Lost Boy: The True Story of Captain Hook

by Christina Henry

From the national bestselling author of Alice comes a familiar story with a dark hook—a tale about Peter Pan and the friend who became his nemesis, a nemesis who may not be the blackhearted villain Peter says he is…

There is one version of my story that everyone knows. And then there is the truth. This is how it happened. How I went from being Peter Pan’s first—and favorite—lost boy to his greatest enemy.
 
Peter brought me to his island because there were no rules and no grownups to make us mind. He brought boys from the Other Place to join in the fun, but Peter's idea of fun is sharper than a pirate’s sword. Because it’s never been all fun and games on the island. Our neighbors are pirates and monsters. Our toys are knife and stick and rock—the kinds of playthings that bite.

Peter promised we would all be young and happy forever. Peter lies.

Genres: Fantasy, Horror, Retellings, Fiction, Young Adult, Fairy Tales, Adult

292 pages, Paperback

First published July 4, 2017

About the author

Christina Henry is a horror and dark fantasy author whose works include GOOD GIRLS DON'T DIE, HORSEMAN, NEAR THE BONE, THE GHOST TREE, LOOKING GLASS, THE GIRL IN RED, THE MERMAID, LOST BOY, RED QUEEN, ALICE, and the seven book urban fantasy BLACK WINGS series.

Her short stories have been featured in the anthologies CURSED, TWICE CURSED, GIVING THE DEVIL HIS DUE and KICKING IT.

She enjoys running long distances, reading anything she can get her hands on and watching movies with samurai, zombies and/or subtitles in her spare time. She lives in Chicago with her husband and son.

You can visit her on the web at
www.christinahenry.net
Facebook: authorChristinaHenry
Twitter: @C_Henry_Author
Instagram: authorChristinaHenry
Goodreads: goodreads.com/CHenryAuthor

Reviews

[megs_bookrack · Rating 5 out of 5]

Question: Who is the BEST character in Peter Pan?



Answer: Captain Hook.
Incorrect Answer:: Anyone else.

With that short trivia portion out of the way, let it be known that Lost Boy brings Captain Hook to you as you have never seen him before!



This is, in fact, the origin story of one of the world's most underrated villains, expertly-crafted by the mind of Christina Henry.



Y'all, Ms. Henry has a dark and wildly creative imagination. We stan.



This story follows our infamous Captain before he is even known as such.

We learn of his early life, when he is simply, Jamie, chosen by Peter Pan to be Peter's first and best boy.



As many of you are already aware, Peter Pan is a spoiled, petulant little prig, who also happens to function with the most murderous of intentions. I have always considered Peter Pan to be a jerk and this reimagining certainly does not dispel that notion.

Jamie tries his best to keep Peter under wraps and is thusly protective of the boys Peter keeps bringing back to the island.



It is a gradual awakening for Jamie, as he begins to realize what Peter actually is. He also comes to identify this life he has been living on the island as a complete lie.

Through these realizations, Jamie begins to grow-up, something Peter vehemently detests.



Coming in at under 300-pages, this is a quick read but in my opinion, you have everything you need to make this a moving and impactful tale. The final pages of this blew my mind. I was speechless upon finishing.

I have so much love for this story and truly believe this to be one of the best retellings I have ever read and certainly the best origin story that I have ever read.



This is dark, with a constant feeling of menace. I cannot recommend it highly enough to horror fans, or just fans of darker works of fiction in general; not necessarily horror.

My dream would be for Christina Henry, in about 8-years, to come out with a sequel to this that completely flips the power balance between Peter and Captain Hook on its head!



For those of us that would love to see the downfall of one, Peter Pan, this would be the most delightful tale to ever be penned, I am sure.



So, Christina, have your people call my people.

Kidding!!! I don't have people, but DM me if you want to brainstorm and let's make this happen!

[jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

okay wow. i have no idea whats happened because everything i know about the story of peter pan now feels like a massive lie. i feel like im in some sort of shock. as far as i am now concerned, this reimagining is the only true version of events.

i think ive always romanticised peter and his lost boys; but when i read the original story last year, i found peter to be quite childish. that was my first turning point. and now this cruel and violent tale has only confirmed what i feared - that peter is undeniably selfish.

i also feel like the brutality of this story is somewhat necessary to emphasise with a character like jamie, a character that we have all come to know as a villain. so to see his origins and understand how he came to be the way he is is really important.

i also want to praise CH for taking dark story and filling it with radiant writing. my goodness, there are some sentences that read like pure poetry. i am so i love with her writing style and how she told this story. its definitely a highlight for me.

this book has been so much more than i expected it to be.

↠ 4.5 stars

[karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

read all about it in this thing i wrote for f(r)iction!!

there are so very many enthusiastic superfans of Peter Pan out there, and so very many retellings and variations of the story have been published to entice these superfans. and before we go any further, let me out myself: i am not one of them.

i don’t dislike Peter Pan, but my only exposure to the story has been through the disney-filter, and i was never really keen on any of the disney movies with people in them - give me The Fox and the Hound or The Aristocats any day, but Sleeping Beauty? snooore. so, while i saw the cartoon, and i read the little disney picture books about peter pan, i was never really driven to seek out the original, which i expect, given what i know about the disnification of other stories, is very different from its source material.

all of that is to say that even though there are likely many references and allusions here that i didn’t catch or understand the full significance of that will no doubt delight you superfans, i still really enjoyed this book.

i'm fond of the ‘villains redeemed’ genre that gregory maguire popularized and to which so many other authors have made offerings, and it's amazing to have such a wealth of retellings of beloved stories to satisfy readers’ cravings to revisit their favorite characters, no matter what shape the retelling takes, or how successful it is as a book on its own. i am myself a superfan of Wuthering Heights, and will read any and all retellings, even if they are atrocious. as many of them are.

but fear not, peter pan kids, this one is a million miles away from atrocious. which is not surprising, considering how popular this author’s Alice in Wonderland retellings are, both of which were bought excitedly by me, only to sit unread on my shelves, because we have already established that i am the worst.

but i read this one, so ppbblltt! and it is such a fun, bloody ride.

here we have jamie, the future captain hook, and the first boy peter chose to join him in his world of adventures and eternal youth and endless irresponsibility. since then, jamie has been peter’s right hand man boy, his first and most special friend, and has witnessed the arrival of so many other chosen boys over the years. and he has also been responsible for burying them. because - fine print - eternal youth is not the same thing as immortality. and on peter’s island of fun and gleeful romping, there are also pirates and crocodiles and the many-eyed and illnesses and … the battles. and while one of the most appealing characteristics of boyhood is the freedom from thinking about the future, or consequences, or anything other than what the next adventure will be, jamie has started to feel the weight of his actual years, and is troubled by peter’s short memory when it comes to all of the unnecessary lives lost to dangers sought out for no other reason than a lark, an adventure, a game. which simmering disquiet is already beginning to complicate their friendship and is made worse when peter brings back a boy who is way too young for peter’s rough-and-tumble ways, and jamie feels responsible for protecting him from the many dangers of the island, not the least of which is peter’s easily-bored carelessness, jealousy, and inherent lack of remorse.

it’s a really interesting dynamic, as jamie assumes the parental presence lacking in these boys’ lives even before they were abducted, and peter is just collecting temporary playmates, like a kid with a jar full of frogs who forgets to punch airholes in the lid.

it's a clever twist, a great character study, and did i mention all the carnage?? it’s like Lord of the Flies with a much higher body count.

i am very eager to finally grab those two alice books from my shelf, as soon as the mighty stack of promises allows.

come to my blog!

