she absentmindedly grasps the amulet around her neck, it grows warmer in her hand [Bad sign, Elizabeth!].

We then get a quick look into Frank’s perspective, where it’s revealed the young man has some sinister plans in store for the Fiers who’ve so kindly [And stupidly, but they don’t know any better] taken him in:

I will wait. I will wait until they all love me as much as they love one another. I will wait and endure it all.
Then I will turn on them—and that will make it all worthwhile. I will enjoy the shock and terror in their faces. It will make up for everything my family suffered at their hands and all the pain I have endured to find them.
I, Franklin—the last of the Goodes.

The last of the Goodes thanks the family for their hospitality and prepares to set off, warning “if you are too kind, you will have ragged drifters like Franklin Goode at your door every night!”‘ [Not using a fake last name, huh? Did he somehow know the Fiers weren’t aware of the curse anymore? Weird]. The Fiers fall right into Frank’s trap and insist he stay the night, and Elizabeth silently rejoices as she gets the guest room ready for him, imagining herself as Mrs. Franklin Goode [Oh, honey].

The next day, Elizabeth kindly takes Frank some water as he chops wood, and he compliments her blue eyes, likening them to the colour of the ocean. They then take a leisurely stroll through the woods, resting at a clearing with two large, flat rocks where Elizabeth and her siblings used to play. It brings back memories of Old Aggie, a little old woman the kids used to see walking in the woods from time to time, running away whenever they saw her. Everyone believed she was a witch, and Elizabeth’s not sure if she’s still alive [I think we can assume she is though, since she’s being mentioned].

Frank notices the amulet around her neck and Elizabeth tells him it’s her good-luck charm, but has no idea of its origins or what the Latin on the back means. He tells her ‘”Someday you might need a real protector”‘, because the world is so dangerous, and Elizabeth absolutely swoons, wondering if he’s falling in love with her [Little does she know she needs protecting from him!].

At dinner, the Fiers sit around the table and listen eagerly as Frank tells them all about his many adventures, and finally Katherine asks what happened to his family. Frank reveals that one by one his parents, then his six older brothers, died suddenly without any signs of sickness or ill health, until only he remained. Doctors couldn’t explain what happened and no families wanted to take the then-12-year-old Frank in in case the same thing happened to them, so he’s been on his own ever since.

Elizabeth tears up at his story and notices sister Kate’s eyes watering too as she hangs on every word, Elizabeth immediately gets jealous because ‘Why was Kate gazing at Frank that way?’ [For the same reason you are, dumbass!]. After dinner the family moves into the parlour, where Elizabeth confides in Kate that she likes Frank very much. Kate likes him too, but seems to be ’embarrassed as if she had been caught in a lie’ and rushes from the room [She’s in luuuurve]. Frank, who’s playing chess with Simon, notices Kate’s exit and smirks to himself, satisfied at how easily his plan is coming together.

Later that week, Frank is indeed living with the family, and each day he and Elizabeth have been strolling through the woods to the clearing. No-one else knows about it, of course, and Elizabeth finds herself looking more and more forward to their walks. As they reach the clearing today, Simon lingers behind her and playfully tugs the red ribbon from her hair, dangling it along her throat as she giggles. Unbeknownst to her though, he’s got the ends of the ribbon wrapped around his index fingers and is about to strangle the poor girl with it [!!!].

Before he can make his move though, Old Aggie appears walking through the woods. Startled by her presence, Elizabeth grabs Franks hands and drags him toward home, not stopping until they’re safely in the yard. She explains who the woman was, and although Frank thinks she’s just a harmless old woman, Elizabeth somehow knows she’s not, because ‘”There is something different about her”‘. She notices how disappointed Frank looks about their spoiled afternoon, and is certain he was going to propose to her this afternoon [Oh sweetie, no :(]. They enter the house and are spotted by Kate, who gawks at them before running from the room, much to Elizabeth’s confusion [Use your brain, hun].

A few weeks later, Elizabeth’s knitting a scarf for Kate’s birthday while waiting for Frank so they can take their walk when Kate bursts in in a very good mood. Samuel, Simon and Katherine hear her excitement and come to see what all the fuss is about, and Kate reveals Frank’s asked her to marry him!

[Cheeky Frank is destroying their sisterly bond!] The family is ecstatic, except for Elizabeth who protests that Frank loves her, unable to comprehend how her own sister could do this to her. Kate’s as confused as the rest of the Fiers though, and Elizabeth flees into the woods before they can ask what she’s on about. She calls out for Frank as she heads to the clearing, tossing the knitting and needles down when she realises she’s still clutching them.

Kate quickly runs after her, and their parents instruct Simon to follow them too, so into the woods he goes, wondering where Frank is this whole time. He can hear the girls’ voices up ahead until suddenly there’s a horrible scream. He quickens his pace, eventually reaching the clearing where he notices something dark behind the large rocks:

“Ohh.” He gripped the top of the rock as his eyes landed on Kate’s body. She lay sprawled on her back, her light brown hair spread out around her head like a halo. Her pale blue eyes were open, reflecting the sky.
Simon gripped the rock till his hand hurt. “Kate?”
She did not answer. She stared up lifelessly, a knitting needle plunged through her heart.

