Overall, I found I enjoyed this book! I loved the spookiness and the tension; it kept me on my toes. The only thing that I wasn't crazy about was that I felt like I was a bit confused at times and didn't understand what was going on. Eventually I'd be able to figure it out, though. A solid read!

Thanks to Penguin Young Readers Group & NetGalley for the early copy in exchange for an honest review. My actual rating is 2.75/5 stars.

Jake Livingston is a black gay teen stuck in the middle of a very white school and town. It doesn't help that he's also a medium, able to see ghosts and interact with them. He goes through life as quietly as possible until one ghost decides they want to keep terrorizing the real world long after death. Jake now has to deal with this ghost while juggling his everyday life.

Honestly, the book was exciting. It kept me on my toes and I liked reading the twists and turns. But. I was not a fan of the writing direction. Jake's POV chapters were confusing, disjointed, and overall chaotic and hard to keep track of. Oddly though, Sawyer's POV was far easier to read and more calm and collected. So it confused me how clearly the author has the talent and writing style, but it was decided to make it confusing as heck in Jake's chapters?

Then again, this was a horror/thriller novel, so perhaps the writing style was a way to keep it chaotic and terrifying for the author, but it was just too confusing to keep track of. I feel like this would actually be easier to absorb as a television mini-series with the visuals explained, since the "ghost" world kept bleeding into Jake's living world.

Jake didn't have much personality beyond "anxious teenager" as well, and his family's backstory took forever to explain. The "romance" felt pretty tame and minimal, I was hoping for more with it.

It's not a bad book by any means, it's just difficult to get through. If you're super into horror and are fine with chaotic writing, go for it! If you're not really a fan of horror at all, I wouldn't try reading this because it'll leave you feeling frustrated.

Still, it's an entertaining and spooky novel!

*Thank you to Penguin Teen for providing me with an ARC of this book through NetGalley!*

I really wanted to like The Taking of Jake Livingston, but it just wasn't for me. I do think it's awesome that it's a horror novel featuring a queer, black protagonist. It has a ton of great representation. Unfortunately, horror novels just aren't my cup of tea, and there were some really disturbing scenes that bothered me. Overall, it was very dark, and I wish I'd been aware of the heavy content present in this book before requesting an ARC of it. There is a lot of potentially triggering stuff in there, so please check out the content warnings before picking up this book! ​I was also quite confused about a lot of what happened and why things were happening; I would have loved to know why, exactly, Jake can see ghosts, or what even is the ectomist? I felt like many elements of this book were half-baked, just there without any explanation as to why, seemingly just to heighten the creepy vibes. I'm also not sold on including Sawyer's diary entries, told in his own POV, being a good choice; they were deeply disturbing and made me very uncomfortable, and they also had the potential to make readers sympathetic toward him--which, I know he went through a lot of terrible stuff, but he also did many truly horrific things, and the author left me in a place where I was unsure of whether to sympathize with him as a victim or despise him as a villain. I honestly felt like Sawyer was a more dimensional character than Jake, though, which was rather disappointing. Jake honestly didn't have much character at all; he was mainly described as being black, queer, and capable of seeing ghosts, with no other characteristics really being described. His relationship with his family was also rather strange, and there was an awkward explanation for his family's tension tossed in at the end, which just felt forced and sudden. Additionally, the romance felt oddly paced and pretty unnecessary to the plot.

So overall, I feel a bit let down by The Taking of Jake Livingston. I'd been really hoping to love it, but there were a lot of elements that I just didn't enjoy or found very uncomfortable or disturbing to read about. However, I do think it's exciting that there's a horror novel with such diverse representation out in the world, and I hope other people will enjoy this book more than I did!

That's all for my review of The Taking of Jake Livingston by Ryan Douglass! As I unfortunately did not like this book, I only gave it 1.5 Stars ⭐️✨.

Content Warnings: racism, racist microaggressions, homophobia, slurs, school shooting, gun violence, bullying, death (graphic), torture (graphic), physical and emotional abuse, suicide, attempted rape of a minor, child neglect, sadism, mental illness

The Taking of Jake Livingston was a thrilling read, although I really struggled to connect with the characters in it. While I loved the representation, I think it was just a little short, and the plot progressed too quickly? I also just really was not a fan of the school shooter POV.

So, I don't read a lot of horror books, I just cannot seem to get into it but this book was actually such an amazing read! The Taking of Jake Livingston is a dark, challenging, fast-paced paranormal thriller. This is a story of abuse and prejudice, and while it is obviously heavy in subject, it still manages to have a lightness of hope to it. I also loved the ruthless social commentary.

