“You poke at evil with a stick… never use your fingers.” – Envy by Gregg Olsen
Let’s face it – it’s a glorious time to be a young adult reader. There have been so many blockbuster, landscape-changing YA series released in the last decade: Rowling’s Harry Potter, Collins’ The Hunger Games trilogy, Clare’s The Mortal Instruments, and Meyer’s Twilight saga, to name just a few.
And I believe there is a direct correlation between the commercial success of these YA science fiction/fantasy sagas and the ever-increasing popularity of comparable “adult” novels, especially those categorized as paranormal fantasy. It doesn’t matter how old – or young – you are, experiencing a novel that is powered by supernatural atmospherics and audaciously blends elements of fantasy, mystery, horror, post-apocalyptic fiction, etc. is undeniably appealing – readers never know what they’re going to get! How many teenaged readers are fans of “adult” paranormal fantasy series like Charlaine Harris’ Sookie Stackhouse saga or Kim Harrison’s Hollows novels or Jim Butcher’s Dresden Files? My guess would be a lot.
That’s why I’m very interested to see how Gregg Olsen’s young adult debut does. Envy, the first installment of his Empty Coffin saga, is essentially a paranormal mystery for teenaged readers. Olsen is renowned as a bestselling true crime writer (A Twisted Faith, The Deep Dark, et. al.) as well as a crime fiction novelist (Closer Than Blood) – Envy is his first foray into the YA market.
Set in the historic town of Port Gamble, Washington – a town that is pretty on the outside but that hides unspeakable evils behind its doors – the protagonists are Hayley and Taylor Ryan, the teenaged daughters of a crime writer father and a mother who works as a psychiatric nurse in a mental hospital. Hayley and Taylor seem like normal 15-year old girls – except that they have strange psychic abilities:
“Hayley’s ability to capture the feelings and images came to her differently than Taylor’s. Her older sister, by less than a minute, Taylor could immerse herself in water and infuse her brainwaves with the past thoughts of others. Hayley’s pathway was more tactile. The transmission that came to her often came through her fingertips. It was as if she could touch an object, a person – dead or alive – and capture a moment in the real, present world.”
When a former friend of the twins, a girl named Katelyn Berkley, is found dead in her bathtub – she apparently committed suicide by electrocuting herself – Hayley and Taylor both sense that Katelyn did not kill herself. The twins, very much their father’s girls, take it upon themselves to uncover the truth. Their investigation reveals some unlikely suspects – Starla “Superstarla” Larsen, Port Gamble’s “It Girl,” a self-absorbed cheerleader whose beauty is most definitely only skin deep; Jake Damon, the bad-boy lover of Starla’s mother with a shadowy past; and a mysterious online friend who may or may not be real…
Reminiscent tonally of the Stephen King classic Carrie – a book that Olsen said in a recent interview “resonated” with him when he was growing up – Envy explores a diversity of universally dark themes (abandonment, alienation, harassment, revenge, etc.) as well as subject matter significant to teens (cyber-bullying, teen pregnancy, etc.). Olsen manages to create an undeniably creepy story that should be more than appealing to young adult readers. (The Robert Pattinson references were a nice touch!)
If you know a teen reader who enjoys his or her literary escapism paranormal-powered and decidedly dark, Olsen’s Empty Coffin saga (Betrayal will be released in the fall of 2012) will more than fit the bill. Remember the names – Hayley and Taylor Ryan may soon be as popular as iconic female teen protagonists like Bella Swan, Hermione Granger and Katniss Everdeen…
Paul Goat Allen has been a full-time book reviewer specializing in genre fiction for the last two decades and has written thousands of reviews for companies like Publishers Weekly, The Chicago Tribune, Kirkus Reviews, and BarnesandNoble.com. He is a member of the National Book Critics Circle.
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