This was so confusing at first. Once I finished the books, I was like, "OHHHHH!" Not my favorite, but pretty good. ( )

A girl went missing in Kendall’s small Montana town. Then her best friend and boyfriend, Nico, went missing as well. This sends Kendall into a tailspin with her Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. She still goes into school early to arrange the classroom to her liking even though the surly new boy drives her to school now. When she notices new graffiti on the desk where Nico sat next to her, Kendall thinks she’s going crazy because she begins to hear voices. Is this part of her OCD or is Nico trying to contact her from wherever he is? ( )

Surprisingly good spooky writing for such a strange premise, but the notion that objects can become haunted or "evil" is ancient, after all. Kendall has OCD, which goes absolutely nuts when her best friend disappears in the small remote town of Cryer's Creek, MT -- the second high school student to go missing in the space of a few months. What is happening to these students, and why can Kendall "hear" voices in her classroom? Set against a story of growing romantic interest, this is a small town mystery with a sickly twist. ( )

The end of this was a little far fetched and didn't really work. I think that if the book had a lot more detail and was a lot longer, she could have made it work- the plot was on its way to being good, but McMann's style is very sparse, so I'm sure she felt it was a "style" thing. Not so much. Sometimes the detail needs to be there, style or no. ( )

This book has one of the lamest plots I've ever seen. Seriously. It's about a possessed desk. On top of that there are way too many ideas that are undeveloped or unexplained.

The main character is Kendall. She lives in a minuscule town in Montana that is so small the entire high school fits into one room. I can't say for certain that one room school houses don't exist today but my gut says that it's highly unlikely. That's the second annoying factor in the book. The first annoying factor is that the voice is 3rd person perspective. There's a reason why very few authors tell the story from this perspective. ITS ANNOYING! I always find myself wondering who the freaking narrator is and how they know what the main character is thinking. It just doesn't work. Since I'm already working the author over pretty good and not close to finished I'll go ahead and say that I think she did a decent job of portraying Kendall's OCD. Probably the only positive in the whole book.

So here's a brief synopsis. The book opens with the town trying to find a girl who went missing at the beginning of summer break. Fast forward to the start of the new school year and two things happen. Two new students arrive which is super rare in this tiny town and soon after the second kid goes missing who happens to be Kendall's best friend/boyfriend. Jacien, one of the new kids, is a total jerk, but once he settles in and takes a liking to Kendall, he has a brain transplant and turns into a completely different person. In other words the author does a poor job of character development. During the middle 2/3 of the book nothing really happens. No one else goes missing although the town requires all students to travel in assigned groups. Annoyingly weird. But this dumb rule allows Kendall and Jacien to fall for each other despite Kendall's constant voice saying she's cheating on her missing boyfriend who she insists to herself is not her boyfriend.

The weirdness really goes off the radar when Kendall notices that both missing kids used the same desk at school. When Kendall sits at the desk she hears a strange voice begging for her help. The ending is bizarre but I won't give away anymore. Let me just highlight some more annoyances.
1. Kendall is supposedly so good at dancing that she applies to Julliard. There are no scenes with her dancing. No mention of dance classes. I'm wondering how a girl who lives in the middle of no where learns how to dance well enough to go to Julliard.
2.The nonsense paragraph that precedes each chapter is just that.
3. Where the kids ended up being found is one of the first places the police would have checked if this were anywhere close to reality.
4. I still don't get how OCD saved Kendall. Maybe the author didn't describe the condition as well as I previously gave her credit for. Or it's possible that I missed it. In fact, it's possible that the entire book went over my head and my true IQ is being revealed.
5. The most interesting part of the book is the description of the punishment doled out at the reform school and it ends up being the whole key to the story, but it only gets the slightest mention at the end.

I could go on but really what's the point? The book is lame. Even my teen daughter abandoned it half way through. Too many good books out there. I'd skip this one. ( )