This book was written very beautifully, the author manages to elevate his narrative perfectly through his writing. This book is a ghost story, about being controlled by someone else, figuratively and literally. It's a story of forced colonization and confused fear in the face of your own identity being ripped from you.

There is even a side slow-burn romance plot that doesn't take over the whole story. The romance allows Jake to come to terms with himself and his evolution as a person. It gives him a sense of normalcy he can hold on to. The chemistry between Jake and Allister was amazing. They are both very well-written characters.

I loved the queer take on this book. Everything in this book strikes so true to the experiences of being Queer and being Black, and definitely gets the intersectional identity of being both. I absolutely loved how Jake's identities were handled.

The only reason I did not give this book 5 stars is because I feel like there were some missing plots to the story. Some things felt unfinished in the story. I also did not seem to understand the connection between Sawyer and Jake and why their stories were tied together. They were both such different characters without any real connection.

Other than that I think this book is definitely worth the read!

This was a social commentary horror/thriller book that addresses what it’s like to be a young queer Black boy in predominately white spaces and how you deal with constant micro aggressions that make it nearly impossible to be your true self especially when you don’t have many people you can count on. The social commentary comes in the form of a dead white teenager who was a school shooter haunting Jake and him trying to figure out how to rid the world of the ghost once and for all. It was a quick book, so quick that I feel like it could have been longer, maybe gone into how Jake discovered his medium powers. I also hated the chapters that focused on the ghosts thoughts but they do make you reconsider what drives a person to commit violent acts when they’re not getting the proper help. I also wanted more of Allister and Jake but it’s clear that the priority in this book is Jake becoming comfortable in his own skin so that he is able to accept romance into his life. Also as someone who lives and grew up in a really white school in Georgia I related deeply to Jake’s experiences. There comes a breaking point when the micro aggressions hurt too much. I had a hard time understanding the writing style but that’s more of personal preference. Overall, I really enjoyed this book and can’t wait to read more from the author!

Jake can see ghosts, and most of the time, that's ok. But recently, he's been seeing a lot of one particular ghost, of an angry and violent teen boy who committed a school shooting, and as time goes on, those encounters are becoming more and more dangerous.
This book follows dual perspectives between Jake in the present day, dealing with the ghost of Sawyer, and Sawyer before his own death. It explores a lot to do with racism, homophobia, and abuse, and really delves into the real life horror of those things, and the monsters they can create. The chapters from Sawyer can feel jarring, knowing what he eventually does, but the book doesn't ask you to understand what he did, only who he was before and how he became what he became. This was uncomfortable to read, and I honestly can't speak to whether it was handled well or not, but it did make me think about how there are so many teens who are going through horrors of their own on a daily basis, and how that opens the door for so much evil. This book was haunting on multiple levels. A horror story where the horrors are more grounded in reality than we realize.
At times the story fell off for me a bit (mostly around the times it was focusing on the violence/fight scenes/etc), but there were also a lot of important and meaningful things to take away, so even thought the plot meandered a bit for me, and felt a bit questionable at times, I still enjoyed the overall story.

This story was a quick read, but also hard to digest, due to the graphic nature of the novel. The images of a school shooting, death on repeat as Jake walks home. The bodies that stand at the foot of his bed when he wakes up in the middle of the night. Definitely not a story to read before bed, which is exactly what I did and instantly regret for fear of pending nightmares. I struggled with the death scenes and I think that it might be too graphic and triggering for a YA novel. I think that it should come with warnings, if it’s going to be marketed toward a younger demographic, as it was very, very heavy.

Thoughts and Themes: I had only seen negative reviews on this book so I went into this one suspecting bad and I wish I had’t. I actually really enjoyed this book and the multiple things that were happening in the story. I usually don’t like for there to be many side plot lines because I worry that they will be left unresolved but I liked the side things happening in this story. I felt that the side things happening helped move the story forward and also allowed you to learn about the characters.

I liked how this book brought up the intersection of being Black and Gay and how that was very different than being just one or the other. I thought this was a important piece that was brought up. I can’t speak on the intersection of holding both of those identities so I suggest that you all read own voices reviews as well.

Something else that I enjoyed about this book was that there were moments in which I felt the characters were coming off the screen. I loved the scenes in which there are supernatural elements involved since I felt these features brought the book to life. It was like this book was a ghost in my own living room.

Characters: In this book you get introduced to quite a few characters through their interactions with Jake and through the journal entries that are provided from Sawyer. I liked the way that we get to meet the people who were in Sawyer’s life and get to understand Sawyer through the journal entries and not just his haunting of Jake.

