I enjoyed every single page of In Nightfall by Suzanne Young. I can't imagine anyone picking this up and not having a great time. So many badass characters.

This was one of those books where the cover jumped out at me the moment, I opened my email with the information for this book tour. After reading the description of the book with the comps to one of my all-time favorites of the Corey’s movies, The Lost Boys combined with one of the few tv shows that I watched religiously from its pilot to its finale as a teen and young adult, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, I knew that this was something I had to read and that I had to be a part of this tour. Now, I will fully admit, that after having read another young adult book that was described as a gender bent The Lost Boys that came out a few years ago and ended up being a complete disappointment as it “borrowed” from the original film just a little too much, I was wary going into In Nightfall.

Thankfully any anxiety I had going into this book were quickly squashed as it became quite apparent from the first few chapters that while I could see where The Lost Boys had been an inspiration, the author took the basic concept of two teens moving with their recently divorced parent to a completely different town that just happens to be infested with vampires, and truly made the story her own. Suzanne Young has managed to create a modern-day YA vampire horror that can stand on its own and carves its own space onto any vampire lovers’ bookshelf.

While this is a horror story with a group of vampires and quite a bit of blood once the fighting said vampires begins, it’s much more than that. There’s also a mystery that runs throughout the book, as Theo not only works to figure out what has happened to her brother that is making him act so strangely, but also what the true story behind the town’s famed “Midnight Dive” is. To aid Theo in her research are a pair of podcasters, Elijah and Felix, who travel all over investigating different horror stories and their origins. I loved the inclusion of the podcasters because it was through them that Theo really first began to question what she was being presented with along with the motives of Minnow and her friends when it came to Theo’s family.

Not wanting to spoil anything, I will just say that this was blast to read and I can’t wait to pick up a finished copy to join other horror books on my shelves next time I’m at the bookstore.

All I needed to see was the comparison to one of my favorite movies, The Lost Boys, and I was on board. I love that movie and a gender-swapped book version feels made for me. It was a lot of fun seeing the girls run things and be the monsters and I appreciated how things were updated yet kept several fun elements of the movie.

The main character Theo was basically Corey Haim and I enjoyed seeing her unravel the mystery of the town and fight for her brother. The siblings had a great bond and I'm always happy to see it. I felt such sympathy for Theo when things started going sideways and she felt like no one was on her side or listening to her. The frustration was real and I wanted to shout at her to maybe talk to her grandma, that lady clearly knew things were not right.

This was a super fun read and if you've seen the 80's movie, you'll be hooked from the start!

I voluntarily read and reviewed this book. All opinions are my own. Thank you to Delacorte Press and NetGalley for the copy.

Before the 70% mark, I thought this was definitely something my students would love. They love thrillers/ mysteries, especially ones with solving murders. However, I was not super impressed with the reveal of what was actually going on in the town. **SPOILERS --- I think vampires are super overdone in pop culture today, and I don't think this book was doing anything new with the genre. Once the vampire plotline was established, it was very easy to guess who the queen vampire was, and so I wasn't in that much of a rush to finish the book, since I had basically figured out the rest of the plot. I wish the cause of missing people wasn't supernatural, because I was initially very hooked and felt some chills while reading. I wish I could have felt that way through the end.

Okay, first off, the COVER. Immaculate. I loved this story, so fundamentally different from other work I've read by this author. I LOVED EVERY SECOND OF THIS NOVEL.

I loved every thing this book was giving. Nonna is such a badass. Theo is such an awesome character. Theo and her brother get sent to their grandmother for punishment for a party that was thrown. I love it.

4.5 ⭐️ almost 5 but the beginning was slightly slow for me. I had so much fun reading this Fem lost boy book! I was plagued by so many emotions all the good ones you want in a book. Nonna was a hilarious bad A and I’d totally read a book about Elijah and Felix. A great read over all!

I picked up In Nightfall on a whim when I saw it described as Lost Boys meets Buffy and I found it very very fitting to that! It was very lost boys and not as much Buffy. I love both so it didn't bother me, but Buffy fans may be let down. I thought it was a fun and well written mystery - I really enjoyed it!

