Ryan Douglass

Get Out meets Danielle Vega in this YA social thriller where survival is not a guarantee. Jake Livingston is one of the only black kids at St. Clair Prep, one of the others being his infinitely more popular older brother. It's hard enough fitting in but to make matters worse and definitely more complicated, Jake can see the dead. In fact he sees the dead around him all the time. Most are harmless. Stuck in their death loops as they relive their deaths over and over again, they don't interact often with people. But then Jake meets Sawyer. A troubled teen who shot and killed sixteen kids at a local high school last year before taking his own life. Now a powerful, vengeful ghost, he has plans for his afterlife--plans that include Jake. Suddenly, everything Jake knows about ghosts and the rules to life itself go out the window as Sawyer begins haunting him and bodies turn up in his neighborhood. High school soon becomes a survival game--one Jake is not sure he's going to win.

The Taking of Jake Livingston

Daphne

Julie Failde

This book had a really great premise and I really wanted to love it, but something about it just didn’t click. Some of the ghost scenes were jarring and felt better suited to a movie (trippy like Dr. Strange or Inception) that just didn’t make a whole lot of sense in the book. I honestly didn’t know what was going on most of the time and there was a lot more show vs tell. The characters also felt a bit detached, which made it hard to root for Jake even though I constantly wanted to.

Read this twice. Once for Halloween (duh) and a second for a book club. 

This is a debut, thus, I'm more relaxed on my reviews. I didn't review it the first time. I will this time. 

There's so much promise here. So much potential that it is enjoyable. The writing feels like I was reading a script not a book. For example, "I got up to the window. I looked out the window. I saw a ghoul. I walk back to my bed. I turn off the light." Paraphrasing here, but that's how it was.

A slight plot hole 🕳 that leads me to believe maybe this will be a series? There's gotta be some explanation over the uncle and if Jake is getting blamed for it. Or was his murder, agreeably justified imo, going to be swept under the rug? I wouldn't mind seeing a sequel with Jake having to maneuver the ghost of Uncle Rob now. That'd be interesting. 

Anyway, Jake is so interesting and I didn't see it coming when he welcomed Sawyer in. Like whoa. That was wild. And just the outburst if violence against Chad was such a classic pre-possession symptom. Gave me Babadook vibes. 

River. Omg River was a great addition. A ghostly allie to help Jake on his Meduim journey? Um yes please! Fiona, supportive BFF and Allister a cyber-security nerd, have all the qualities to make a nice Scooby-Doo gang. Love it. Potential yes. 

Other than the writing being, script-like, I don't have anything negative to say. I have it on a 3.5 rating only because I could immediately tell that this was a newer author. Needed something more to round out the story. Maybe a less rushed ending. We got some closure on things, but it was glossed over to get to Allister and Jake finally getting together. Again, maybe we will get more? Idk what the author has in mind, but I hope we get more of Jake. His story doesn't feel complete yet.

Naria

Read this twice. Once for Halloween (duh) and a second for a book club. 

This is a debut, thus, I'm more relaxed on my reviews. I didn't review it the first time. I will this time. 

I give this a solid 3.5 (rounded to 4).

There's so much promise here. So much potential that it is enjoyable. The writing feels like I was reading a script not a book. For example, "I got up to the window. I looked out the window. I saw a ghoul. I walk back to my bed. I turn off the light." Paraphrasing here, but that's how it was.

A slight plot hole 🕳 that leads me to believe maybe this will be a series? There's gotta be some explanation over the uncle and if Jake is getting blamed for it. Or was his murder, agreeably justified imo, going to be swept under the rug? I wouldn't mind seeing a sequel with Jake having to maneuver the ghost of Uncle Rob now. That'd be interesting. 

Anyway, Jake is so interesting and I didn't see it coming when he welcomed Sawyer in. Like whoa. That was wild. And just the outburst if violence against Chad was such a classic pre-possession symptom. Gave me Babadook vibes. 

River. Omg River was a great addition. A ghostly allie to help Jake on his Meduim journey? Um yes please! Fiona, supportive BFF and Allister a cyber-security nerd, have all the qualities to make a nice Scooby-Doo gang. Love it. Potential yes. 