[Charlotte May · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Once you come here you can never leave. Nobody leaves. Nobody goes home. This is home now."

What a brutal retelling!

This is the story of Peter Pan and Captain Hook. But not as you know them.

Jamie and Peter have been best friends for as long as he can remember. He is Peter's favourite, his first, the most special one out of all the boys. Jamie has lived with Peter for years, and in all that time hasn't changed even slightly - Peter says they will never grow up.
Every once in a while, Peter goes to the other place and brings back more boys to play with, more boys to taunt the pirates and swim with the mermaids and play battle.
But Jamie doesn't see Peter's real side. The side that doesn't mind putting the boys lives in danger, the side that doesn't care when the boys get killed. Because after all, that's no fun!
Bit by bit Jamie sees Peter's true colours, and when Peter brings back little Charlie, a boy far too small for their games, Jamie makes it his mission to protect him.

There are plenty of new twists brought to this well known tale. There are the many-eyed; creatures who live on the island and are feared by the boys. As long as Peter is having fun, it doesn't matter who gets hurt in the process, and when things turn deadly - Jamie suddenly realises Peter doesn't love them at all.

A gruesome retelling, with plenty of gore and disturbing scenes, I was gripped. A fantastic revamp to an old story and I will definitely be reading more of Christina Henry's books.

"Peter didn't care about obstacles, even if they were shaped liked people. They were only things to be jumped over, to be knocked down. You didn't care about them."

[Sean Barrs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Everybody has their own story to tell, and more often than not people only see things from one perspective. In the original Peter Pan Captain Hook is an angry, perhaps slightly jealous, tyrant. But why is he this way? Christina Henry weaves a terrifying narrative together in response to such a question, a response that has the potential to alter the reader's perception of the original work forever.

It certainly changed my ideas about Peter Pan. The reason for that is how strikingly well the story is put together. There is nothing in this speculative prequel that could not have happened in relation to the original work. Taken in a certain light, the actions of the childish Peter are as twisted and evil as Henry made them out to be. He has the carelessness of a child, and with such carelessness comes a misunderstanding of the needs of others. Peter is unaware of how his actions can be considered bad; he doesn't set out to do evil: he accidently does so with his selfish ways. And because of this he has the potential to ruin many lives.

The boys are taken to Neverland to suit his purpose and it is very much his island, existing for his personal enjoyment, rather than creating a sense of community. The death of the boys means little him as he has a very vague concept of death in general, a product of his immortality. They are all replaceable and inconsequential. Each boy has deluded himself into thinking he is special, that he is Peter's favourite, but in reality he has been manipulated by Peter. He convinces people that he is their friend, so he can use them for his own entertainment. Whether that is frightening pirates or exploring the many dangers of the island, all the boys are at Peter's disposal. Jamie, our soon to be Captain Hook, was no different.

Told in the first person from his perspective, the narrative tracks his disenchantment with a friend he once loved. After a series of careless deaths and unfortunate encounters, Peter's spell (this charming illusion) is broken. The shift is gradual, as the friendship between the boys slowly breaks down. One only cares about fun and games, and the other is starting to grow up leaving the whimsical nature of the ageless lost boy behind. The end result is inevitable and deeply saddening. What Christina Henry does so well with her adaptation is to create a situation which is so plausible in relation to the original work. Her Peter is violent and unpredictable when his actions are considered beyond the heroics he defines them as. Indeed, not everything is as simple as it seems in Neverland.

The story is highly reminiscent of The Lord of the Flies by William Golding in which a group of children form their own society centred on ideas of violence and disastrous attempts of immature governance. I personally recommend this book to those who enjoyed the work and wish to read about similar themes in a fantasy-based setting

[Helen 2.0 · Rating 4 out of 5]

He didn't bring magic and fun and eternal youth. He brought fear and madness and death, trailing blood behind him, trailing all the corpses of all the boys behind him.
And yet it didn't weigh him to the earth at all. Every drop of spilled blood only made him lighter, gave him the freedom to fly.

Not so cute now, is he?

There are LOTS (probably far too many) Peter Pan mega freakazoid fans out there, and I'm one of them. #sorrynotsorry

I even had a crush on Peter as a kid. Damn if this book didn't cure me of it.

Lost Boy: The True Story of Captain Hook follows Jamie, the very first boy Peter ever brought to his magic island of fun and adventure. He loves and follows Peter religiously but slowly loses faith in him because of Jamie's fatherly love for the other boys; and because of Peter's complete disregard for their safety and happiness. The more Jamie cares for his fellow lost boys, the more his eyes open to the manipulative, selfish, murderous nature of his best friend.
But even as Jamie grows apart from Peter, figuratively and literally, he doesn't realize how far Peter will go to keep him by his side.

Christina Henry's interpretation of an fan favorite is chilling and believable. I like it far better than some other retellings which try to romanticize Peter Pan (like Tiger Lily) or give him a love interest (which in my opinion attaches adult notions to an eternal child).

tl;dr: this is a very adult reimagining of a children's classic. You may never look at the Boy Who Never Grew Up the same way but it will be worth it!

[Dan Schwent · Rating 5 out of 5]

A young man named Jamie tells the tale of the worst villain he's ever known... an impish boy named Peter.

I've long been a fan of dark retellings of classic tales, like Alice and The Child Thief. When I saw the Bibliosanctum was having a giveaway for this one, I jumped at the chance.

Lost Boy is a dark retelling of Peter Pan from the point of view of the boy who would become Captain Hook. And it's fantastic. What would an island populated by eleven year old boys really be like? It's way more like Lord of the Flies than Neverland. Lost Boys die all the time and Peter goes to the Other Place to retrieve more, just like he did with Jamie, the boy who has been his right hand for 150 seasons, at least.