Theo and her brother Marko are being sent from their sunny home of Arizona to Nightfall, Oregon to spend their summer with their dad. They’ll also be meeting and living with their mysterious Grandmother, a paranoid woman who is a little mean and a little weird.
Theo and Marko take no time getting to know the fellow neighborhood teens, who host nightly parties down at the beach and LOVE tourists and making everyone feel at home.
I wish I knew what about this book bothered me, I really kept flipping between 5 stars and 2 stars. It seemed to change with each paragraph. I loved the mystery of this book and the spooky unanswered questions. A lot of things felt continent though, like grandma not answering questions until the end, or two podcast hosts being their to info dump whenever Theo had suspicions. Or the only vampire boy in town falling in love with Theo? Don’t even get me started on Grandma having an anti dote the WHOLE TIME?! But only using it on her grandson to save the day at the end. Eye roll.
Also a lot of the dialogue felt a little insane. You’re telling me this guy is gonna be pissed while in the middle of a fight for his life with a literal vampire because said vampire insulted the production value of his podcast?? Bro.

This book is described as Lost Boys meets Buffy and it definitely is but I think it's a little TOO Lost Boys (like some pieces seem like a direct retelling) and then the Buffy piece not enough. The book is well-written and pretty fun mystery wise, but not as original as I would expect. If this was marketed as a retelling I think it would go down a little easier.

On just the book itself, it's a fun read. I enjoyed it but wanted a little better balance in the plot. The "mystery" goes on for a bit too long so the pacing of the story felt off to me. I think it's worth reading, but probably a library borrow or ebook for me.

Mysterious, atmospheric, and a whole lot of fun, IN NIGHTFALL combines all of the elements of some of my favorite paranormal fantasy books and tv series and gives readers a delightful tale of a secretive town with something lurking in the night. Readers will be kept guessing what exactly Nonna Maggione warns Marco and Theo about Nightfall after dark, and it’s such a fun ride trying to figure it all out. ⁣
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The book had the drizzly feel of Forks, the small town feel of Riverdale, and characters that were just as kickass as Buffy and the Winchesters. Nightfall was in itself the main character, and I loved how eerie, atmospheric, and gorgeous the setting was. You could practically feel the fog rolling over your skin, smell the sea, and feel the ocean breeze. Young did such a phenomenal job transporting readers to the quaint (and super mysterious) coastal town. I absolutely loved the siblings Marco and Theo and the bond that they shared. I adore strong sibling relationships and theirs was so delightful and so precious. The side characters, aside from being just as mysterious and secretive as the town itself, were all delightful as well, and I loved the friendships that the siblings made in this new town. ⁣
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All told, a fun ride from start to finish. Perfect for fans of Buffy, Supernatural, Twilight, and even Riverdale, this book will pretty much turn the pages all on its own. Many thanks to @tbrbeyondtours and the author for gifting me an arc!

Scheduled to post 4/8/23.

I had to give myself a little time before reviewing IN NIGHTFALL. I was so far into my feels with it I needed a passport to get back. I am all for Lost Boys-inspired books. It's pretty much a guarantee that I will pick it up. It's how I found the Blood Coven series by Mari Mancusi (after a referral from a friend) and MAYHEM by Estelle Laure. GIVE. IT. TO. ME. So when I saw that IN NIGHTFALL was Lost Boys-inspired, I went YES.

Until I read the blurb.

Why did the blurb take be aback? Because it's basically the plot of The Lost Boys. Down to moving from Phoenix to a small beach town in California, I mean Oregon. Commence rage.

No, Donna! Don't! Don't judge it until you can read it! That might not be the case!

So I read the first chapter preview.

There was more rage.

Why? Because it's the opening credits scene of The Lost Boys. Nearly to a T.

THINGS AREN'T LOOKING GOOD. 

I'd requested the book as soon as I heard about it back in July or August. I just got the approval for it in March and I immediately started reading because I had to know.

I HAD TO.

And????

I'll start with what I liked about it:

Divorced from its source material, it's exactly the sort of YA horror I've been looking for in the current market. Not too deep, kind of kitschy, fun, spooky, underlying creepy. An all around good time. Doesn't require too much thought and gives me exactly what I was looking for. In that aspect, it nailed The Lost Boys right on the head.

Unfortunately, it nailed everything else about The Lost Boys right on the script.

