Area teenagers repeatedly make bad choices, this time in abandoned subway tunnels.

66. Survive the Night – Danielle Vega

There were a lot of dirty feet in this book. The main character gets paint on her feet after she almost loses a “leather ballet flat” (being that specific happened a few too many times) climbing down; later she loses her shoes entirely in some seriously disgusting water. One of the group takes off her shoes and walks barefoot through the streets of NYC before also occasionally not wearing shoes at the underground rave. If she wasn’t being targeted by a monster she’d have tetanus. A homeless kid with plastic bags on his feet seemed to be the most prepared for the underground rave in disused subway tunnels. Good work, Lawrence.

Casey just got out of rehab for Oxy (familiar) and as soon as she goes to the clean girls’ sleepover and tries to get on with the sober life her past comes rumbling up in an old Buick to whisk her away to the sewers. Her “best friend” Shana takes her to trigger-central- her ex-boyfriend’s band’s show, and when she makes it through that unscathed, they hunt down the underground rave…where she drugs her drink. What a best friend!! What a homecoming!

In the two books of Vega’s I’ve read the narrators could be swapped. They’re good girls for the most part, trying to be- at least, and they get in over their heads with shitty female friends and supernatural elements. They feel hollow and rush into make outs- although, point to Survive the Night, it’s her ex-boyfriend so it’s earned. But – It’s basically a blessing when the tentacle monster shows up.

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Salem is waiting by his personalized plastic pumpkin for the tentacle monster to give it a high-four and return its shoes.