Something that I really enjoyed about this book is that both Sawyer and Jake are gay males. I thought it was great to see how that identity played into their daily lives and also their interactions with each other. I thought that them both being gay added depth to the story and added more to the reason Sawyer was haunting Jake. I felt that this fact made Sawyer feel like he could relate with Jake, and slowly it felt like Jake was able to relate with Sawyer.

I also really enjoyed the brief romance that we got through this book between Jake and Allister. While the romance wasn’t front and center in this story, I liked the glimpses that we get of their relationship and how it develops.

Writing Style: This story is written in first person point of view through Jake’s perspective and it also includes some of the entries from Sawyer’s journal. I like that this book goes back and forth between Jake’s life and Sawyer’s journal entries. I liked getting to know who Sawyer was prior to the shooting and try to see why that event occurred. I also thought it was great to see that this journal was being read by Jake and it was informing him of why this ghost was now haunting him.

I am obsessed with this cover and after reading the contents of this book, I'm obsessed with this story too. While I have some issues on background and the general spooky world, mostly the lack of information, this book is too good not to read. This book made me cry and think and feel so many different things that I read it in less than three hours because I couldn't put it down. 

For some reason, I have been really into paranormal fantasy, especially if it has horror in it. When I saw there was a book tour for this book, I jumped on the occasion and I'm so happy I can review this book! I mean, murderous poltergeists, terrifying demons, and queer kids trying to find themselves - in one book? Who wouldn't want to pick this up?

The beginning of this book jumps right into the story and the action and everything was a bit jarring at first. We don't get much info about Jake's experience with being able to see ghosts before this story begins, though we do meet his medium mentor once during the book. I wanted more backstory on his powers and definitely more scenes with his mentor, but with what we had, I could kind of understand what was going on. And let me tell you, if I constantly saw the world of the dead surrounding the world of the living, I would probably have had a million heart attacks and would never leave my house or wake up, ever. Because it sounds terrifying!

The descriptions of the spirit world, ghosts, and ghouls, and all the in-betweens were horrifying. I read this book in one sitting, starting from 7pm and finishing at 10pm (with dinner in-between) - I was jumping at every sound and at one point, my sweet kitty jumped up on the bed and touched my leg, and I straight kicked her. Yeeted her off the bed because I was so spooked, I flinched! She scared me and unfortunately, she paid the price. Ryan is amazing at bringing these horrific depictions to life and my heart was racing. There were so many moments in this book when I felt myself on the verge of a panic attack because I was legitimately terrified, as if I was the person in danger! 

In terms of the plot, I thought this book was really interesting. We have a murderous poltergeist, set on killing the people he couldn't murder when he was alive, and since he's here, he might as well try and steal the body of the medium who can stop him. Meanwhile, poor Jake is just trying to scrape by. As a gay kid, still in the closet, he doesn't want to ruffle any feathers, but it's hard not to do that when you can see ghosts. Or when a cute boy transfers to your school.

This story touches on a lot of topics and many of them are very uncomfortable. As just some of the topics discussed we have school shooting, suicide, murder, child molestation, rape, child abuse, assault, racism, homophobia, bullying, and the list goes on. Ryan does not hold back in this book and I kind of love that. I like that he's not afraid to discuss these topics and bring attention to them, and he does so without making it feel like it's thrown in there "just cause". He takes extra care to approach these topics in a way that suits the story rather than just a shock factor. 

One of my favorite things about this book is the growth Jake goes through. When we first meet him, he's pretty much a loner. He has one "friend", who's not really a friend, and Jake is alone for the most part. But as the story progresses, we see Jake make real, genuine friends. He finds people who like him for him, and who he can trust to help him. And my favorite part, he learns how to trust himself and feel confident in his actions and decisions. 

In addition to Jake's story, we also get Sawyer's story, and the reasoning behind why he murdered his classmates and then himself. While it was hard reading Sawyer's diary entries and getting into his head, it added a lot to the story, and I think it made it easier to understand his actions. While I don't condone murder or suicide, Sawyer shows us how awful his life was and how stuck he felt. His anger and sadness, built up over time, lead him to snap. And the final entry we read made me cry. I couldn't even comprehend what that experience must have felt like and I was sobbing for this poor guy. 

While the horror was terrifying, and the book was entertaining, this was a story that made me think really hard. I laughed, I cried, I gasped in horror, and I found myself absorbed in this book. Even though the whole ghost world confused me, it seems like it confused Jake too, and so I went along for the ride. But as this book taught me, sometimes you don't have to have everything figured out, you just need to trust yourself and trust the process and eventually, it will all make sense. 

