Pam Smy

"Parallel plotlines set in different times, one told in text and one in art, inform each other as a young girl unravels the mystery of a ghost next door"--

Thornhill

Sarah Sammis

It's the counter play between the dark lines of the architecture with the darkness of Mary's story where the parallels between past and present emerge. The ending, while tragic, isn't a surprise. It's a satisfying pause in what will probably be a series of events linking the two buildings together.

http://pussreboots.com/blog/2018/comm...

Kelci

Léa

** spoiler alert **
           Ce livre qui se trouve à mi-chemin entre le contemporain et le graphique m’a touché en plein coeur. 
Je vais déjà commencé par poser les Trigger Warning qui sont : 
- le harcèlement 
- la solitude 
- la violence 

Maintenant que les bases sont posées et que ceux qui lisent ceci sont ici en toute connaissance de cause, c’est parti. 
Le sujet évoqué dans ce livre est un sujet qui a fait écho à des choses que j’ai vécu. Sans faire étalage de ma vie personnelle, je pense qu’on est beaucoup à pouvoir s’assoir à la table des harcelés à une période de notre vie. Donc les pensées de Mary, ce qu’elle a vécu m’ont particulièrement touchés puisque j’ai vécu et pensé des choses similaires. 
Maintenant en m’éloignant du rapport à ma vie personnelle, je peux dire que ce livre reste touchant. Parce que malheureusement ils décrivent une réalité trop longtemps ignorée. 
L’écriture, se voulant être celle d’une petite fille, reste très simple mais il n’empêche que cette simplicité la rend d’autant plus frappante. 
Les dessins sont très beau et le choix du noir et blanc accentue le côté tragique du livre. 
J’ai beaucoup aimé cette lecture et je pense que tout le monde devrait lire ce livre.

Maggie Gordon

I seem to be on a roll with books for younger readers that are probably a bit too advanced in theme for younger readers... Thornhill is an interesting experiment. It melds traditional prose with an illustrations section, telling two different stories in two formats. Through prose, we read the diaries of a young selectively mute girl who lives in an orphanage with a bunch of other girls, one who continually torments her. The other story, told primarily through illustrations, is about a young girl who moves into a nearby house years later, discovering the journal and history of the other protagonist. I loved this back and forth way of story telling, and the art was wonderful. The book as a whole is a really gorgeous product, black and weighty. 

What I think might be a bit problematic is the story itself. As said, it is about bullying. Very serious and traumatic bullying that leads to the suicide of the young mute girl. The girl from the present meets her ghost and also either kills herself or dies in a fire, the narrative is unclear. While I think it is important to address the consequences of something as harmful as bullying, the narrative leaves quite a bit unclear as to whether or not this was a good way of solving these girls' problems (and we're not even fully aware of the problems of the present girl). That being said, it's one that would probably be good to prompt discussion, but one I would want teachers/parents to be aware of before handing it off to a kid or teen.

Kim Tyo-Dickerson

Told half in diary entires, half in black and white illustrated sequences, this dark, middle grade thriller pulls you into a gothic landscape dominated by the rundown shell of Thornhill Institute, an abandoned orphanage. Teenage Ella, who has recently lost her mother, has just moved with her father into a house that backs up against Thornhill's overgrown gardens. She stares at the "keep out" signs and barbed wire crisscrossing the weedy lawns, and suddenly sees a figure in the overgrowth, a girl that appears and then vanishes. Alone most of the time with her father traveling, Ella unpacks her things, tapes up photos of her and her mother, and finds herself staring more and more out her window at Thornhill, wondering if she actually saw a girl there or not. She sets out to explore the property and find out where the girl has gone, going deeper and deeper into the grounds and ultimately into the house itself. Meanwhile, diary entries from 1982 tell the story of another lonely girl, Mary Baines, an orphan living at Thornhill who is mute, creates handmade puppets of characters from favorite books including Jane Eyre and The Secret Garden, and who is terrorized daily by another orphan girl who remains nameless, just a constant source of pain and suffering for Mary. While Mary's diary entries detail how she creates her puppet friends and the various humiliations she suffers at the hands of her bullies, the silent scenes of Ella moving closer and closer to the truth of what happened to Mary Baines and Thornhill 35 years before gains an unsettling urgency. Mary and Ella's stories alternate rapidly as their stories take on speed, thick black double-page spreads indicating a break in Mary's diary and the resumption of Ella's quest to discover the unhappy, potentially sinister secrets of Thornhill. 

This satisfying female gothic is wrapped in a beautifully produced book, with each element building the sense of dread in the story, from the cover with an outline of the house with a girl's silhouette in the uppermost window, to the richly illustrated and stitched pages, to the "keep out" endpapers, all framing the narrative and creating a story that begs to be read quickly and before the lights go out.

Andy Bayliss

EDIT:
i can't stop thinking about this book!!!! oh my i just want to read it again!

5 stars*

WOW. 
An amazing read! i've been wanting to read this book for ages now and finally got to it, all in one go. I honestly thought that it would end a bit differently however i did somewhat expect what would happen. The drawings were absolutely beautiful, simplistic but interesting. And i do hope to re read this sometime in the future!

Parallel plotlines set in different times, one told in text and one in art, inform each other as a young girl unravels the mystery of a ghost next door.

Grace O'Callaghan

Thornhill follows two girls and their parallel stories with the house of Thornhill. Mary lives at the Thornhill orphanage and feels incredibly lonely. What makes matters worse is that one of the girls living there with her is bullying her. Ella has just moved across the street from Thornhill and can’t stop obsessing over the creepy girl she sees around Thornhill. Watch as these stories intertwine and connect with a brilliant and eerie ending.

