Way back in high school, in between books about magical journeys and other worlds, I liked a fun mystery now and again. I don’t remember when I first read Blue is for Nightmares, but I do remember the images of dark hallways, moonlit boarding school quads, and a student lying murdered inside an empty classroom. It was by no means the creepiest or scariest mysteries I’d read, but it did leave something of an impact. And now, during my current witch craze, I decided it was as good a time as ever to revisit them.
Stacey Brown is a junior-year hereditary witch. She lives in a dorm at Hillcrest Academy with her best friend Drea, practicing her craft to bring good fortune to herself and her friends. However, Drea begins receiving mysterious phone calls and strange white lily bouquets. Drea thinks it’s all some mysterious ploy to get her attention, but Stacey senses something darker afoot. After all, white lilies symbolize death, and each bouquet has fewer flowers in it, counting down the day to Drea’s death. Stacey pulls together her magical skills and knowledge to discover Drea’s stalker and thereby prevent her imminent death…
Oddly enough, of all four books in this series, this is the book I remember the least about. I could most strongly recall Stacey creeping through the dark empty hallways of Hillcrest and finding her classmate murdered in a classroom, but other than that, nothing else stuck.
The mystery here is not that complex. After all, the book is barely under three hundred pages. And again, nothing all that creepy or threatening really happens. Re-reading it felt very reminiscent of early 2000s horror movies like The Ring, Final Destination, Ginger Snaps, or even Scream, where you have plenty of dark hallways, teenagers getting threatening phone calls, and paranoia among close friends. You wouldn’t really know that this book takes place in 2003 because not much fashion, lingo, and pop culture is referenced, but this book’s horrific events feel reminiscent of the horrific events of those movies, if that makes sense.
Though I do imagine this book would have been creepier if the characters were better written, especially Drea.
The whole book hinges on Stacey wanting to protect Drea from a stalker. However, Drea is such a whiny, self-centered brat that it’s hard to understand why Stacey and Drea are such good friends to begin with.
Drea thinks the stalker calling her and sending her white lilies is cute at first, but it’s only when Stacey explains to her why it could be dangerous that she takes it seriously. Sure, maybe that’s Drea being a teenager not knowing any better, but when you’re shaking your head alongside Stacey, you cannot help but wish Drea had known better.
There’s already some drama between Stacey and Drea since Stacey has a not-so-subtle crush on Drea’s on-off boyfriend Chad, and it helps illustrate why I find Drea annoying. She flies off the handle a lot at Chad for no real reason and she is stubborn to a fault, which not only makes Stacey’s job protecting her more difficult, but also makes it harder to root for Drea to stay protected.
Not that I would ever root for Drea to die. I’m just saying that someone who bitched and moaned less would make a more sympathetic damsel in distress.
We spend several scenes with Stacey and Drea, and during those, I couldn’t really care less about Drea being saved. However, when Stacey sees her murdered classmate’s grieving mother, and she feels absolutely gutted about not being able to save her, that’s when I finally felt strongly about the stakes. It’s not a good thing when one character we’ll never see again wrings more emotion out of you than a character you’re supposed to care the most about.
A little nitpick, but Stacey’s friends Amber and PJ are not that much better. Amber refuses to be Stacey’s roommate unless Stacey stops wetting her own bed (one of many ways that Stacey’s body tells her something is wrong). And PJ is just obnoxious and weird. I’ve read worse characters, but I’m just glad they’re not in the book that much. In all, Stacey needs to get herself better friends.
At least Stacey is a likable protagonist, since she is very passionate about her magic craft. She takes it quite seriously too, since she did not listen to her prophetic nightmares once, and it led to the sweet girl she babysat before getting killed. I can imagine this series making a lot of teenage girls want to practice the craft.
The writing is a little strange sometimes. Stacey once describes how “rain would sprinkle down in feathers,” which I guess is supposed to describe rain falling softly, but I don’t think rain floats quite like feathers do. Some sentences are downright confusing like, “If Donovan’s eyes made brush strokes, Drea would look like a Picasso by now.” A Pollack, or something more abstract and wild, would make more sense, if you ask me.
I think I like this book more for the nostalgia than the actual story and characters. It doesn’t hurt to go back and revisit it (all the books’ covers are pretty iconic), but there are much better mysteries with more compelling and sympathetic characters out there. Though, maybe people just starting out with teen mysteries and light horror may like it.
The Library Key 