Last year, Ollie had a normal life, with an adventurous mother and an artistic father and friends, attending softball practice and
chess club meetings. This year, everything's wrong, and has been since their family of three became a family of two. Shutting out
everyone, even her father, she buries herself in books, her only steadfast friends. Books, after all, never talk to her like she's a
fragile eggshell or give her the dreaded "sympathy face"... which is why she was so horrified the day she found the madwoman about to
throw a book into the creek. Ollie snatches it from the woman and flees. It's a strange book titled "Small Spaces", which tells a
strange, sad ghost story of two quarreling brothers, a tragedy, and a terrible bargain made with the Smiling Man who emerged from the
mists after sundown. Only by hiding in small spaces after dark can one avoid his terrible minions.
When Ollie's sixth-grade class takes a trip to the local organic farm, things start seeming awfully familiar to her from the book,
down to the names on the stones in the rundown graveyard. And when the bus breaks down on the way back to school and the teacher
vanishes into the darkness, a strange mist creeps in... Now Ollie and a couple of unlikely classmates are caught in a ghost story of
their own - but "Small Spaces" had no happy ending. Will their story end badly, too?
Review
Small Spaces is a solid middle-grade horror tale of regret, loss, and the folly of bargains made on misty nights with smiling
strangers. Ollie is having trouble processing the death of her mother, a woman so full of love and life that it seems impossible that
either could simply stop existing in a single terrible moment. Her grief turns to anger and resentment at her classmates and teachers
and even her own father at times, and the more anyone tries to help, the more she lashes out. The little black book's tale offers echoes
of her own life-warping grief and the lengths some people will go to in order to cling to something that is lost - and the terrible
price that effort exacts, often paid by others. Still, she's not so far gone that she's entirely oblivious, and she soon realizes that
there's something very not right about Misty Hollow Farm and its staff... not to mention the numerous creepy scarecrows dotting the
fields and gardens, scarecrows that become much more creepy (and ambulatory) after sundown. She has two companions essentially forced on
her by circumstance, the last two people in the class she'd ever want with her - clumsy new girl Coco, with her pink hair and babbly
mouth, whom nobody really likes, and popular hockey star Brian, whom Ollie always took for a brainless jock - but they turn into a decent
team in their struggle to escape the Smiling Man's dark world, also helping her process the grief she's been avoiding. The tale does a
pretty good job ratcheting up the tension and generating scares and conjuring spooky imagery, building up to a fine finale. (And I give
marks to the audio presentation; even when the narrator dropped into creepy, creaky voices, the sound quality was decent.) The ending
itself feels a little neat, given what everyone went through, but wraps things up well enough.
Coco used to be the new girl at school who many people didn't much like, too bubbly and clumsy and with pink hair to boot. That was
before the incident on the school trip to the farm, where she and two classmates, Ollie and Brian, found themselves pulled into the
world beyond the mists, a world of malevolent living scarecrows and mournful ghosts and a dark entity known as the Smiling Man, who
offers wishes and plays games with terrible strings attached. Since surviving that, the three kids have been best friends. Now, they're
on their way to a week at a new ski resort in the Vermont mountains, Hemlock Lodge, along with Ollie's widower father and Coco's single
mother (who seems to be spending a lot of time with Ollie's dad lately). They're all looking forward to a vacation... but even before
they get there, in the heart of a snowstorm, there are signs of trouble ahead. A phantom figure appears in the road, as though to bar
the way. Nightmares warn about the "dead voices". And when they get to Hemlock Lodge, they find the power has failed and no other
guests have been able to brave the roads. Then the stranger shows up and tells them of the lodge's haunted past, and the ghosts who may
still be stalking the halls. Like it or not, Coco and her friends are about to experience another close encounter with the
supernatural... only, this time, they may not escape with their lives.
