The Stone House by A.K. Benedict
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The synopsis on the back of the book sounds like a typical horror novel: A (haunted) stone house that draws you in and won't let you leave. Said house conjuring nightmare after nightmare to torment the unlucky captor. But somehow, I grew attached to the story.

I was very confused when I first read it. Maybe that was why it took some research on my part to understand the peculiar (at least to me) dynamics of the story.

From the synopsis of the book, I understood that Miss Quill was the kids' teacher. I was a bit perplexed at how a teacher would be directly involved in the kids' haunted house quest, but I counted on the book to eventually reveal itself.
Then I read that Miss Quill was living with 2 other students, Charlie & Matteusz (for the record, I've been searching YouTube and all for how exactly to pronounce 'Matteusz'). And then there was something about Charlie and his involvement in 'the war'. Seeing as both Charlie & Matteusz were students, I was confused.
I read on the cover that it was supposedly from the world of Dr Who, but then I still couldn't understand how. And I couldn't stand being so befuddled in what seemed like a promising story. Also, I read More Than This by Patrick Ness before (the first book I read of his), and I loved that book. So I admit that I was slightly disappointed when I found that I couldn't make heads or tail about this one, and even tried to recall if this had been his writing style in More Than This.

So I looked up the details of the Class series. And then I learned - aaahh. Class was a spin-off of Dr Who, Miss Quill and Charlie, like the Doctor, are aliens. After that bit of research, everything made more sense.

Anyway. Seeing as this isn't exactly a full-fledged novel (being only 272 pages), it was good. It was interesting enough to keep me in a book - nerd mode; that is to say, I had to force myself to stop reading when it got too late at night or when I had other things to do/other places to be. I even got a bit teary at the ending.
The story finished off well, and I felt a sense of satisfaction at how everything played out.

Ahh. Now there's the Patrick Ness I'm familiar with.

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