The Lost Mind in Read with The PikeCast

Jan 04, 2022 Thomas rated it liked it

When it comes to Christopher Pike, I am mostly familiar with Spooksville. I even did a blog post all about it. I have heard about the YA work he is mostly known for but I hadn't read any of it in full. Until now. The Midnight Club is being adapted into a series later this year and I decided to tie into it. But I wanted to go a bit bigger than just doing one here and there.

So every month I will read one Pike YA book leading up to whenever that series comes out. Maybe I'll keep going after it depe When it comes to Christopher Pike, I am mostly familiar with Spooksville. I even did a blog post all about it. I have heard about the YA work he is mostly known for but I hadn't read any of it in full. Until now. The Midnight Club is being adapted into a series later this year and I decided to tie into it. But I wanted to go a bit bigger than just doing one here and there.

So every month I will read one Pike YA book leading up to whenever that series comes out. Maybe I'll keep going after it depending on when that comes out or what I've done. Either way it will be randomized so it will be a crapshoot of how good or notable each one is. I do hope to get to the big ones even if they don't get pick at some point. But for now I obey the wheel. I am very interested to see how this goes. I'm not allowing the adult books, sequels so I don't get bogged down in too much of the same, the Final Friends trilogy for same reasons, the two short story ones, and Whisper of Death because...yeah no. (I think some 2010's ones are stand alone YA but even if so, skipping those too,)

First up, is a later-ish one. Published in August 1995, this is when he was really pumping them out. This would be the last thing he did before Spooksville came out in October. He isn't big on his later work as it was rushed to meet deadlines and such. Reading it, I can kinda see it.

A girl wakes up next to a dead body with no memory. She has no idea who she is, who the murdered person and doesn't recall anything about their lives. She must figure out who she is, why this person was killed, and all that jazz. So I didn't know how to rate this one. In the end I say I kinda liked it but it was teetering on a 2.5.

The best aspect is the setup. From page one it sucked me in and I was really interested to see where it would go. The writing is solid, mostly early on as things come into view. It's a setup I tend to like, and it is somewhat interesting how things unfold.

It's a slow burn at 213 pages, and I do mean slow. Things happen just enough to keep me kinda interested but it could have been shorter. It's not super thrilling, with not that much action of horror. It's more about mystery. Ir's both kinda interesting and kinda dull. We find out more about the lives of those people and it's sorta interesting but not always hugely so.

I liked the stuff with Jennifer and her brother, it's more wholesome than I expect from these. This gets into some weird places due to some dreams and the explanation of what is going on. It is both weirdly complicated/hard to understand and a bit too simple at the same time. By the very end I sorta get but still nor quite.

It's weird. Pike apparently goes to some spiritual places and there's plenty of that here. It's kinda neat but confusing. It actually ends on a solid note, which is what pulled this up. It's not amazing but it was nice and at least left me with a fine feeling.

The rest was an odd mix, some interesting stuff but some under-cooked sutff to. Jen is a blank slate on purpose which is fine but even as more is found out, it's not all super deep. There's a jerk boyfriend because of course there is. There is a middle eastern character named Amir who is alright at first but things get more iffy with him as we go on. Not awful but not great. We do get commentary on how these cops accuse him though, that was something.

I can tell Pike's work can be a lot but while this has tropes in there, the extreme stuff is toned down. There's sex and death but not to a big extent. I kinda wanted more but I get wanting to do something kinda different. I imagine he has done some of these ideas in other places.

Overall, the wheel didn't pick an ideal one but it wasn't bad. It can get too dull and confusing with a few iffy bits, but it is compelling enough and kept me at mildly interested and the ending worked mostly fine. It could have been so much more but for what we got, my easy to please myself got enough out of it.

I'm hoping more exciting stuff is ahead of me though. Next month, the wheel has picked thankfully takes to an early one. And it's one of those ones I found thrifting. Woo hoo. See ya then. ...more

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Mar 31, 2022 Leah rated it liked it

Definitely not one of his strongest works. In fact the main character was super frustrating up until the last chapter when things finally started getting explained better. It was still kind of a muddy explanation, but props for originality, as usual!

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