I would seriously recommend picking up a copy if you like horror. I know this is going to be a go to recommendation for me from now on and I can't wait to read more from Ryan in the future!

A YA Medium, Paranormal Thriller??? My rating for this title is a full 5 stars, and I’d give it 10 if I could somehow get Goodreads to change their rating system.😂

What a unique plot, that hooks the reader immediately and turns into a page turner. I love that it’s written through main characters’ Jake’s narrative, so we get to know him, his thoughts, reasons behind his actions, and most importantly know all his feels. As it touches some important social themes, set a unique paranormal high school environment.

A creepy story about a young boy who can see dead people, and that’s just the start. Perfect addition to your spooky/scary/thriller TBR for the Halloween season! (My fave!)🎃

Perfect for all readers who love a good scare.😍👻

P.S. The cover artwork is amazing!

Thank you so much to the publisher, Penguin Teen, for sending me an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book is chilling, haunting and the perfect book for fall! I loved the vibes of this book. It is honestly one of the creepiest books I have ever read and I couldn't get enough of it. I really connected with the main character, Jake. He is super shy which I remember being the same way when I was in high school myself. The writing of this book is so good and transported me right into the setting of the book.

This book was absolutely fantastic and I cannot wait for it to come out into the world for readers to enjoy. This is definitely NOT a book to miss out on, it is fantastic!

3.25 Stars

Thank you to Netgalley, Bookish First, and Penguin Teen for an arc of this book.

Jake Livingston can see Dead World, and it's having quite the effect on his life. But when the ghost of Sawyer Doon, a deceased school-shooter, escapes his loop and starts going after others, he finds a particular interest in Jake and his medium abilities. Jake will have to stop Sawyer before he kills more people.

There are a lot of really great things about this book. I love the exploration of his sexuality that Jake goes through, and the character growth that happens. I love the idea of dead world and medium who has to stop the ghost that escaped his loop.

Some things that tripped me up about this book were the pacing and the writing style. Even though I thought the plot and characters were really interesting, I felt the pacing was too slow for what was actually happening, and I just didn't love the writing style. There were times when it was too much in a characters head and other times when it spent too long on descriptions.

This was a good spooky thriller with a lot of meaning behind it though, and I absolutely love the cover!

Pub date: July 13, 2021

<b>Content Warnings</b>
Graphic: Homophobia, Racism, Bullying, Religious bigotry, Mass/school shootings, Animal death, Death, Child death, Abandonment, Murder, Child abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Gun violence, Sexual violence, and Violence

I didn't like it, but I only review a book if I finish it. Therefore, I didn't write a review. Thank you, as always, for the generosity in loaning us books to preview.

CWs: some graphic images of death, injury, blood, gore, and violence; references to suicide ideation and suicide attempts; mentions of child abuse, domestic abuse, and rape; some references to racism, bullying, and homophobia; explorations of mass shootings and gun violence

The Taking of Jake Livingston is a dark, challenging, fast-paced paranormal thriller. Where it shines for me is in its ruthless social commentary and in the way the story examines how it feels when identity is violently stripped away from you, figurately and literally. The possession story arc also shines light on the forcible colonization of the body—again, in a literal sense—and how the goal of the colonizer is to weaponize the colonized against each other and get them to finish the colonizer's work. With Jake constantly being surrounded by ghosts, dying, and trauma, I think the story also comments on how Black communities, especially, are not afforded the luxury of healing from trauma—both personal and generational—because how can you heal from a wound that doesn't close?

The atmosphere and the imagery at play in the story are also highly effective, because there is a constant and pervasive sense of danger, tension, and darkness. There is definitely a grotesque, horrific edge to the story, and I appreciate how drastically that adds to the heightened emotion of the characters. There is a constant sense of this situation being very much life-or-death for the characters involved, and that intensity makes the stakes feel real and consequential. Especially for a supernatural YA horror story, this book definitely goes so much darker and deeper than I ever expected it to, and that's part of what almost makes it hard to look away from the page.

With that said, I struggled a bit with this story in terms of structure and character. Structurally, the story is split between between Jake's point of view and diary entries from Sawyer, the vengeful spirit who took his own life after enacting a deadly high school shooting. Personally, I didn't see the need for Sawyer's POV being so prevalent. The content of his diary entries not only further perpetuate the stereotype of the traumatized "lone wolf" shooter who comes from a broken family, but felt somewhat sensationalist to me. While the intent may have been to "humanize" him a bit more, I think most of his diary entries were disturbing just for the sake of being disturbing.

