The Girl From The Well

The Girl From The Well

by Rin Chupeco

Synopsis:

I am where dead children go. Okiku is a lonely soul. She has wandered the world for centuries, freeing the spirits of the murdered-dead. Once a victim herself, she now takes the lives of killers with the vengeance they''re due. But releasing innocent ghosts from their ethereal tethers does not bring Okiku peace. Still she drifts on. Such is her existence, until she meets Tark. Evil writhes beneath the moody teen''sskin, trapped by a series of intricate tattoos. While his neighbors fear him, Okiku knows the boy is not a monster. Tark needs to be freed from the malevolence that clings to him. There''s just one problem: if the demon dies, so does its host.

My thoughts:

The Girl From The Well is Chupeco's debut novel which is based on the Japanese legend of "Okiku and the Nine Plates", the same tale that inspired The Ring.  For over 300 years Okiku has been wandering the world taking vengeance on child murderers; half because she wants to free the children that get chained to their murderers and half because death and revenge are almost the only thing that she understands anymore.  When Tark crosses Okiku's path while she is hunting a serial killer, he sparks something in her that she thought was almost impossible: curiosity.  As Okiku observes and slowly befriends him and his cousin Callie, she discovers that something truly dark and malicious is trying to break free of Tark and his strange tattoos are the only thing keeping the spirit bound.  After Tark's mom is violently murdered, Tark, his father, and Callie head to Japan to scatter her ashes on a particular shrine and ended up meeting some women, who were friends of Tark's mother, that might have the answers that Tark and Okiku have been looking for.  The Girl From The Well told from Okiku's point of view is a creepy thriller that people will want to read during the day with the lights on . . . preferably not near any closets or wells.  While this novel would definitely fall under the horror genre Chupeco uses a cutscene technique rather than violent disembodiment to build up the suspense so that by the time the final battle begins the reader is a bundle of nerves that jumps at the smallest sound and is terrified of what will happen when the other shoe drops.  Chupeco has written a haunting tale that is well worth reading and the poetic style that is used when Okiku is hunting is genius.