June 2016 Group Read: Hex

[Tracy]

This is the place to discuss this month's group read!



Whoever is born here, is doomed to stay 'til death. Whoever settles, never leaves.

Welcome to Black Spring, the seemingly picturesque Hudson Valley town haunted by the Black Rock Witch, a 17th century woman whose eyes and mouth are sewn shut. Muzzled, she walks the streets and enters your homes at will. She stands next to your bed for nights on end. Everybody knows that her eyes may never be opened.

The elders of Black Spring have virtually quarantined the town by using high-tech surveillance to prevent their curse from spreading. Frustrated with being kept in lockdown, the town's teenagers decide to break their strict regulations and go viral with the haunting, but in so doing send the town spiraling into the dark, medieval practices of the past.


Let's discuss!

[Latasha]

I'm listening to this for another group I'm in. 'm hoping to start sometime this week, so i'll just add my comments here too.

[Empress Reece (Hooked on Books)]

Same here : )

[Latasha]

I'm starting Tuesday at the latest.

[Latasha]

this book is not anything at all like I thought it would be. this is the vibe I'm getting from it- they put the pines and paranorman in a blender and this is what came out. oh and with a dash of the lottery as well. I'm well into part 2 but come on! let's talk about the witch!

[Latasha]

I finished. well, it was ok. I did zone out a little towards the end but I think I got it. (view spoiler)[ do you think the witch was really Katherine or someone else from the past that was in the same situation as Steve? or did I miss that detail in my spacing out? (hide spoiler)]

[Eva]

Started Hex a lot later than I had planned, but am about 25 % in now and it still has not really managed to grab me.
I thought it's gonna be a lot darker, instead it is almost comical!? Not laugh out funny comical, more involuntarily comical.
Hope, the witch will show a bit more action than just stumbling around town with a tea towel over her face.

[Eva]

Finished it and am rather disappointed. The book tried so many things at once and didn't seem to get anything right: it wasn't funny, it wasn't scary, it was no comment on society nor was it that well written.
Well, it just wasn't for me.
Latasha, don't know about your question, because I only skimmed over the ending (view spoiler)[ I never thought though that it is someone other than Katherine. Steve was able to relate to her and her situation from what he knew of her story. But come on: should I really believe that Steve rather let his younger son and wife burn to a crisp instead of saving them, so that he could welcome back his Zombie son?! And then to blind himself before welcoming his son from the undead. He really opted for the worst-case-scenario here!! I thought the author just tried to shock the reader and wanted to pile one thing onto the other. Way too much and not a very convincing ending! (hide spoiler)]

[Empress Reece (Hooked on Books)]

Eva wrote: "Finished it and am rather disappointed. The book tried so many things at once and didn't seem to get anything right: it wasn't funny, it wasn't scary, it was no comment on society nor was it that w..."

I tried to read a little more of this last night and the whole thing is just absurd and goofy. They sit around eating dinner, joking around with a witch standing around like this is normal. The one son, Matt, eats dinner half naked with just a towel on? And like you said Eva, they just throw a dish towel over the witch's head and she just carries on like that which I didn't find remotely funny or scary either. Add to that, all the other weird stuff with that neighborhood and I literally felt like I was in the Twilight Zone!!

I'm definitely not feeling this one at all so I'm more then likely going to DNF it.