IN NIGHTFALL isn't an homage to The Lost Boys. It's not inspired by. It IS. Young did not deviate from the plot of the movie at all. So readers, if you're familiar with The Lost Boys, you will know the entire plot of this book before even picking it up. You will know which character is which, what happens to who, every twist and turn, and how it ends. You already know how this book pans out. There aren't Lost Boys easter eggs in here. It's the whole damn rabbit. Characters, actions, scenes, character motivations, the blood-sucking Brady Bunch. It's all there.

What's different about it? It takes place in Oregon and the vampires are chicks. That's about it.

It's The Lost Boys without the personality of The Lost Boys. Gone is Joel Schumacher's sexiness, the dark undercurrent of the story wrapped in a pseudo-happy-go-lucky veneer, and the flash genius in the frying pan of the 80s to do something wholly unique. IN NIGHTFALL ends up being a pale, bland knock off that's disappointingly straight. Where Schumacher's movie was throbbing with queer subtext, Young's book gives mid-teens YA vibes in its heteronormativity. Of course, I can't forget the Frog brothers, I mean the gay podcasters that are the token gay comedic relief that exist to serve the main character. I've literally read better, more inventive TLB fanfic (and I've read A LOT of TLB fanfic). This book screams self insert Emerson sister fic.

I was so, so hopeful that Young was going to do something different with it. Killer mermaids or sirens or selkies or something. Do something to make it actually her own story. Those were the vibes I was getting for the first, like, third of the book. NOPE. It's The Lost Boys, slightly tweaked.

Who is this book supposed to be for? Because when the blurb is using comps like The Lost Boys and Buffy, are today's teens going to know what any of that is? Probably not, unless they have parents with taste. Those comps are for people my age, because this YA book isn't really being sold to teens, now is it? Says the teen librarians themselves, books like this are being written for the adults who buy them, not the teens who read them. The thing is, IN NIGHTFALL is actually a great book to fit in that space. The MC doesn't even have her license yet. This is actually a fantastic YA book FOR TEENS. But the marketing is targeting the nostalgia of the people with the bank accounts. I'm sure teen readers, especially younger teen readers, would love this book, but it has nothing to do with The Lost Boys or Buffy.

It's just getting old that publishers are getting so risk averse with what they put out that they just keep regurgitating the same thing because it's safe. Young, with her impressive backlist, is as safe and as sure of a bet as one can get in publishing, which is why we're here. Her writing is fine. It's nothing to write home about, but she can string a sentence together. It gets the job done and moved me from one end of the book to the other. But this safety also guarantees that instead of a unique take on The Lost Boys, something that is genuinely a hat tip to the movie but stands on its own and speaks to a newer author's imagination and verve, we get barely conceived fanfiction that doesn't do anything with the source material except follow the movie's plot. I'll just watch the movie, thanks.

PS: Where the hell does Buffy come into this? The fancy dress and vampire-staking at the end? Bit of a stretch.

1.5

I grew up in the 80s, and The Lost Boys was one of my favorite movies. I watched that so many times I lost count. I also devoured the Anne Rice vampire novels – like I was reading them as she was writing them (yes, I’m old!). So when I saw that Suzanne Young was writing what looked to be a sort of homage to The Lost Boys and 80s/90s vampire fiction, I was all in! And In Nightfall *definitely* gave me all of The Lost Boys vibes!

It’s funny because the movie happened to be on TV the weekend I started reading this book (of course I rewatched it, ha), and I noticed a fair amount of similarities that made me smile. At the same time, Young created a story that is wholly her own, with a great origin story for the tiny town of Nightfall, Oregon. The tension and creep factor rose steadily as the book went on, which definitely kept me flipping the pages to see what would happen. I was rooting for Theo and Marco, and there was a pit in my stomach several times. And Nonna…good old Nonna was definitely my favorite character! She was an amazing, teeny tiny force of nature.

Now, In Nightfall is definitely YA, so although it’s classified as horror, it’s not gonna be as scary or gory as, say, Anne Rice’s work. So don’t be put off – there’s just enough creepy tension to freak you out a little, but it’s not like adult horror. And there’s a great sense of dry humor permeating the whole thing, which had me chuckling many times while reading (and which you can see from my favorite quotes bellow). If you’re a fan of The Lost Boys, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and the like, you should absolutely pick this one up – it will give you all the vampire nostalgia!

Rating: 4 stars

**Disclosure: I received an e-ARC of this book for purposes of this blog tour. This is my honest rating and review of the book.

