By Myra Gabor
OK, I admit it. I love stories about teenagers. I find it fascinating to read about their heartaches, and even better, to read about how and if they overcome their difficulties. And in Poor Jeffrey, oh boy, they have difficulties.
Jeffrey was smart and likable. But he was also clumsy. It was this clumsiness that caused him to trip and fall into the path of a truck, and that killed him.
His friends Tommy, Chloe and Jed were heartbroken. Tommy was always willing to do anything risky. Jeffrey was always the voice of reason, talking him out of dangerous stunts. With Jeffrey dead, there was no one left to control Tommy. He studied a magic book and became determined to bring Jeffrey back to life. He convinced the girls to perform a ritual to bring Tommy back from the grave. They succeeded. But Jeffrey didn’t come back whole. He came back feeling like every part of his body was broken. He was a living corpse that could feel pain.
There is also a serial killer in town. He likes to eat his victims while they are still alive and drink their blood. The whole town is on edge when some of their children go missing and their mutilated bodies are found.
Chloe is so upset about what they did at the cemetery that she walks away and falls directly into the arms of the murderer. Tommy is distressed because he saw the horror he caused. Jed picks up the magic book and tries to make amends.
This basic plot recap doesn’t take into account how Jeffrey’s grieving parents accept their resurrected son’s return home. Nor did I mention Sheriff Klimt Davis, the town’s wealthy man Frank Fielding, Father Cade, or the FBI agents who have been tracking the serial killer.
This is not a horror story about zombies or vampires. This is a horror story about what happens when people interfere with the natural order of things. Grief makes us do strange things, and we cannot see all the consequences of our actions. This is actually a story about love: the love between friends, the love of the residents for the town, the love of parents for their children. Everything done in the name of love sets off a chain reaction of horror. The characters in the story realize too late that they can’t go back in time and make things go back to the way they were.
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score:5/5