Peter as an uncaring sociopath makes a lot of sense and is very well thought out. Peter has a short attention span and is extremely selfish and self-centered. The Lost Boys and the pirates are just playthings to him, to be tossed away as soon as they become uninteresting. Actually, he acts more like a cat than a little boy, now that I think about it.

After being on the island with Peter for nearly a century, Jamie starts seeing the chinks in Peter's armor and knows a bloody confrontation is coming. Peter isn't happy unless he's the center of attention so when Jaime spends more time with some of the newer Lost Boys, things go south in a hurry.

The book has a lot of brutal, heart-breaking plot twists. I set the book down to tell my wife about them a few times but, for the most part, I wolfed this book down in three sittings. It's a really gripping read and I couldn't wait to see what psychotic gesture of "friendship" Peter would make next.

The dark spin on the Peter Pan mythos was fantastic. This book postulates answers to age-old questions like "Why don't the boys age?" and "What's with the vendetta between Peter and the pirates?"

When Christina focused her dark lens on Peter Pan, she crafted a winner. If you like dark takes on classic tales, this is the book for you. Five out of five stars.

[Claudia Lomelí · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe 3.5...

[Kelly (and the Book Boar) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Find all of my reviews at: http://52bookminimum.blogspot.com/

“All children grow up, or they die, or both. All children, except one.”

Before I begin, I have something I need to ask Christina Henry . . . . .



I’d say Lost Boy was highly anticipated by me, but that would be a lie because I had no clue about its existence until the Goodreads “Recommended To You” feature finally got one right and popped this up on my feed. I luuuuuuuurved Alice, but passed on Red Queen because homie don’t do series, yo. When I saw Lost Boy was a retelling of Peter Pan from HOOK’S perspective, I was all over it. I mean, who doesn’t want to get to know this guy better????



AmIrightoramIright?

WARNING: Typical Kelly aside fast approaching. Click away now or forever hold your peace. Still here? SUCKERS! Okay, so as a kid I was terrified of Peter Pan. I mean, for realz, dude was a straight up kidnapper FFS. I never believed he was a child, I always thought he was a little person or had some disease no one else knew about where he never looked older or something. As I got older and learned more about the church stranger danger, I also figured he was probably a pedophile. Not to mention the fact that (at least in the Disney version) he was a ginger, which would totally explain the fascination with Captain Hook . . . .



If you are like me and figured Peter was a supercreeper, all I have to say is . . . . .



While Lost Boy has tidbits of the original story . . . .



It doesn’t necessarily head “straight on ‘til morning,” but rather goes a bit sideways instead . . . .

“This isn’t a wonderful place for boys to play and have adventures and stay young for always. It’s a killing place, and we’re all just soldiers in Peter’s war.”

Action, adventure and stabby. OH MY! Easily my favorite read so far in 2017. Every star. Even the second one to the right.

P.S. Look at me getting my timing perfect on this read. I say really idiotic things (shocking, I know) like “I don't really read fantasy” and then pick this up. So stupid. But yay me. Now give me a participation medal : )

[Sara · Rating 2 out of 5]

Boring 😵, it didn't bring anything new to the table 😂
2⭐⭐

[Heidi The Reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

Christina Henry, author of the chilling Alice, which is a brilliant re-telling of Alice in Wonderland, has shifted focus to a new fairytale. In Lost Boy, readers get to experience the story of the boy-who-never-grew-up through the origin story of his arch-nemesis. And what a story it is.

"Peter will say I'm a villain, that I wronged him, that I never was his friend. But I told you already. Peter lies. This is what really happened." loc 85, ebook. Goosebumps? Yeah.

Fans of the original tale will need to prepare themselves for having beloved characters shown in a new and sinister light. Think Longbourn, but worse, much worse. "I had been with Peter longer than I'd been in the Other Place, longer than I could count, anyway. The seasons did not pass here and the days had no meaning. I would be here forever. I would never grow up." loc 146, ebook. The others in Peter's group call the narrator, Jamie.

He is a fierce fighter- the best. And he protects the younger and weaker members of those lucky few that Peter brings back from the real world or in this tale, the Other Place. This protective instinct is sneered at by Peter who accuses Jamie of "babying" or "mothering" the boys. In truth, there is no worse insult in Peter's arsenal. Grown ups either abuse you or take your stuff or both. They're pirates.

"(Peter) had invited us there, had promised us we would be young and happy forever. So we were. Unless we got sick, or died, or were taken by the pirates." loc 257, ebook. So, Neverland is not the paradise that it is portrayed as in the original tale. There are also monsters called Many-Eyed that eat the boys alive, if they catch them.

"Was this, I wondered, what it felt like to be a grown-up? Did you always feel the weight of things on you, your cares pressing you down like a burden you could never shake? No wonder Peter could fly. He had no worries to weight him to the earth." loc 1971, ebook.

The stage is set. Love and hate intertwine with magic, blood and, of course, a little bit of fairy dust.

If you enjoyed this tale, you may also want to explore some other Peter Pan re-tellings like Tiger Lily by Jodi Lynn Anderson or All Darling Children by Katrina Monroe. The last, a horror-filled offering, may really appeal to those who want to delve more into the potential shadows of Neverland. There's a price to pay for never growing up. In that tale, as in this, Peter pays it without a qualm.

Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing for a free advance reader's copy of this book. Reminder: the short quotations I cited in this review may vary in the final published version.

[Sara Bow · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wirklich eine tolle Neuerzählung von Peter Pan. Allerdings verstehe ich überhaupt nicht wieso dieses Buch unter die Kategorie "Horror" fallen soll. Es ist zwar ein düsteres Buch, aber ich persönlich hatte keine Stelle in dieser Geschichte, in der ich Angst hatte oder vor Spannung das Buch nicht aus der Hand legen konnte. Daher Punkteabzug. Trotzdem eine tolle Story - besonders das Ende hat mir wahnsinnig gefallen!

[Ellen Gail · Rating 3 out of 5]

Peter promised we would all be young and happy forever.
Peter lies.

Ellen Gail tested. Chloe approved.



In Lost Boy: The True Story of Captain Hook, Christina Henry does what she did insanely well in Alice and brings a good deal of bloody retelling fun to a classic fairy tale. In this case, it's the tale of Peter Pan - he never wants to grow up, and he just wants all of his friends to stay young and carefree with him.

Peter's boys never grow up.

What could possibly be wrong with that?



Our main character here is Jamie, Peter's original lost boy. Peter brought him to his island so many years ago; his original home is nothing but a vague idea from a dream now. There have been other boys, some who are still with them, and many, many others who have long since passed.

In all these hundreds of years together, Jamie has worshiped Peter, loved him. Peter loves all kinds of bloody fun and games, but Jamie is the one left to clean up the bodies.

