Nightmare

I spent a lot of time in my high school library. I would help out in there during my freshman, junior and senior years since I had study halls those years. My senior year, I remember helping put books away while also looking for my next book to borrow since I read all the books in my house. That was when I came across Nightmare by Joan Lowery Nixon. I remember it was the cover that had caught my eye originally. I was like, "Hmm. This looks interesting." I stopped what I was doing and began reading right away.I couldn't put this book down. Just a few minutes before the bell rang I check the book out and must have gotten yelled at by my teachers to put the book away or they were confiscating it at least twenty-six times. I loved this book and had Mom read and the both of us fell in love with it. Joan Lowery Nixon became one of my favorite writers along with Stephan King, Stephine Meyer, Jane Austin, Edgar Allen Poe, J.K. Rowling and J.R.R. Tolkien.

This book is very exciting and I never wanted to put it down but sometimes I had to I would definitely recommend this book!

Absolutely loved this book totally worth the $7. I wish I would have finished it in high school when I began reading it in the first place.

I bought this as a gift for my grandaughter. She really enjoyed "Nightmare", and the book was in excellant condition, as well! I would have no problem ordering more books.

Love

I read this book back in middle school and I couldn't put it down . I did a report on my favorite book and this was is it . To this day it is my favorite and I never thought Id find it online but I did here ! Im so exited for it to get here !!!

Emily Wood is the main character in Joan Lowery Nixon's latest book, NIGHTMARE. She is a sixteen-year-old who has been dubbed an "underachiever" by her teachers and parents. They believe this stems from the pressure Emily feels to live up to her two near-perfect older sisters. But her feelings go much deeper than that. For years, Emily has suffered from a recurring nightmare of a dead body. She does not know who the victim is or where it's happening, but the nightmare is so vivid and strong that it has intruded her world while she's awake. To feel safe, Emily has begun hiding herself: growing her hair long so it covers her face, sitting quietly in the back of her classes, floating invisibly through life. Emily's parents want to see her succeed in school and in all areas of life, so they enroll her in a summer program called Camp Excel, a radical clinic that specializes in new techniques to reach those hard-to-reach kids. Emily doesn't want to go, but her parents leave her no choice. Once there she meets Haley, her too-perky roommate who believes in the Runes and fortune telling. She also meets Taylor, a girl with spiked hair that's dyed pink. There is also Maxwell, a playwright wannabe. During classes and therapy, Emily spies a portrait of the woman whose dead body she sees in her nightmare. This is when the trouble begins for Emily. Someone does not want her to remember that her nightmare really happened. This someone begins to hatch a plan to take care of Emily once and for all. There are many twists and turns in this novel; readers will not be sure of Emily's fate or who the killer in her nightmare turns out to be. Readers, like Emily, will have a very difficult time trusting certain characters. Emily is a believable heroine, and her chilling story will keep readers involved from beginning to end. Nixon has another winner on her hands with NIGHTMARE. --- Reviewed by Melissa A. Martin (Melissaenglish72@yahoo.com)

Sixteen year old Emily is less than thrilled to be on her way to Camp Excel, a camp designed to motivate underachievers. She is even more unsettled at having one of her reoccurring nightmares happen on her ride to the camp. In her dream, Emily looks right into a dead woman's face, floating in the water, staring back at her. What is it about Camp Excel that disturbs her memory, but won't let her remember? Suspense builds as Emily has a feeling she is being stalked. An ominous symbol casually picked from a roommate's rune collection adds to her apprehensions. As Emily pieces her memories together, she starts making sense of the murder in the nightmare she experienced as a child, and all the staff members in camp become suspect. When a fellow student at camp is attacked, Emily is sure she was the intended victim. The plot thickens and the suspense intensifies as the reader encounters intermittent chapters revealing the evil thoughts of an anonymous voice that works at the camp and is plotting Emily's demise.Joan Lowery Nixon has constructed a quick read, yet an intricate mystery, which readers should find appealing. Her characters are quirky, to fit in with the dysfunctional theme of the camp; but also trendy enough to be valid. There's Taylor, with her spiked pink hair; Maxwell, the procrastinating playwright; and Haley, Emily's roomate with a hyper personality and an obsession with fortune telling. Interjecting the anonymous voice in alternating chapters heightens apprehension and sets the reader to guessing. Emily is being stalked, but by who, and why? Nixon performs a great job of increasing the complexity of details without letting the reader be able to foretell the cullprit. Emily's initial insecurity gives way to reveal new found confidence, leaving the readers feeling she is on her way to a more successful future.