But even more than that, I felt a strong sense of disconnect with Jake as a narrator and protagonist. I want to be absolutely clear: I do NOT mean that I "wasn't able to connect" with Jake because of his background or identity, in fact I found those to be the strongest tenants of his character. When I say I felt disconnected from him, it's because he's literally disconnected from everything and everyone around him, to the point where his family and friends are constantly mentioning how spaced out he tends to be. What's happening with Sawyer is very much all-consuming for Jake (and with such high stakes, why wouldn't it be?) but besides his ability to see ghosts, I really have no sense of who he is, even after having read the entire book.

And, for me, that really stems from how the emotional and relationship-based dynamics are literally disconnected from the ghost/possession storyline. Again, trying to break the connection between himself and Sawyer is Jake's number one priority, and understandably so, but because of that, it feels like his connection with the characters around him has to be put on hold until *after* that's been dealt with. The things Jake is struggling with and the emotional dynamics he has with those around him don't really get addressed or come into play until the very end of the story, and it left me wishing that those issues had been better integrated to even further intensify the stakes. I did really appreciate the themes of rebuilding bridges, claiming your identity and your history, and combating erasure by simply existing, but I also feel like those ideas came in a bit too late.

So as you can tell, I'm kind of left in the middle. I think, thematically, this story is parsing some really important questions and using conventions of the genre to evocative, powerful effect. But with that, I still wish there was more character development and that the relationship dynamics didn't feel so much like an afterthought. But I'm still excited that more people will finally get a chance to read this one soon, and I would love to see what Ryan Douglass writes next.

This was one of my most anticipated reads of the year, and unfortunately it just didn't live up to my hopes. I feel there were messages it was trying to send, but again, unfortunately, it just didn't send them. The book didn't feel authentic in its course of action, and although I would have really liked to finish it to see if it would pick up, it ended up being one I DNF due to the confusing nature of the narrative.

I am very excited to recommend this book to teens! I loved how diverse it was for a YA horror story, as I do not find many Black or gay horror in YA, and it is even harder to find both. I enjoyed the pacing of this book a lot, and I enjoyed that it was not TOO scary.
I also really liked that the romance was not the main point of the story, as there are many teens who want to read YA but don't like how much romance is in most YA books. Over all, I really think that this book will find a great audience.

The Taking of Jake Livingston is a fantastic, thrilling adventure through the drama and trauma of high school. Being one of the few Black kids at his prestigious private school is made even harder by racist teachers and the fact that Jake is a medium and constantly sees dead people everywhere. Having to relive other people's last moments over and over is emotionally and physically exhausting and when a spirit seems to be gaining power, Jake has gather all of his courage, and the with the help of new friends, take on the spirit before it can hurt anyone else.
This is a powerful and thrilling novel that takes an unflinching look at the realities that our teens face every day.
Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review. All opinions and mistakes are my own.

Jake Livingston, a gay African-American teenager, attends a private, nearly all-White high school and deals with racism and bullying every single day. Jake is also a medium who sees ghouls and ghosts during the day and unwillingly has his soul dragged out of his body at night. He sees people reliving their last moments in a loop.
Jake is being stalked and tormented by a troubled teenager who shot multiple victims at his high school and is now able to kill the living. Jake knows this is happening and realizes that he and his friends could be next. His life is a living nightmare. He has a few allies: another medium who seems to pop up out of nowhere, his love interest, a girl who was killed in the school shooting, a friend from school, and some ancestral ghosts.

The plot was uneven in places. Where did this other medium come from? How long had Jake known her?

The tension was so high and the text so readable, I could not put it down. I could easily see this becoming a movie or a graphic novel given the dreamlike descriptions of Jake's visions and experiences.

I will recommend this to my YA students.

Thank you to NetGalley for the e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

Really enjoyed this dark, queer YA horror book!

The Taking of Jake Livingston by Ryan Douglass is about a queer minority teenager who can see and sense spirits. This is definitely a horror book, and deals with some dark and triggering issues: school shootings, murder, stabbing, violence, abuse, suicide attempts and ideations, racism, and homophobia.

This book switches POV between Jake and the shooter, now turned angry ghost- Sawyer. The Sawyer chapters were pretty horrifying to read, but did well to showcase how abuse and neglect can manifest into a disturbed person who abuses others.

I enjoyed seeing Jake grow from silent victim to standing up for himself and speaking his truth, though the book did seem rushed at times. But overall I enjoyed this atmospheric book and was impressed at how the author took us into the minds of Jake and Sawyer.

Still, definitely watch the trigger warnings on this book.

Trigger warnings: school shootings, murder, stabbing, violence, abuse, suicide attempts and ideations, racism, physical bullying and homophobia.