The Haunted Hikikomori by Lawrence Pearce

Release Date: August 8, 2013
Publisher: Juju Books

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars.

Synopsis:
Hidden away from the world outside his apartment, Jared lives in a world of his own creation. He has everything he needs brought to him through online orders with the odd delivery of pizza to link him to humanity. While in his apartment, he does his best to avoid the pain and memories of losing someone close to him. His imagination provides him a companion when he needs it. Life is good.

Or so it was until strange things begin to happen throughout his apartment that make him question his grasp on reality as well as his past behavior. Seeing glimpses of the one lost starts Jared down a downhill spiral of self-loathing and judgement that leads him to make a pivotal decision.

Review:
Oh, how I wanted to give this book a higher rating. It truly made me sad that I couldn't justify one in the smallest degree. The story is so intriguing and compelling that it did keep me turning the pages. Not only do we, the readers, see the aftermath of a tragic event but we're witnesses to several other events that we can do nothing to change. At certain points in the story, we know more than the characters. I found myself wanting to direct the characters away from areas or to do different things in order to keep them from harm.

The steady pace of the story did a great deal to keep my interest alive. I felt the author did a good job of drawing you into the story through the character's emotions and the reasoning behind their decisions seemed logical in their situations. At one point it seemed that the story was a vicious cycle, never to end as person after person found their way into that apartment.

My only reason for not rating this work higher was the many grammar/editorial mistakes that I found as I was reading. Even reading for pleasure, my brain picks up on places where commas should have been, a word is misspelled or quotation marks out of place. Unfortunately, there were a bunch of places where commas were needed as well as an instance where the author had written "And I am sat ...." which I presume he meant "am sitting." Between those and part of the book being formatted with paragraph indented while the other wasn't, I got distracted from the story. If these issues were corrected, I have absolutely no doubt that this book would be a great one because the story is haunting and chilling in so many aspects.

The Haunted Hikikomori by Lawrence Pearce is available in Kindle form and can be purchased from Amazon.com by clicking the link below.
The Haunted Hikikomori by Lawrence Pearce