Other than the writing being, script-like, I don't have anything negative to say. I have it on a 3.5 rating only because I could immediately tell that this was a newer author. Needed something more to round out the story. Maybe a less rushed ending. We got some closure on things, but it was glossed over to get to Allister and Jake finally getting together. Again, maybe we will get more? Idk what the author has in mind, but I hope we get more of Jake. His story doesn't feel complete yet.

Lane Hokanson

I really wanted to like this. I loved the concept: MC that was black, queer, and a psychic medium. I thought it would be a fun YA thriller with some important conversations happening. Instead, it felt super disconnected and drawn out. I actually stopped reading and checked to see if this was the second or third book in a series that I had started by mistake because it did such a bad job explaining any context or backstory at the beginning of the book. And while I do believe in the importance of multiple perspectives, it seemed odd to feature the narrative of a school shooter, and detailed their history in a way that felt kind of like apologia. This one just wasn't it for me.

Read this in a day, it was good I had fun but idk it didn’t quite live up to the hype for me! I think it kinda focused too much on Sawyer and tried to make people sympathise for him…idk that was weird. I also felt the book was both too slow and too fast at the same time? It could benefited from being a bit longer really!

Also the ~taking~ part of the story didn’t really happen till like 80% through which I kinda expected to be a bigger part tbf. The ghost stuff and the lore though was really cool and I did like Jake as a mc. 

Fun vibes, kinda spooky, 3*

Get Out meets Holly Jackson in this YA social thriller where survival is not a guarantee. Sixteen-year-old Jake Livingston sees dead people everywhere. But he can't decide what's worse: being a medium forced to watch the dead play out their last moments on a loop or being at the mercy of racist teachers as one of the few Black students at St. Clair Prep. Both are a living nightmare he wishes he could wake up from. But things at St. Clair start looking up with the arrival of another Black student—the handsome Allister—and for the first time, romance is on the horizon for Jake. Unfortunately, life as a medium is getting worse. Though most ghosts are harmless and Jake is always happy to help them move on to the next place, Sawyer Doon wants much more from Jake. In life, Sawyer was a troubled teen who shot and killed six kids at a local high school before taking his own life. Now he's a powerful, vengeful ghost and he has plans for Jake. Suddenly, everything Jake knows about dead world goes out the window as Sawyer begins to haunt him. High school soon becomes a different kind of survival game—one Jake is not sure he can win.

joakim 

not bad, not incredible? the pacing was sorta wierd and i would’ve liked for it to explore character dynamics and the romance more. i did not understand at all how the ghost/medium stuff worked. i liked jack alot and love the black queer rep !

riven

that was a quick read. i loved it. amazing. YES.

Isabela H 

My first queer horror novel! It’s definitely something new and refreshing, but there is a definite disconnect between the “queer” and the “horror” 

** spoilers ahead ** 

The whole book, I just felt sad. Sad for Sawyer and sad for Jake. I couldn’t stop thinking about how Sawyer didn’t deserve what he got (yes yes yes I know the author was making a point)

sophia n

this was a very good paranormal horror novel, and a great example of a complex thriller. i think it might be a bit unfair to the book but i was taken by surprise by a pretty explicit trigger that honestly soured my enjoyment of this. wish i'd just known before going into it. but i absolutely loved the ending.

ok thought about my review of this for the past week and i realized: i really WANTED this to be a 4 or 5 star read, and i'm frustrated because so much of it was at least 4 stars for me. but then we get to the handling and progression of sawyer's storyline. i feel like it started good and uncomfortable and was balancing the line of true horror really well, but by the end it was ... A Lot. and not in a way that i thought was a good use of the triggering content that was on page. mild spoilers about the triggering content and it's usage: (view spoiler)[i think sexual assault of a minor is ... not something i take lightly as a narrative function especially in a character arc, and the use of it here as a sort of reason for what tipped sawyer over the edge was. not my favorite! not that it's not understandable, but it wasn't successful in making him a sympathetic villain imo. instead it was triggering and jarring and left a bad taste in my mouth. like. did it really have to be that explicit. i'm very confused as to what purpose it served other than sending me into a ptsd spiral for 3 days ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ (hide spoiler)]

the ending of this redeemed that very low point for me, and i loved the whole final confrontation plus the closure given, and every part of jake's medium-ness was awesome, but my issue with sawyer's storyline and content usage overall made me feel conflicted. i think if i'd known the trigger was coming upfront and could've been ready for it, even narratively if it'd been foreshadowed or woven in more, it might have been more successful for me, but idk, who can say. anyway i'm not sure why this is marketed as ya? if i'd read this as a teen i would've probably tried to un-alive myself LOL but i guess that's just a me problem, which i feel like is the summary of this whole review, so make of that what you will. :')

tws: racism, school shooting, graphic death, graphic violence, graphic sexual abuse of a minor, attempted rape, mentions of suicide attempt, child abuse, physical and emotional abuse, parental and medical negligence, revenge porn, gore, homophobia, bullying, body horror, bugs