Review
I enjoyed Small Spaces, and had no idea Arden had extended the series into a quartet. While the first book focused mainly
on Ollie as she came to terms with her mother's loss, this one shifts focus to small (and often underestimated) Coco. She likes her
friends, and they like her, but sometimes she still feels out of place among them; they like books she doesn't like, and games she
doesn't play, and sometimes it seems she doesn't belong with them much at all, despite their shared secrets. While Ollie still has a
major role to play and more issues to work out, this time about her father possibly being ready to move on from her mother (who still
seems to maintain a presence in Ollie's life through her peculiar watch), it's Coco's turn to step up and face the challenges of the
phantom threat, one that may have a very familiar face underneath it all. As before, the adults are pretty much sidelined while the
kids are left to deal with the (no real spoiler, as it's a horror title) all-too-real malevolent spirits of Hemlock Lodge. Also as
before, there's plenty of creepy imagery and scary moments and a few nice twists along the way. I enjoyed it, and hope to get to the
rest of the quartet soon.
It's springtime in Vermont, but the chill still hasn't left Ollie, Brian, and Coco. Ever since last fall's field trip to a local
farm went terribly wrong, the three kids have been haunted, quite literally, by the "smiling man" and his ghostly minions. Though
they've plunged themselves into research on the supernatural - to the point their grades are slipping, and Brian's parents even
threaten to keep him from seeing Ollie and Coco as possibly "bad influences" on their son - they have yet to find a way to break
the monster's power... but, surely, there must be places even his hand can't reach, like the waters of Lake Champlain.
Coco's mother, an investigative reporter, gets them all tickets on a local sightseeing tour whose theme is "Champ", the legendary
lake monster. The captain even claims to have seen it three times... not up close, but certainly there was something far too big to
be a fish in the water. Still, it's a nice day to be on the lake... or it was a nice day, until Phil, the captain's nephew and
one-time best friend of Brian, reels in a strange silvery sea "snake", and something massive attacks the boat, tearing out the
engine and leaving them stranded by an island that isn't on any charts - an island that may not even exist in the ordinary world,
but beyond the mists in the domain of the smiling man. Monsters, ghosts, and a local legend collide as the three kids, Phil, and
Ollie's Dad and Coco's mother fight for survival - and this time, not everyone will make it out alive.
Review
The third installment of the Small Spaces horror quartet steps up the threat and tension of the "smiling man" and the
hauntings that have plagued the core trio for half a year now. This time, Brian steps to the forefront; his parents have noticed
that he's not the same as he was before the strange disappearance at the farm, and are wondering whether his new friends are to
blame. He himself starts to realize that he's been pushing people away, out of fear that any friends he makes or confides in might
become targets of the supernatural forces that have taken a personal interest in himself, Ollie, and Coco. (This is also why they
haven't told their parents what's going on; even given the high likelihood that the adults wouldn't believe them, they're all
terrified of endangering their families.) When Brian has a run-in with Phil, who was his best friend before the fateful field trip,
he realizes that the three of them may not actually be the only kids who remember what happened in the corn fields like they
thought... and how much worse must it have been for Phil to not only remember having been turned into a living scarecrow, but not
be believed and lose his one-time best friend Brian at the same time? Even as the group considers whether to draw Phil into their
confidence, it seems the smiling man is reaching out once again, first with a cryptic warning and then with the sea serpent attack
that strands everyone on the impossible island. This time, two adults are endangered as well, in a way that makes it impossible to
ignore that what's going on is outside the bounds of normal reality, but it's still the kids who have to figure out how to escape
this latest trap - a trap with ties to Lake Champlain's history and a mysterious shipwreck that eerily mirrors their own
circumstances.
As before, Arden delivers some deep chills and thrills and tangible threat. The kids sometimes stumble and make mistakes, but do
the best they can given the circumstances and the information they have. It builds to a very tense climax that changes the stakes
dramatically, setting up the fourth and final installment. I will definitely be looking for the last book soon.