[Wow, surely Frank did that] We cut to later that day, where a dishevelled Elizabeth rocks back and forth in a chair by the fire, repeating that Kate was a liar and Frank loves her. Samuel, Katherine and Simon all can’t believe Elizabeth killed her sister, and don’t believe her claims of innocence. Frank’s sitting on the couch, watching them all, but eventually crouches beside Elizabeth and argues that she would never kill anyone. The Fiers just storm from the room though, leaving Elizabeth alone to be gaslit by Frank:

“It is hard for a mother and father to imagine their own child killing herself,” Frank went on. “But I know that is what happened. Kate killed herself. Your parents did not see it, Simon did not see it, but you and I could see it. Kate was going mad.”
Elizabeth nodded. All that strange behaviour. It was the only logical explanation.
“Kate was jealous of you,” Frank said. “You know I never told Kate I would marry her. How could I? I am in love with you.”
He kissed her hands. Elizabeth drank in every word he said.
“Kate made it up,” said Frank. “She made up that whole story about our engagement. She ran right to you to tell you first. I think she really believed it was true. She was mad, truly mad, the poor girl.”

Elizabeth realises her family will never believe the truth that she didn’t kill her sister, and agrees to run away with Frank tonight to elope. Meanwhile, Frank’s silently gloating about how they’ll both leave tonight, but only he will return. Then his thoughts turn to how confused Kate had been when she saw Frank in the woods, not understanding his betrayal until the last second when he plunged the knitting needle through her heart. He can’t wait for the rest of the Fiers to feel that betrayal too [Get it over with, Frank! I like these Fiers too much to read about them suffering]!

That night, a restless and mournful Simon heads to the clearing, needing to get out of the house and away from his family’s grief. As he sits on one of the rocks, Old Aggie appears and gazes into his palm before declaring that Franklin Goode killed Kate and is plotting Elizabeth’s death right now, and will destroy the whole family if he’s not stopped. Simon isn’t sure whether to believe her or not, but Old Aggie rambles on, revealing the family is under ‘”a curse cast by the Goodes, and by your own evil history”‘. She explains the Fiers’ fate lies in their name, as the letters can be rearranged to spell fire [OK, how did I never pick up on that?], which is how they will meet their end.

Old Aggie hands Simon a dagger dipped in poison, so one scratch to the enemy’s skin with it will kill him, but it will only work once. She then sends him back home, where Simon can see the kitchen filled with light while the rest of the house is dark. Bursting in, he’s met with the grisly scene of his mother sprawled on the floor and his father slumped over the table, pools of blood surrounding them. Elizabeth cowers in a corner by the hearth, Frank Goode standing over her, the axe he used to murder Samuel and Katherine with raised above his head.

He swings it down as Simon just watches [What the hell are you doing, Simon?!], chopping off a clump of Elizabeth’s hair and laughing gleefully as he tells her he’s just teasing, but the next one will be for real. But before he can off her, he wants to gloat:

Frank turned to Simon and smiled.
“The Fiers nearly won,” he said. “Your family nearly managed to destroy the Goodes forever. That is what your ancestors wanted, is it not? To wipe us from the face of the earth?”

[…]
“In the end, though,” Frank continued slowly, calmly, “the Goodes will survive. I am the last of my family—but that is enough. I have served my ancestors well. I have lived to destroy the Fiers.”

Frank swings the axe toward Simon who ducks out of the way, and the axe gets stuck in the dining table instead. Hoping Old Aggie was right about the dagger, Simon pulls it out and scratches it across Frank’s arm, who laughs and decides to kill Elizabeth first instead [What? Why?]. He easily dislodges the axe and turns back to Elizabeth as Simon hopelessly realises that not only did the dagger not work, but he’s not strong enough to overpower Frank himself [Well, you could at least try, Simon]. Lucky for Elizabeth and Simon, Frank suddenly drops dead and the siblings embrace as Simon gazes at his dead parents:

They had always been kind, good people, Simon knew. They were kind and took in a starving drifter—and he murdered them in return.
Kate had never harmed anyone in her life. And she had been brutally, coldly murdered, too.
Goodness is weakness, Simon told himself. That is clear to me now.
Goodness is weakness.
Only evil can fight evil.

[What do we reckon, is being good and kind weak?]. Elizabeth can’t help feeling her amulet had a hand in saving them and gifts it to Simon, wanting him to hold its power from now on. Upon placing it around his neck, Simon immediately feels warm and sees fire briefly when he closes his eyes. Then he leads Elizabeth out of the house, satisfied that with the last Goode dead, ‘the curse has been erased’, although Old Aggie’s words about the Fiers meeting their end through fire still play on his mind. He decides that changing the spelling of his last name will abolish the feud and the curse once and for all:

I am no longer Simon Fier.
Now and forever I will be known as Simon FEAR.

[Ohhhh, so that’s how Fear came about. Interesting].

Village of Shadyside, 1900

Back to Nora now, who stares at what she’s just written and wishes Simon had been right, so her beloved Daniel would still be alive and she could be living with the man she loves. But the story isn’t over yet so there’s no time to cry, ‘For now comes the tale of Simon Fear—the most horrifying chapter of all’, and the book ends there [Can’t wait for book three!].

Final thoughts

Loved it, definitely on par with the first one. I couldn’t stop reading! I enjoyed Jonathan’s plots; I thought he was a great character and the resentment he had toward his father and the curse rather than the Goodes was an interesting plot and a very welcome addition to a sequel that easily could have been more or less the same story as the first book. I also really loved Elizabeth’s family – who’d have thought Fiers could be so lovely?!? I would have liked to spend some more time with them, though, because I feel like there was less of an impact when her family died because we never really saw Elizabeth without Frank around and we didn’t see much of the other family members either.

I’m looking forward to the next book, and praying it’s just as good as the first two!

86 buckets of chicken blood out of 97!