Evi stuyts

mighty dragon 

trigger warnings: racism, school shooting, violence, homophobia, child abuse, domestic abuse

the structure of the book feels very... indonesian YA-ish/teenlit. kinda reminds me of fantasteen, but i'm not really good at explaining.

Shelby

Ari Rose

I actually didn't even know what this book was about so it was much darker than I expected but I loved it! I'm glad the story prioritized what needed to be focused on in order to progress the story, like the romance was focused on just as much as it needed to be in order to let the darker, more interesting themes step forward. I loved Jake's perspective and development, and found it so terrifying to step into the mind of Sawyer. I'm not sure about that climax though, the very fantastical scenes didn't seem to fit in with the rest of the story.

aoife

Maegan Kennedy

Rating: 3 ⭐️

Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for sending me an arc via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. 

Trigger warnings: suicide, school shootings, gruesome descriptions, depression, gun violence, homophobia, racism, abuse

“The Taking of Jake Livingston” follows Jake, one of the only black students in an all-white school. He has the ability to see ghosts and can also see how those people died. This ability ends up putting him in danger when he encounters the ghost of a school shooter, who may or may not be targeting Jake now. 

This story keeps you on the ends of your seat. If you’re into horror, the this book is for you. I am personally not a fan of horror but this book wasn’t too bad. There were some gruesome parts and the vivid details really made it feel like you could see what Jake was seeing when it came to the ghosts’ deaths. I really like the aspects of the ghosts. I thought the descriptions of the spectres really added to the horror element of the story. 

Sawyer, the ghost who haunts Jake, seems like a great villain and adds edge to the story through his history with the school shooting. We get a dual POV between Jake in the present and Sawyer’s journal entries leading up to the shooting. I feel as though we didn’t really need the journal entries every second chapter. I think it was just there to add a goreyness to the story. I mean, it does add a little background to why Sawyer did what he did, but I feel like I could’ve connected with him better if we didn’t get his perspective. Maybe if we learned about him through other people then maybe it would’ve read better. 

A positive thing that came with this book was that it was very fast paced. It’s a quick, short read that kept a steady pace the entire time. I listened to the audiobook and I think that was the way to go. The narrator was great at acting out both POVs along with the ghostly sounds that were added. I always appreciate a quick read and this one did not disappoint in that aspect. 

While the story was enthralling, I had an issue connecting to the characters. I felt like these characters didn’t really have an arc at all. Jake didn’t change very much throughout the story and I couldn’t really tell if Sawyer did either. This might be affected by the length of the novel. If it had been a little longer, even 75-100 pages longer, these characters could’ve been fleshed out a little more.

Overall this was a decent YA horror novel and if you like plot driven stories, then I highly suggest this one. If you prefer character driven stories, maybe consider passing on this one.

Marisa S. Pan 

I really enjoyed this book and I want to read more from this author. I really liked the characters specially how they were just real and not trying to be "ideal" characters (and was honestly very intrigued by S.A.D chapters).

I also liked the message of this book specially about Jake Character and him getting through life and moving on stronger. 

It was only a 3.5 star cause I felt like something was missing and I jus can't pinpoint what was (I think it was the final battle that was very meh) 

Torrey

Content warnings: school shootings, gun violence, suicide, abuse, sexual assault, racism, homophobia, homophobic slurs

Okay I want to start off this review by saying that you should take all my thoughts with a grain of salt because this is definitely not a genre I typically pick up.

Some things that I really enjoyed in the book and thought were well done: The double perspectives. We mainly follow Jake Livingston who has the ability to see ghosts, as he realizes that the ghost of a school shooter, Sawyer Doon, is starting to come after him. You get the perspective of Jake who is being haunted by Sawyer and living in the aftermath of the school shooting, but you also get Sawyer's journal entries in the time leading up to the shooting. I found it so interesting to see the combination of the circumstances Sawyer is placed in, his experiences, and already fragile mental health come together to cause the shooting. I also thought the relationships between different characters were great. I found the relationship between Jake and his brother to be realistic, at least for my own experiences. The fears that Jake has about relationships were also so valid and relatable which I loved. 