And after a few hundreds of years of being the grave digger, nursing sick and dying boys, and watching Peter go get new playmates when his old ones no longer amuse him, or heaven forbid grow up, Jamie is feeling a little frustrated. Fighting pirates, battling one another, swimming with the mermaids; all these adventures don't have the same joy they used to.

When Peter's newest addition to his gang of lost boys is barely out of diapers, tensions reach an all time high between Jamie and his longest, his only friend. Why must he always shoulder the responsibility? What isn't Peter telling him about the island? Is he really Peter's right hand man? Or just another disposable plaything?

Lost Boy is chock full of bloody adventures, the rowdy freedom of youth, monsters (both human and non,) and violent spasms of friendships being shredded into adulthood.

Also crocodiles.



So now the real question? Is it good?

Mostly, yeah. It can't beat Alice, her best and most dynamic work. But it is a solidly entertaining story. I'm not familiar with the Peter Pan story intensely, not beyond the Disney movie anyway. It was never one of my favorites. Growing up when it was Friday night video store time, my sister without fail wanted Peter Pan or Cinderella. I would 9/10 times choose Pocahontas, the other 1/10 being The Lion King.

If you'd like me to continue discussing Disney movies I can. I can discuss Disney's animated catalogue for dayyyyyys.

Okay, so back to the book.



Henry's writing is great as usual. She really hits a good balance between the more visceral action of the story and the emotional development of the characters. Jamie in particular goes through a lot of nice development as he feels the increasing weight of responsibility, pulling against his years of love for Peter. As for Peter, he's very much like a malicious child, collecting ants one minute, then burning them the next. He has no concept of right or wrong - there is only fun and if you aren't willing to play with him, and play according to his rules, what use are you?

The biggest drawbacks of the story to me, fall into spoiler territory. There's really no easy way to discuss them without spoiling the ENTIRE story, which I don't really want to do. What I can say is that I found Charlie, the smallest and newest lost boy, to be necessary completely. The story would have been drastically different without him, in terms of plot and character. But this didn't mean that I liked him much. Also: Sal. I have a myriad of issues with Sal's character. Or not really with the character in particular, but in some decisions and reveals and reactions.

I know that's horribly vague. You'll forgive me.



Is Lost Boy great? Unfortunately no, it falls shy of Christina Henry's best. But it is good, and if you have an interest in reading a Peter Pan retelling full of violence, mischief, and childhoods that either last forever or end all too soon, this is likely a book for you!


Thanks to Goodreads and Berkley for the arc!

----------------------

UPDATE: Screw waiting for July, I have an arc!
I'm reading this bitch now!

-----------------------

July has never seemed so far away.

[Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've never read J.M. Barrie’s “Peter Pan”, so my knowledge of Peter Pan is mostly derived from the Disney adaptation. I love that Peter! He is spirited, whimsical, and carefree. Then along comes a story so fascinating and cleverly told, that it forces you to rethink the entire storyline you grew up with…“Lost Boy” does just that.

We are so use to thinking that Captain Hook is the villain, and villains are always bad. But we’re not born bad, are we? Everybody thinks they are doing the right thing and that their enemy is the one in the wrong. Everybody is a hero in their own story. This is definitely the case of "there are two sides to every story" as we learn about Peter Pan, Tink and the Lost Boys, and their adventures in Neverland from Jamie -- the boy who eventually became Captain Hook.
In this retelling, Peter isn’t so much the spirit of eternal youth, but rather a sinister cult leader. Sadistic, arrogant, and selfish -- he embodies the very worst characteristics of children and then some. Jamie, the first of Peter’s boys, has become the caretaker of the Lost Boys. As he becomes burdened by the price in blood and death entailed by Peter’s choices, and how disposable the boys are to Peter, he begins to struggle with the reality of who and what Peter Pan really is -- and how monstrous the reality of a child who always gets his way can be.

“Lost Boy” is definitely dark, lots of death and blood, but it's never gratuitous. The action is well paced, and the gravity of the drama is heartbreaking. For me, what really drives this story forward are the questions it raises about childhood, devotion, coming of age, and loss. The characters are three-dimensional unlike in the Disney version who felt like props to have adventures around. The twins were my favorite, but every character felt real and you were enveloped in their lives. Jamie’s character is so well-written and his coming-of-age is engaging, especially as it's set against the backdrop of the island, and Peter. Peter himself is part of what makes this story fantastic. He is such a well developed villain that I wanted to kill him myself! Nevertheless, I can see both sides of the story quite clearly, and I feel for both of them. I felt bad that Jamie had to go through all that because Peter wouldn’t let him go; and I felt bad that Peter was so desperate to keep Jamie by his side, that he thought the best way to go about it was to get rid of the people Jamie loved the most -- and in doing so, he lost Jamie’s friendship in the end anyway.

Retelling stories is a special skill, different than ordinary fiction, and Christina Henry definitely has it. I was drawn in by the ideas alone, but she also measured up well on pacing, character building, and quality prose. It's both approachable and has the depth to chew on. Reveals and twists are believable, even undeniable, and done in such a way that it would be fun to read again. The story seems awkwardly unresolved, but in fairness, I'm not sure how it could have been resolved. Maybe my unease with it was exactly the response I was supposed to have. There are no happy endings here. Children die, lives are ruined. Peter may not get exactly what he wants, but no one else does either. Jamie may grow up and turn his back on Peter, but they will never be free of each other. You can see this end coming, even though you wanted badly to be proven wrong.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

"It is a fantastic lie."

I've always been the devil's advocate when it comes to villains because monsters are made, not born right? Well, when it comes to Captain Hook, Christina Henry gives us all the dark, bloody details related to how Hook's hatred and vengeance gained its shape. It's not a pretty story. Hook wasn't always the villain. In fact, according to Christina Henry's imagination, you may be shocked to learn who the true villain really was.

I love retellings and reimagined prequels, and Lost Boy: The True Story of Captain Hook is an excellent one. If you're in the mood for a fairytale with a high body count, check out Lost Boy. You may never watch the Peter Pan film the same way again.

My favorite quote:
"There was so much blood. That was what Peter brought. He didn't bring magic and fun and eternal youth. He brought fear and madness and death, trailing blood behind him, trailing all the corpses of all the boys behind him."

[Carrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yes folks, I am yet again reading another Peter Pan retelling. Lost Boy by Christina Henry is another young adult fantasy retelling of Peter Pan that flips the script and shows a much darker side of the Peter Pan that we all knew from the original.

This story starts at a much earlier time than the original back when “Jamie” was Peter’s best friend and second in charge of the boys Peter brought back to the island. Peter of course offered the boys a place where they would be young forever and the family of other boys like them.

However, over the years Peter’s idea of fun began to wear on Jamie. Battling pirates and losing good friends began to open Jamie’s eyes to just how heartless and cruel Peter could be. Doing whatever he can Jamie protects the boys from the other side as Peter brings them closer and closer to danger.