The Small Spaces quartet, Book 4 Katherine Arden G. P. Putnam's Sons Fiction, MG Horror Themes: Circuses, Diversity, Ghosts, Girl Power ****
Description
Last autumn, Ollie, Brian, and Coco first encountered the terrifying entity known as the smiling man, devious player of
games and captor of the unwitting, on a school field trip to a farm near their small Vermont town. In winter, they had their
second encounter at an empty mountain lodge. Three months ago, in spring, the smiling man made yet another play for the
children... and, this time, Ollie struck a terrible bargain to save the lives of her father and her friends. Now, nobody but
Brian, Coco, and Brian's friend and fellow survivor Phil remember anything about that terrible time on the island in Lake
Champlain, where they faced ghosts and the legendary lake monster Champ itself. Even Ollie's dad thinks she drowned in a
"boating accident", and doesn't recall how she leapt into the waters to free them all. But part of Ollie's bargain was that
her friends would get one chance to win her freedom. Though they've watched and waited, there has been no sign of the
smiling man - until, one hot August day at the local swimming hole, a terrified boy stumbles up the creek babbling words
that seem like utter nonsense to everyone but the three kids. They know just what this means: the next game has begun.
Only they don't understand the rules or the cryptic clues about missing keys, and time is already against them.
In the clutches of the smiling man, Ollie finds herself aboard a train that periodically transforms into a traveling
carnival - but, as with all things related to the evil entity, the carnival is not at all what it appears. People have a
way of disappearing at this carnival, and sinister beings stalk the midway after sundown. The smiling man keeps trying to
convince her that her friends have given up on her, that there is no way out, but she cannot let herself believe that...
nor can she sit idly by waiting to be rescued. The more she investigates, the more she realizes just how much trouble she
and her friends are in, how much darker and more terrible this fourth and final "game" with the smiling man will be. This
time, if Ollie and her friends lose, it's not just her own life that'll be forfeit: he'll take her friends, their families,
their entire town, and maybe more.
Review
The fourth and final volume (for now) in the deliciously creepy Small Spaces quartet pits the original trio of
kids (and Phil, a relative newcomer to the group who was pulled into their circle during the events on Lake Champlain in the
previous installment) against the smiling man and his minions in one last grand and terrifying game in a story that draws
inspiration from Ray Bradbury's classic Something Wicked This Way Comes and elements of the cult-classic horror
film (that's very much not a children's movie) Killer Klowns from Outer Space.
Things start at the tail end of August, where the three remaining kids have become further withdrawn, further alarming
parents who already were growing concerned with their children's odd behavior. Coco's mother and Ollie's father have no
recollection of the supernatural aspects of their lake disaster in spring, only "remembering" that Ollie drowned after their
tour boat "sank", even though Ollie's dad still has the scar from the venomous sea monster bite that nearly killed him. All
they know is that their once happy and outgoing offspring are acting like they're terrified of something and won't tell
them... but people who are told about the smiling man don't tend to fare well, and all too often the smiling man has ways of
manipulating memories. Still, Coco grows desperate enough to consider breaking their unofficial vow of silence on the
matter; things have gone too far, and maybe the grown-ups can help somehow. Brian still advocates secrecy, terrified of
losing his own family, while Phil still feels a bit like a third wheel in their group, the "lesser Ollie". When the smiling
man sends his message that the new game is afoot, it comes via a boy who was reported missing from a carnival at a nearby
town - a boy half-insane from what he's been through. The kids are both relieved and frightened by his words, even as they
realize that, yet again, they're in way over their heads in a game they do not understand and with rules that always seem
to favor the monster.
Ollie, meanwhile, must deal with the consequences of her bargain on the island, and days spent in the company of the smiling
man. He can be disarmingly charming and almost normal, enough that she sometimes almost forgets how empty and amoral he is
inside, how devious his mind is, and how often he seems to be playing one game but is actually playing another altogether.
No passive, swooning girl in distress, she sets out to find her own way out and solve the riddle of the three keys that will
let her escape the monster's clutches. This time, instead of stalking scarecrows, ghostly minions, or monstrous serpents, she
faces grotesque clowns whose very touch has horrible consequences. She also faces the smiling man's persistent gaslighting
and manipulations, making her question her own convictions, memories, and reality itself.
As fitting for a finale, the stakes are higher and more personal, the challenges more daunting, and the climax more tense.
Given the darker tones of the series as a whole, and how much trauma and lasting consequences were woven into the whole story
- they all still have nightmares going back to their first encounter with the smiling man -, I thought some elements of the
wrap-up felt a bit clean and neat, but it's a decent enough place to leave things (and there's just a hairline crack in the
door in case Arden ever wants to revisit).