Overall I found the story to be enjoyable and thought that it was paced really well. There weren't any moments that really felt like they dragged or times that I lost interest. Obviously this book deals with some very dark topics but I didn't feel that the book left me emotionally drained like other darker books will. There were enough happy and uplifting scenes to balance out the darker elements of the story.

The biggest thing that hindered my enjoyment was confusion. There is a lot of astral projection and general ghost and haunting things that left me very confused. However if you really enjoy reading about those things then you will probably love this book. However that is just not really my thing and and I struggled to understand what was going on in those scenes. Even though I was confused, and this is not my typical genre, I still was able to enjoy the story.

Kayla 

DNFd, it’s gonna be a no from me :// I wasn’t super drawn in from the beginning, the pacing is weird and things are just kind of being thrown out there randomly but once it got revealed that the other POV we were reading was a school shooters?!? Yeah I have no interest in that I’m out ✌🏻

cossette

content warnings: racism, school shooting, death (graphic), violence (graphic), mentions of suicide attempt, physical and emotional abuse, mental illness, parental and medical negligence, sociopathy, sadism, attempted rape, revenge porn, gore, homophobia, bullying.

Candyce Kirk

3.5 stars

I don't read much horror, but the cover and synopsis of The Taking of Jake Livingston definitely had me curious. It isn't a very long book, so I was finished pretty quickly. While this was a good book and Jake was an interesting character it lacked for me in certain areas. I felt like there was too much going on and that made it hard for the story to really go deep with parts of the story. Definitely a spooky read, but maybe my expectations were just a little too high?

About a 3.75 stars- I really enjoyed this. The characters were so loveable but I really wish we had had more time to sit with them and have them develop more along with the story. The commentary on micro aggressions towards black people, being a black person in predominately white spaces, as well as the idea of being “too much” because one is apart of multiple marginalized communities was amazing. The romance in here was also precious. Overall, i loved Jake and his friends and seeing him grow and beat up some evil ghosties. I can’t wait to see this author grow and read what he puts out next. :)

Cameron Austin

personally, i did not see the get out reference until the end, and even then i'm not sure if i would even say it related to get out. to me this book does well without that reference, but i'm not knocking it for that.

I am living in a parallel reality in 2021. I am disliking what everyone loves and vice versa. Ryan Douglass was really out here saying "realness à la Walter Dean Myers but make it gayer and paranormal" and so YA has reached its zenith for me here. My tortured little sixth grade self huddling in a corner inside me has found everything she needed here.

Big trigger warnings for both domestic and sexual abuse of a minor, homophobia, racism, graphic gun violence/school shooting

Lisa W.

The category is YA Horror but make it Black! 
Ryan Douglass better werk...debut novel says who?

The Taking of Jake Livingston is a dark and twisted horror story centering a young black gay boy gifted with the abilities of a medium. Although he has lived with his ability since age 5, he hadn't fully tapped into his powers until he met Sawyer Dune. Sawyer is the deceased school shooter that still haunts the town seeking revenge on living targets. 

Before jumping into my thoughts, I would like to mention this book is unfairly marketed as a Get Out. That would be false. There is a scene that reminds me of black panther but that's about it. This book is uniquely it's own and should be marketed as such. 

What makes this book so special is that you get dual perspectives. I went into this thinking that the two characters would be parallel opposites however the author wrote them almost as mirrored characters choosing to make different choices. Both outcasts within at school and gay with dysfunctional family dynamics. There were plenty of chances that Jake could have taken an alternate path, specifically related to douchebag Chad. He's lucky that's lead was all he got. (IYKYK)

Ryan tackled a lot of difficult topics that require trigger warnings. Sexual assault, Suicide, school shooting, domestic and parental abuse, homophobia, etc. I appreciated how much this book made me feel particularly about being apprehensive about love after heartbreak, what a person would say to their parents if killed prematurely, etc. 

This is a book that I can see being extremely polarizing but I'm her to tell you I loved it. Well done Ryan!

The Taking of Jake Livingston

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