I have to say that I loved the way this story was told. It’s told in diary entries from Mary’s perspective and pictures through Ella’s. I thought they both suited each girl’s story perfectly, a great narrative choice. The art is black and white and has such a gothic feel to it that I just loved.

My biggest criticism was how long it was. I think I’d be able to give it that full five stars if it hadn’t dragged so much in the middle. Perhaps it’s also due to the lack of plot and more about the characters and mystery surrounding them.

I can’t say that I ever connected to the characters. Whilst I have a lot of sympathy for both of their situations, I was never really attached.

Don’t go into this book expecting a really scary vibe throughout. It’s more of a slow build that eventually crescendos into such a creepy and unnerving ending. I don’t think I’ve ever had such full body shivers while reading a book. The ending made up for quite a lot of the boring middle.

I’m not too sure what age range I’d put this in. I see a lot of people marking this as middle grade but I think it’s actually a lot darker than that. I was hesitant to put it in young adult at first because the maturity of YA seems to get older every year. But I do think this is YA as even I had chills by the end of it, and I’m not someone that gets scared that easily. It’s perhaps just on the younger side as the story is easy enough to grasp.

Overall, I’m really glad I picked this up. I can’t remember the last time I picked up a book and that I knew nothing about and just read it. If I see a book I’m interested in I usually read the synopsis and look into reviews from people I trust. But it was so nice to see a book that looked interesting at the library and read it right away. 

Content warnings below:
(view spoiler)[Abuse, bullying, abandonment, suicide  (hide spoiler)]

Tiffany Robinson

I thought this was an interesting book. I liked how they told one part of the story through text and one through pictures. It was a fast read but I was hoping there would be more to the story. It felt a little short.

orfanato para chicas

Alex Najera 

Cuando crecemos nos olvidamos que en algún momento también fuimos niños, que sentíamos cosas y pasábamos por momentos en los que más necesitábamos que nos pregunten “¿estás bien?” Este libro me recordó lo mucho que abusamos de nuestros niños, no les creemos, los abandonamos y los tratamos de manera condescendiente pensando que son estupidos. Quisiera que ningún niño en la vida se sienta como se sintió Mary y Elle. Y que si estás pasando por algún momento difícil, pide ayuda, por favor.

Kristina Masone

What a chilling middle grade book! I loved the illustrations.

Jordan Robinson

Paige Green

Rating: 4/5



Genre: Middle Grade Mystery/Horror



Recommended Age: 14+ (death, psychological horror, trigger warnings for suicide)



Pages: 544



Author Website


Amazon Link



Disclaimer: I received this book through KidLitExchange! Thanks! All opinions are my own.



Synopsis: 1982: Mary is a lonely orphan at the Thornhill Institute For Children at the very moment that it's shutting its doors. When her few friends are all adopted or re-homed and she’s left to face a volatile bully alone, her revenge will have a lasting effect on the bully, on Mary, and on Thornhill itself.

2017: Ella has just moved to a new town where she knows no one. From her room on the top floor of her new home, she has a perfect view of the dilapidated, abandoned Thornhill Institute across the way, where she glimpses a girl in the window. Determined to befriend the girl and solidify the link between them, Ella resolves to unravel Thornhill's shadowy past.

Told in alternating, interwoven plotlines―Mary’s through intimate diary entries and Ella’s in bold, striking art―Pam Smy’s Thornhillis a haunting exploration of human connection, filled with suspense.



This is probably the most unique book I’ve read in my life. The book is told in duel POV. The present day is told entirely in picture format, the 1982 written version in diary format. I think this format works amazingly well for the book and I was able to connect to both of the girls. The writing was amazing, the plot was intriguing and the pacing was excellent. The world building for both time periods was also detailed and impressive as they were both done in different ways.



However, I do fear that some of the subject material in the book might be a little bit too mature for middle grade kids. The book deals with a lot of heavy topics and while I found it amazing, I do want to caution parents to make sure your child is emotionally mature enough for some of the warnings I listed above.



Verdict:  Amazingly unique and dark. Perfect for the young horror fans.

Nota

The set-up is fun, it references children's classics, there is a lot of mystery, the narrative makes the reader think about what is happening and how is the story being told if you haven't read the synopsis. The book creates a cool atmosphere and coupled with its illustrations that can spark the imagination.

However, the execution feels flat, the descriptions don't deliver a lot of the time. The protagonist refers to her emotions by calling them.... anger, fear, etc. which you could say is fitting for their age, but is not compelling to read.

And then while the themes leading up to the end were intriguing and make you theorize, the answers themselves are not enough. The ending left a lot to be desired, the set-up was better.

Bruno Darío

Es cuco, pero repetitivo hasta la saciedad (y eso que tiene poco texto) y los supuestos "escalofríos" no llegan hasta el final. Si fuera una novela corta con ilustraciones, sería mucho más efectivo.

Stefie 

This is a book about bullying, loneliness, madness, and how it can messes someone’s life.
It’s told in two format. One is through illustration which is Ella’s perspective in 2017. The other perspective, Mary in 1982 through chapters.
I love how Pam Smy binds these two perspectives together. I think it’s clever and speak so much. 
The illustrations... it’s chilling to me.
This book....!! It’s so hard to imagine that this is a work of fiction. Like, it felt so real but at the same time I’m glad it is not!

Books that shows how cruel human can be, creeps me out more than ghost stories. So, since I borrowed mine from the library, I’m gonna get a copy myself.

Thornhill

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