WONDERLAND by Jennifer Hillier

Fans of Chelsea Cain and Lisa Gardner will devour this edgy thriller about the gruesome secrets hidden beneath a small-town amusement park. From the author of Creep, Freak, and The Butcher, Jennifer Hillier’s “fine knack for creating hideous killers” (Booklist) is vividly on display.

Welcome to Wonderland. By day, it’s a magical place boasting a certain retro charm. Excited children, hands sticky with cotton candy, run frenetically from the Giant Octopus ride to the Spinning Sombrero, while the tinkling carnival music of the giant Wonder Wheel—the oldest Ferris wheel in the Pacific Northwest—fills the air. But before daybreak, an eerie feeling descends. Maybe it’s the Clown Museum, home to creepy wax replicas of movie stars and a massive collection of antique porcelain dolls. Or maybe it’s the terrifyingly real House of Horrors. Or…maybe it’s the dead, decaying body left in the midway for all the Wonder Workers to see.

Vanessa Castro’s first day as deputy police chief of Seaside, Washington, is off to a bang. The unidentifiable homeless man rotting inside the tiny town’s main tourist attraction is strange enough, but now a teenage employee—whose defiant picture at the top of the Wonder Wheel went viral that same morning—is missing. As the clues in those seemingly disparate crimes lead her down a mysterious shared path of missing persons that goes back decades, she suspects the seedy rumors surrounding the amusement park’s dark history might just be true. She moved to Seaside to escape her own scandalous past, but has she brought her family to the center of an insidious killer’s twisted game? Acclaimed author Jennifer Hillier’s bone-chilling thriller is masterful and fast-paced, hurtling toward a shocking, bloody conclusion.@goodreads

MY REVIEW:

 https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1362976927                5 STARS

 I thought this book was AWESOME. When I first saw the book cover I was pulled right in, I mean it's wicked cool and looks creepy! I love amusement park books, movies, stories...

I was thinking it was going to be some creepy clown or some deranged person that escaped from a lunatic asylum running around taking people out. Not, so much. This is a very long and drawn out book about murders that are so complex you don't have a clue where to begin. I mean everyone in this little seaside town know each other and everyone has a secret. All of this revolves around WONDERLAND the second largest amusement park, but back in the day it was the largest.

All of these boys over the years have been going missing. The book starts out with who they call homeless Harry who had his face eaten off and was found down by the Wonder Wheel. Then a boy named Blake who had climbed the Wonder Wheel to prove a point and taking pics for social media goes missing the same night that homeless Harry shows up. The thing is when the new deputy police chief Vanessa Castro starts working on this case, she finds out other boys have been missing over the years. What is going on with these boys? Who is killing them? Are they all dead? Where did they go? What in the holy clam bake is going on in the dungeons under the creepy clown house? Wait... there is a dungeon? Why in the crap didn't anyone tell Vanessa? Why didn't a lot of people tell Vanessa a lot of things. She digs up so much stuff on this town it's insane and let me tell you, the freaks don't just come out at night!

All of this craziness started many years ago with the first owner named Jack Shaw. Now I'm not going to say what good ole Jack the jerk did, but it was pretty bad and the town wasn't sad at all when he became..um... removed. Then you have Nick Bishop the current owner and his daughter Bianca and their VP of operations, Oscar Trejo.... DO NOT GET ME STARTED ON THIS CRAZY TRAIN! All of these people, and there are more, make this town a who dunit and why and what in God's green earth is wrong with you people!!! They have all went bat sh*t crazy!

I loved it! I'm going to buy it when it comes out in Oct. Right now you can pre-order on Amazon the kindle edition for $1.99 or you can run over to Netgalley and try to get a copy.

I had a lot of fun with this book, like I said before, I love anything with amusement parks. Then you throw in a wack-a-doo mystery/thriller/psycho/freaks......etc...... and you have one awesome book. But that's just my opinion and you know what they are like :)

I recommend to anyone that likes any of the many genres or descriptions I have mentioned here.

**I would like to thank NETGALLEY and GALLERY, THRESHOLD, POCKET BOOKS for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for my honest review.**