Review: The Haunting of Alaizabel Cray

I want to give a review of a book that's been out for about seven years and one that I had never heard of (P.S. I usually like to pretend I've heard of everything). I am aware of who the author Chris Wooding is, but I was not familiar at all with his book The Haunting of Alaizabel Cray until a co-worker placed it into my hands and told me I needed to read it. So I read it, and now I want to share it with you.

Wooding introduces us to an alternative Victorian-like London where seventeen-year-old Thaniel Fox lives and works as a wych-hunter, a hunter of the daemonic wych-kin. It's when Thaniel meets Alaizabel Cray that his entire world changes. It happens that an evil occult is beginning to take over London, and Thaniel's new companion may be at the center of it.

The prose in this book is incredible. It reads at such a smooth pace and the details, particularly the action scenes, are so descriptive it's like watching a movie. The Haunting of Alaizabel Cray is a young adult Gothic thriller at its best. Wooding's London streets are haunted by wych-kin, wolves, thieves, and a very disturbing serial killer named Stitch-Face. The novel, itself, is intelligent, shocking, creepy, dark, and will keep you turning the pages until you've reached the last; I didn't want it to end. Wooding has an amazing imagination and that imagination has made the book an intensely suspenseful read; something to keep you up at night.