Back in the day, Suzanne Young wrote some YA dystopian classics.

She's back with a standalone paranormal story for the 2020s.

Though many reviews have said what kind of paranormal story this is, I'm not going to because the book keeps you in suspense about what is going on in Nightfall for some time.

Theo and her brother Marco get sent to Nightfall to stay with their grandmother as a punishment for a huge party Marco through without permission.

Right off, their grandmother tells them not to stay out past dark. What? This is a tiny Oregon town. What dangers could possibly lurk here?

This did take a bit of time to get started, but I found it a fun and atmospheric read. This series will always be my favorite YA paranormal series, I think teens will love it, but adult fans of 1990s paranormal shows and movies will love it too!

In Nightfall is a book that captured my attention just from seeing the cover and reading the synopsis. I often find myself having a love or hate reaction to supernatural YA books and I'm happy to say that this one falls into the LOVE IT category! Theo and Marco come across as fairly typical teenagers, but they have a great sibling relationship that made me like both characters from the start. Once they met Nonna, the story really grabbed me. I thought Nonna was a great mix of quirky and caring and she was probably one of my favorite side characters. I love that there were so many strong female characters in this book and that they didn't allow their thoughts to become muddled over what they were feeling.

There was a lot of foreboding alluding to what was going to happen, but I think that helped make the book a little more suspenseful because I was wondering when the characters were going to figure it all out. The action really picks up in the second half of the book and I was left feeling satisfied by how everything played out. Other supernatural YA books have disappointed me in the past, but I feel that this one is a great addition to the genre and I will happily recommend it to YA readers.

This is a fun vampire story, if not an inventive one.

I liked the vibes, it did feel like Oregon, which books set in Oregon don't always.

The decision to not reveal the vampirism till the last 25% or so of the book made for an interesting dramatic irony.

3.5 rounded up

In Nightfall, we follow Theo and Marco who have to live with their grandmother in Nightfall during the summer as their punishment. And it won’t be a fun vacation because their grandmother has one rule: to be home before dark. Theo and her brother don’t think much of this rule because they want to have fun during their summer break and so they start meeting some new people. Soon they’ll start to regret not having listened to the ONE house rule…

When you tell me that there are going to be vampires in a book, I’m always all in! So I just had to read this book. I enjoyed the setting and the descriptions that we got of Nightfall, and was immediately intrigued by the house rule of the grandmother.

I was a bit disappointed however because I found the pacing to be a bit too slow for my personal liking. Also, the “real” action only appears very late in the story. And another thing that made me rate the book only 3.5/5 stars is that I didn’t like the characters. Not because they were supposed to be unlikeable, but because there was just something that didn’t make me “click” with them. Even though the vampires appear late in the story, I really liked the way they were written by the author.

Overall, “In Nightfall” is a great read that I think many of you will certainly enjoy. I just had too high expectations, which I should have set aside. And after I did just that, I enjoyed reading it. If you love books about vampires set in small towns and mysterious things happening, then this will have to be your next read!

This book is described as The Lost Boys meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer in the synopsis, and that describes the vibe and the story perfectly!

It's a fun & emotional read about two siblings who are forced to spend their summer in the small town of Nightfall, Oregon and the dark secrets that the town is hiding.

I haven't read a book solely centered around vampires in a long time, and this story has convinced me to get back into this niche!

I loved the FMC Theo - she's inquisitive, determined, and will anything to protect her family! Plus, I thought that her grandmother Nonna was very interesting, and the more I got to know about her, the more I admired her.

Also, there are a few *complicated* romances in here that are super entertaining to watch play out!

All in all, if you're interested in a charming story about a small town plagued by vampires, check this out!!

In Nightfall is a solid YA supernatural light horror. It is in every way a modern version of The Lost Boys. Very enjoyable.

I went into this book knowing almost nothing and because of that, I was so pleasantly surprised. I knew that something bad was going on in Nightfall but I wasn’t quite sure what it was. This book is such a good summer read. It’s takes everything that we love about a summer slasher with everything we love about monster/paranormal books. However, there was so much sadness in the book that I never anticipated. that emotional depth made the book all that much better.

the only thing I found was that Theo’s realization of what was going on happened way too late in my opinion. and because of that, the ending felt a little rushed. other than that though, it was such a fun read.