Possess by Gretchen McNeil

Publisher: Blazer + Bray
Age Group: YA
Rating: 4/5
Source: Publisher

Fifteen-year-old Bridget Liu just wants to be left alone: by her mom, by the cute son of a local police sergeant, and by the eerie voices she can suddenly and inexplicably hear. Unfortunately for Bridget, it turns out the voices are demons – and Bridget has the rare ability to banish them back to whatever hell they came from.

Terrified to tell people about her new power, Bridget confides in a local priest who enlists her help in increasingly dangerous cases of demonic possession. But just as she is starting to come to terms with her new power, Bridget receives a startling message from one of the demons. Now Bridget must unlock the secret to the demons' plan before someone close to her winds up dead – or worse, the human vessel of a demon king.

When I first began reading POSSESS, it was at night and I had just finished another book and my insomnia was kicking in so I decided to read more. I was terrified reading this at night! I thought I was hearing noises coming from my kitchen and I was too scared to even go in there to see. Then, I thought the lights were going to turn off and I was going to be left in the dark.

I didn’t exactly know POSSESS was going to be about exorcism. The only exorcism movie I ever watched was THE EXORCISM OF EMILY ROSE and I couldn’t sleep for a week. I’ve heard of THE EXORCIST, but I don’t dare watch that one. The whole book revolves around Bridget Liu who has this cool ability to banish demons, otherwise known as exorcism. She’s not very fond of her gift, I wouldn’t be either, but it’s who she is and after school she goes with Father Santos and Monsignor Renalt to perform exorcisms.

The scary parts of the book are when the humans are possessed by the demons and the description McNeil uses to describe what’s happening is flawless. I felt as though I was watching a movie and an exorcism was being performed and the demons were talking.

Overall, this book is great and it would be a whole lot of fun reading this one on Halloween night! But just make sure you read it during the day.