I’ll be the first to admit that I actually prefer the darker versions of the story so this one was right up my alley. Taking readers all the way back to the first days on the island and showing how Captain Hook became who he is in the later stories was fun to read and of course one can see how this could all be woven into the later versions of Neverland. Fun read that I’d definitely suggest the retelling fans to check out.

For more reviews please visit https://carriesbookreviews.com/

[Dianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Peter lies. Peter is a manipulator. Peter thinks only of Peter. He is not the rescuer of unwanted children. He is not a magical hero or purveyor of fun and excitement. Peter is a monster, but the boys he brings to his island are too naïve to realize, until it is too late, but the boys did have Jamie.

Jamie was one of Peter’s first boys. Jamie was the teacher, the nurturer, the voice of reason, the protector and the one whose attention Peter craved the most. Jamie knew the real Peter, the ugly side of the boy who never wanted to grow up. What he didn’t realize was the length Peter to which would go to keep his island world as his personal fiefdom, until Peter pulled his most cruel stunt ever and Jamie fought back for all the boys lost, all the boys who were tricked by Peter and all the boys who died for his entertainment.

Christina Henry’s Peter Pan is not the fantasy boy in a wonderful world of adventure. LOST BOYis a tale of a truly lost soul in search of the love he never understood, a boy jealous of real little boys who knew family and love and security, a boy just skewed enough to use his “boys” as pawns in his wicked games.

Told through the eyes and heart of Jamie, we see a world that is not as pretty, not so magical, but rife with deceit, treachery and lies, because, as Jamie says, Peter lies…and someone must pay the price. That price will give rise to Captain Hook, as we must decide, was he really the villain or just another of Peter’s victims?

Fabulous story telling with an intriguing concept that feels right as one boy fails to mature while those around him may, but only after they have seen through his façade and learn to think for themselves with both their minds and their hearts. For as much as I felt badly for Peter and his lost soul, there isn’t a boy in this tale that one wouldn’t want to protect and save.

I received an ARC edition from Berkley in exchange for my honest review.

Publisher: Berkley (July 4, 2017)
Publication Date: July 4, 2017
Genre: Fantasy | Fairy Tale
Print Length: 302 pages
Available from: Amazon | Barnes & Noble
For Reviews & More: http://tometender.blogspot.com

[Constantine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ ½
Genre: Fantasy + Retelling + Young Adult

This is a retelling of the Peter Pan story in a very dark and sinister manner. It's more like a cross between Peter Pan and Lord of the Flies if that makes any sense. The plot retains many of the primary elements that made the original so beloved, like Peter's invincibility and his promise to bring the children to his island home. But in this version, Peter isn't a naive kid, and the things that happen on his island aren't quite as magical and beautiful as he tells the kids he brings there that they will be.

Jamie, who is the first youngster Peter brings to his island, acts as the story's narrator and tells it from the first-person point of view. And it is through Jamie's perspective that we see the really harsh side of Peter. This is the first time I've read a book by Christina Henry, and I’m so glad to report that my experience was very positive. I didn’t expect to like this book that much.

Lost Boy is quite captivating and was written very effectively. Christina Henry has created a vivid and detailed world for Peter and the other boys to live in. The characters are incredibly realistic, and their struggles are incredibly moving. Jamie’s side of the story is one of pain, heartbreak, and ultimately, hope. I appreciate how the author kept the hope going on until the end of the book. I liked the ending.

The author has a way of writing that is really engaging, and there are points in the story that are both horrifying and heartbreaking. Henry does a fantastic job, both in her descriptions and in the language that she uses, of bringing the narrative to life. The story progresses rapidly, which maintains the reader's interest throughout the narrative. I highly recommend it. I’m glad to have her other books on my TBR too. I can’t wait to start them.

[Esther Kruman · Rating 2 out of 5]

This review contains marked Lost Boy spoilers and unmarked Peter Pan spoilers.

There are two questions to answer here: (1) Is Lost Boy a good book in its own right? (2) Is Lost Boy a good prequel to Peter Pan? I’m a lifelong Peter Pan fan and I’ve been studying the mythos for God knows how many years, so this will be pretty thorough.

First, though, a content warning: If you’re sensitive to violence, you should know that Lost Boy is quite graphic. Do not expect children to be spared. Arachnophobes and selachophobes should know that a couple of violent scenes involves spiders and one violent scene involves sharks.

(1) As a stand-alone novel, Lost Boy is decent. It’s well-written, but not well-crafted. While the sentences were pleasurable to read, the story as a whole did not work for me. The pacing was inconsistent. Some of the narrative choices were predictable and unnecessary. The romance felt hasty and trite. Peter was sufficiently frightening, but entirely devoid of nuance. Character deaths lacked emotional weight. The ending (particularly the last few pages) felt rushed. But the writer’s voice was good enough to make this a quick and reasonably engaging read.

My biggest criticism of Lost Boy as a stand-alone work was Sal’s gender reveal. As both a feminist and a woman writer, I fully understand the impulse to insert a female character into such a thickly masculine story. (Indeed, exploring gender roles was a huge part of the original Peter Pan.) Unfortunately, it doesn’t work here. First of all, it was not at all surprising. I assumed that Sal was a girl the moment she was introduced. Second of all, Sal was infinitely more interesting as a boy. Lost Boy is full of boys with no qualms about killing, so it was great to have a boy who was morally opposed to killing people. But once Sal was officially Sally, it strongly implied that she only felt this way because she’s a girl.

(2) As a Peter Pan prequel, Lost Boy fails. A good prequel should answer unanswered questions from the original story and, in the case of villain POV retellings, subvert what you thought you knew. Lost Boy doesn’t really do either of those things. Instead, it ignores all of the backstory, characterization, and world-building that we already have, giving us a blatantly non-canonical story that can only function as a separate text. If you’re familiar enough with the original Peter Pan, Lost Boy just kind of falls apart.

Hook’s Backstory

In the original Peter Pan, Captain Hook attended Eton before he came to Neverland, thus making literally everything in Lost Boy impossible.

But How Do We Get to Neverland?

Lost Boy is based on the premise that Peter Pan brings boys to Neverland to be his companions. That is false. In the original, the Lost Boys are all babies who fall out of their carriages. If a week goes by and they haven’t been claimed, they’re sent to Neverland. The only children Peter brings to Neverland are the Darlings.

Hook’s Hand

If there were one question that a Hook POV prequel should answer, it’s how Hook’s hand came to be eaten by the crocodile. In Lost Boy, Hook’s hand is never eaten!!!!! And neither is the infamous clock!!!! Henry tells us how Hook loses the hand and then doesn’t follow through with the rest of it.

