Party Games – Jon Athan

2.5 stars

This one wasn’t my favourite of Athan’s books. I didn’t like nearly all of the characters, I had a hard time getting into the plot, and I didn’t get the usual satisfaction of a great ending that I was looking for.

Let’s start with the characters: most of them were exceedingly shallow and just plain unlikeable. I couldn’t really care that horrible things were happening to them because I couldn’t connect with them at all. The only one I felt bad for was Brian; the poor guy just wanted to help his friends because he had the means to do so, he just didn’t have a great way of explaining himself and going about offering help.

The plot felt rushed. It felt like everything was hurried along, and what supposedly took all night seemed more like it took maybe an hour or two, tops. Some of the characters changed loyalty on a dime without much motivation, but maybe I felt like that because my passing of time wasn’t aligning. I think maybe with a different structure, like going by hours, I would’ve been able to understand how the night was playing out better.

That being said, the party games themselves were interesting. The violent interpretations of them were really creative, and God bless Jon Athan and his need to ruin eyeballs 😭 I think I physically cringed at that part.

But…..the ending. Usually, I get to the end of a Jon Athan book, and I have that sweet satisfaction of resolution. I didn’t really get that here. For being the bad guys, Chase and his friends were very upfront and did exactly what they said they were going to do until they didn’t. It felt a little disingenuous, and I closed the book at the end, feeling more disappointed than I wanted to.

Party Games isn’t a bad book by any stretch. It’s creative and blood-filled and a very quick read. It just didn’t pack the punch that I’m used to from Athan.