Bad Form

In Peter Pan, Hook is obsessed with the idea of good form. He laments that he does not possess it and he is devastated that Peter does. For instance, when Peter disarms Hook, Peter allows Hook to retrieve his sword. Even more notable is when Peter does this:

“Quick as thought he snatched a knife from Hook’s belt and was about to drive it home, when he saw that he was higher up the rock than his foe. It would not have been fighting fair. He gave the pirate a hand to help him up.

It was then that Hook bit him.”

Now, I didn’t expect Hook to show bad form in Lost Boy, since he is no longer supposed to be the villain. But it feels like bad form on Henry’s part when she portrays Peter as a cheat, not fighting fair, etc. I know this might not seem like a big deal, but the whole good form/bad form thing drives Hook’s entire character in the original.

No Girls Allowed???

The entire plot of Peter Pan is about Peter bringing Wendy to be a mother to him and the Lost Boys. (He’s also friends with Tiger Lily and, of course, Tinker Bell.) Peter is particularly charming towards girls; it’s one of the reasons that Wendy is so fond of him. Yet in Lost Boy, Henry writes that Peter passionately hates girls and forbids them to come to Neverland. (Tiger Lily is never mentioned and pixies presumably don’t count.) This is a blatant contradiction and it doesn’t even serve a real purpose.

Lost Boys

One of Henry’s Lost Boys is called Slightly, which struck me as odd. That’s a real Lost Boy in the original. And they are very obviously not the same person because their characterizations are completely different and this one gets killed off, whereas the original Slightly leaves the island and grows up to be a lord. Maybe it was just an Easter Egg?

Also, this one isn’t a big deal, but Nod and Fog are identical twins. The original Lost Boys also had a set of identical twins, and Peter called them both Twin because he couldn’t tell them apart. It’s a shame that Henry didn’t do the same here, because it would have perfectly aligned with her characterization of Peter.

Pedantry

I was really disappointed by the minor contradictions to the source material. They made me feel like Henry didn’t do her research. For example, Peter Pan has a very clear description of Captain Hook’s eye color:

“His eyes were of the blue of the forget-me-not, and of a profound melancholy, save when he was plunging his hook into you, at which time two red spots appeared in them and lit them up horribly.”

“Dark as were his thoughts his blue eyes were as soft as the periwinkle.”

But Lost Boy explicitly contradicts that:

“My eyes were not blue. They were black like His, dark and pupil-less, like the eyes of the sharks that swam in the sea.”

Lost Boy also claims that Peter named Tink after the “tinkling noise” that she makes when she talks. Yes, Tinker Bell’s name is obviously a reference to the fairy language, which sounds like tinkling bells. But canonically, she is called Tinker because she is literally a tinker, mending pots and kettles. And there’s no indication that it was Peter who named her.

I was surprised to see one review claim that Lost Boy explains why Tink is the only fairy in Peter Pan. That isn’t a question that needs answering at all. The original Peter Pan states that Peter knows lots of fairies, that Tink is just his companion at the time, that fairies live and die and then he forgets them.

And that goes for Hook, too. In Peter Pan, he’s obviously made out to be impressive, but he’s also presented as just another of Peter’s foes, forgettable once disposed of. Whereas Lost Boy acts like Hook and Peter are practically soulmates, with Peter fixated on Hook instead of the other way around.

Peter’s Characterization

In the original Peter Pan, Peter is already a villain. (In fact, Hook wasn’t even a character until later drafts!) But Peter is never evil. He’s a boy, “gay and innocent and heartless.” The entire point of Peter Pan is to show that innocence is neither good nor bad. Peter is a chaotic force, but his childish cruelty also comes with boundless joy, courage, and an earnest belief that life is fair. Christina Henry vilifies Peter in such an over-the-top way that Lost Boy, while edgy, is ultimately much less sophisticated than Barrie’s Peter Pan.

Originality

It’s worth noting that this is not the first novel to tell Captain Hook’s POV. J.V. Hart (as in the Hook screenwriter!) set out to accomplish that in Capt. Hook: The Adventures of a Notorious Youth, published in 2007. ABC’s Once Upon a Time also depicts Hook as a hero and Peter as a villain, complete with their own take on how the two became enemies. So reviews lauding Christina Henry for originality might be overstating things a bit too much.

Lost Boy is part of a much larger conversation about an even larger mythos, and Henry largely ignores that mythos. That said, Christina Henry absolutely puts her own spin on this.

[Krystal · Rating 3 out of 5]

I probably wouldn't call it 'horror' but it's definitely violent and gory and full of darkness, which was fun.

This re-telling had me hating on Peter Pan almost instantly. Kid is a proper narcissist with some seriously disturbing ideas.

We all know the legend of the boy who didn't want to grow up. This story takes everything problematic about this notion and explores its darkness, sacrificing the lives of many of Peter's 'Lost Boys' to make its point.

The story is told by Jamie - who wears a fancy red coat which might hint at what his future has in store for him. But even knowing the legend can't prepare us for the journey towards that famous enmity.

Almost instantly the roles are reversed, and we're supporting Jamie over the selfish Peter. Peter collects boys to play with, whereas Jamie is the one who cares for them all, and protects them where he can. Yet he's still victim to his own rages, which serves as a reminder that, no matter how in control Jamie seems, he's still just a kid.

The story itself was a little slow for me, and perhaps that's because I wasn't particularly taken with any of the characters immediately. While Jamie is easy to like, he's far too serious to be any proper fun. Fog and Nod were far more entertaining, but their part is rather small in comparison to the detailed, complex relationship between Peter and Jamie. While there is still plenty of action, this story is stronger in themes - in particular, it focuses on the lack of responsibility of childhood, and the pros and cons of growing up.

There's definitely an element of fantasy, but there wasn't really enough magic for my liking. It had a strong Lord of the Flies vibe, with all these wild boys running mad on their own island, splitting into factions and perpetrating all manner of unrestrained violence on one another.

I certainly enjoyed the second half of the novel far more, as things really escalated and we began to see everyone's true colours. Yet it did still feel a little washed out to me. There was no real surprise, or dramatic turn of events. It was all pretty predictable, which took away some of the fun.

I was hoping for a dark, twisted spin on the story we all know, but it was more just an exploration of the dark themes the original story never really considered. It's about unhealthy relationships and immaturity and the damage that spawns from the refusal to take responsibility. I guess it made me think more than it allowed me to just sink into a story that entertained.

It was a good read, and I thoroughly enjoyed the ending, and it was certainly hard to put down. But I don't think it diverted enough from the original story to really make its mark with me. It's all about the wildness of the boys, and the magic that makes me such a fan of the original Peter Pan was sadly lacking here.

Maybe it's time I start using half-star ratings, because this wasn't as bad as a 3, but not as good as a 4. So let's consider this my first official 3.5-star.

[Carole (Carole's Random Life) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This review can also be found at Carole's Random Life in Books.

This was a lot of fun. I am not really someone who reads a lot of fairy tale retellings but the idea of this one really appealed to me. I really don't know a whole lot about the original Peter Pan story besides what I know from Disney which was probably one of the things that made me want to pick this book up. It did start out a bit slow for me and I was able to set it aside but once I really got going, I didn't want to put it down. This was really a great read.

I have a weakness for villains but Jamie really doesn't feel like a villain in this story. I really enjoyed seeing Peter Pan, the island, and the other boys from Jamie's point of view. Jamie was the first boy that Peter brought to the island and he is the favorite. He takes care of the others and keeps things in line. For a boy that will never grow up he is really very mature.

Peter wasn't the lovable innocent child that I know from the Disney movie. Not at all. Peter was cunning and thought only of himself. He brings boys to the island so that he will forever have playmates and he wants them all to love him. That doesn't mean that he cares about them all that much because if they die or get hurt he can just go and get more boys. Peter wants things the way that he wants them and he has all of the power on the island so the boys follow his lead.

The story had a lot of exciting moments. I was happy to see the things that I remember from my limited knowledge of Peter Pan including the pirates, the tree, and mermaids. I was also thrilled to see a few surprises along the way. This was definitely not a Disney movie and some of the scenes were actually quite violent. There were plenty of characters to like and a few to hate. Once the book hit the mid-point the action really didn't let up until the final page.

I would recommend this book to others. I thought it was a really well done story with great characters. This is the first book by Christina Henry that I have read but I hope to read more in the future.

I received an advance reader edition of this book from Berkley Publishing Group via First to Read.

Initial Thoughts
I don't really know much about the Peter Pan story besides what Disney has shown me. I must say that I really did enjoy seeing this other side of Jamie and Peter. I will have to check out some of Christina Henry's other books.

[Jordaline Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dude... this is so good. A really dark retelling of Peter Pan / Origin story of Hook.
SUPER GORY. Just dead kids everywhere and Peter is an absolute psycho. Loved it.

[Nenia ✨ I yeet my books back and forth ✨ Campbell]

Christina Henry traumatized me forever with her dark retelling of Alice in Wonderland. I give her my blessing to do it again with a dark retelling of Peter Pan.

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

5/5stars
January, 2020:

Reread this for my Master's project on adaptation and peter pan and I just absolutely adore this book and honestly rereading it after deep-diving so completely into Barrie and Peter Pan and everything surrounding it, it's an even more amazing adaptation! Love this book so much!


2017:
edit 7/8/17; I just got my physical edition in the mail and I legit got sO FUCKING EXCITED AND FOND AND LOVING that I just sort of knew I needed to bump this up to the full 5 stars.

OH MY LORD THE PHYSICAL EDITION HAS A MAP

GUYZ

GUYZ I'M SO EXCITED

4.25/5stars

I received an e-book copy of this book from NetGalley

Okay. I am very... conflicted on how to feel about this. Because, on the majority of my hands, I LOVED this, but on a tiny pinky of a hand I'm a little bit annoyed.

This tells the beloved story of Peter Pan, but before he flew off into the sky to retrieve Wendy and her brothers; back when Jamie was Peter's very best friend, his very FIRST friend, and the two of them fled into a hole in the ground to go find new playmates together. This is the story of how Jamie once loved Peter Pan, and slowly grew up to hate him. Because "Peter needed to be a hero, so somebody needed to be a villain."

This was, hands down, my FAVORITE portrayal of Peter Pan. Christina Henry PERFECTLY captured how he was in my head from my reading of the original story, and how I just always imagined him - because, I've read a handful of retellings so far and Peter is always just a little too innocent and nice or just a little too overly evil. Peter is just a boy - a little, eleven year old boy who wants what he wants when he wants it. He throws temper tantrums, he screams and fights when he's upset, and he's a horribly manipulative little creature. As a person who almost solely worked with boys between the ages of 8 and 12 for almost six years, I will be the first to tell you that (although you may think it) that age group isn't actually as evil as they're made out to be. They aren't innocent either - they're more just horribly simple and one track minded (for the most part). And Christina Henry captured this in-between PERFECTLY to me. Peter was perfect in this book.

And Jamie! Oh Jamie, he was wonderful too. I REALLY enjoyed her twist that James was originally a lost boy - not just any lost boy, but Peter's FIRST lost boy. It was a really, truly refreshing look on the story. And it made their rivalry as Captain Hook and Peter Pan seem all the more horrific and childish - which, I enjoyed.

I also LOVED that Christina Henry didn't hold back. There are so many flaws in Peter Pan's little world on the island; so many things that simply don't add up. And Henry totally pulls those things to the forefront and exploits them. SO MANY people die. there's illness, there's blood, there's boys who hate each other and there are boys who don't fit in on the island. Some of her descriptions were seriously gruesome and I swear a certain death is always going to stick in my head just imagining a canon ball ripping through six little boys and leaving their tops barely even attached to their bottoms serious is like WOW how'd you think that up Henry thanks for the nightmares

Overall I fucking enjoyed this so much. I never didn't want to be reading it - it captured my heart from the start and I'm angry I got this book at such a busy time in my life or I would have read it in a single sitting rather than a day. And please PLEASE don't think I'm writing this review so well because I got it from NetGalley (legit just go look at my other review I did for a book from them cause I tore it apart and hated it lol) because I will legit be preordering my copy RIGHT NOW and ordering all of Henry's other books because I'm in love.

But.

There's always a but isn't there

There is a small, tiny little thing that bothered me.

It's slight spoiler territory so I will be hiding it but it has to do with the romance in this book.


I feel like I shouldn't be so annoyed with this, because no where does it say that this was going to happen in the description, but, I'm still a little peeved. Basically, throughout 75% of this book, Jamie talks about how much he's in love with Peter Pan. Not just how much he likes Peter or how much he enjoys being around him and playing with him. He talks about how he's IN LOVE with Peter Pan. How he just wants to see Peter smile and how he would do anything for Peter and how he's fuCKING IN LOVE WITH PETER PAN.

I feel queer baited. I shouldn't. But I do.

If you give me a character who, from page one, is telling the reader how much he loves another character you'd think those characters were going to have a slightly more-than-friends relationship, RIGHT??

The majority of my highlights in this book are Jamie AND PETER talking about how much they love each other.

Now, I understand there are multiple types of love. (I am asexual, obviously I understand there's romantic love, platonic love, family love, etc. etc.) But when you say you're IN LOVE with someone usually that implies romantic feelings??????

I dunno, I just wanted something. Cause, even though I knew where this book was going to end up, I still felt like the author could have done SOMETHING with this whole LOVE thing??

Okay, that is all.



but yes this book comes out July 4th and I highly recommend it if you're a fan of Peter Pan or "Lord of the Flies" because tbh it was VERY similar to that book which makes total sense that I loved this book so much cause PP and LOTF are my two all time favorite classics.

[Jo (The Book Geek) · Rating 1 out of 5]

I willed myself to love this, I really did, but, it just didn't work for me, not in the slightest. Being a fan of Peter Pan and fairy tale retellings, I truly believed that I was in for a treat here. I have read Christina Henry's two retellings of Alice in Wonderland, and I rather enjoyed these.
But this story, was just mentally draining. I literally felt like I had to force myself to read it, which definitely is a warning sign for me.
From the very beginning, the story just consisted of violence and death involving boys, and Peter was made out to be a total monster towards boys who were apparently supposed to be his friends. The part where a boy had his baby teeth knocked out, and let me add, this part was rather descriptive, was the final straw for me. I feel the author could have told a great story, without all the sickening violence in it.

[Alexandra Elend Wolf · Rating 4 out of 5]

“That was what Peter brought. He didn’t bring magic and fun and eternal youth. He brought fear and madness and death, trailing blood behind him, trailing all the corpses of all the boys behind him.”

First of all, something I feel that it's important to state is the fact that I've never been a huge fan of Peter Pan so reading a Peter Pan re-telling is a bit out of the ordinary for me... especially because this book is a horror book and I've never read anything in that genre. So, you can say that I started it being terribly hesitant and incredibly excited as well as nervous, there was no in-between of all those emotions.

To my delight, this book delivered magnificently in all the aspects I could have hoped being incredibly entertaining and disturbing to satisfy my burgeoning curiosity of the horror genre.

Not to bad to be the first-ever book I read in this genre.

“I should have killed him then. It would have prevented everything that came after.”

The fact that I have a natural fascination and love for villains was the first thing that attracted me to this story. Captain Hook's backstory? A cruel Peter Pan? A friendship going very sour? Sign me in, buckle up, because I'm doing this thing.

Truly, more than a re-telling it's a prequel to the events we all know and cherish. Which, naturally, made it even more appealing to me.

We already know Neverland, we already know Peter Pan so this things are not difficult to understand, but everything else is just new and gory and crueler than anything else and, dare I say, it makes all the sense in the world.

It is the story we all know but at the exact same time it is not, and I loved every second of it.

“They weren’t forever young, unless dying when you were young kept you that way for always.”

I say that it was the perfect book to start me in my horror journey because as scary goes this one was mostly disturbing and chilling and gory and not downright terrifying.

There is a great deal of blood and death and it certainly doesn't scamper on the details and showing all there is to show, but I certainly didn't lose a night's sleep over it.

Of course, the fact that it all made so much more sense to me this way and that it didn't felt like a stretch of the imagination at all at any point is one of my favorite things about it. Well, that and the characters, who were all very charming and broke my heart in about twenty different ways... something I was most certainly not expecting.

No, I was not expecting the tears and the ache in my heart, I was not prepared. Though, in retrospect, maybe I should have expected the aching heart at least.

“We all believe him, at first. Even me. That’s how he lures us here with his promises. And then he rips us to pieces.”

The present/future narrative style was really good to set the mood for the book. It kept me on my toes and expecting what was to come next adding a very nice eerie and expectant feeling to the whole book.

It sets, very well, the childish setting as well as the fact that, well, these are very different children something that could have been very easily misconstructed or lost in the writing.

Really, the book is setting the scene, and projecting for the next scene, perfectly from beginning to end. Which keeps a very engaging and fast pace to the whole book. There is not one second when something isn't happening or you feel the lull of emotions coming down, no, everything is always in high alert.

“Even when there was blood he made me think it was only play, until there was so much of it even Peter couldn’t pretend anymore.”

Needless to say that I enjoyed this book thoroughly... which did come as a huge surprise to me. Not because I was expecting it to be bad or not to like it, but because I was so nervous, to begin with, that I feared I wouldn't be able to wholly appreciate it.

It left me with a hunger for more books in this genre and profound satisfaction. Which is good, because it beats any other outcome I was expecting from the whole experience.

“Once I was young, and young forever and always, until I wasn’t. Once I loved a boy called Peter Pan.”

_____________________________

This went... Surprisingly better than I expected.

It was gory and disturbing and chilling even if I wasn't stuck with terror. And it was also really heartfelt and emotional and deep, which I was not expecting, and made me feel much more than I imagined.

RTC.
_____________________________

I'm kinda nervous to start reading this book... After all, it's the very first time I dip my toes in the Horror genre.

However, I am excited since it seems like it's gonna be super interesting and, well, if it's also pretty gory I don't suppose I'll be mad about that.

To be perfectly honest, I have no idea as to what I want this book to be aside from interesting.

[Quirkyreader · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you Penguin for the ARC of the latest chapter of the Peter Pan mythos.

I have previously read biographies of J.M. Barrie, so I had some idea of what I was getting into. As I have mentioned on other platforms, this is not the Disney version of the story. If you want to keep and cherish that version run far away from this story. It will change everything you love about the character.

For those of you who wish to continue it is a well written story that continues ideas that one might have come up with whilst reading the original story.

Spoiler ahead.............

The Peter in this story is a narcissistic and bloody wraith out for his own pleasure and the young boys he takes end up being damaged for life.

This story is well worth the time. And it might inspire you to re-read the original and see what is there.

[aileen | ✾ · Rating 5 out of 5]

I fucking knew it. I knew it. RTC.

[Brandon Baker · Rating 4 out of 5]

After an initial DNF at around page 40 a few months prior, I knocked this book out in an evening!! I just think I was in a very *I want to read the most F’d up things imaginable* mood at the time, and this just didn’t fit the bill.

BUT! I’m happy I picked it back up tonight. I thought it was very fun and pretty intense at times. I love Henry’s writing, and this was a solid read!

[Vivian · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Peter's idea of fun was considerably more savage than his."

This was a quick read. The first portion of the story reminded me a great deal of Lord of the Flies, albeit more gory and less allegory. The innocence of PETER PAN is twisted into something very dark, here. I don't want to ruin the fun of it, so I'm not going to expand further on the storyline other than to say it does an very interesting job exploring some previously untold backstory.

"They weren't forever young, unless dying when you were young kept you that way for always."

I enjoyed this, but it is not sophisticated; it's an engaging retelling, a twist of the kaleidoscope. I don't think I'll ever reread it, but it was a fun ride. 3.5 stars. If you like what WICKED did for THE WIZARD OF OZ then you'll like this.