The Exterminator’s Daughter by Meg Cabot (14/15)
Prom Nights From Hell opens with one of Meg Cabot’s short works. If you’re unfamiliar with Meg Cabot, all you need to know is that she’s the creator of the Princess Diaries series, which was mostly targeted at a tween audience. The Exterminator’s Daughter is a light-hearted, enjoyable piece of urban fantasy fiction – Cabot transitions smoothly from humorous teenage girl angst to a sharper, wittier heroine effortlessly, whilst managing to keep the storyline engaging.
In The Exterminator’s Daughter, teenage protagonist Mary is intent on assassinating her best friend’s latest vampire beau with a crossbow (in a crowded Manhattan nightclub, no less!). What she doesn’t expect is help coming from Adam Blum, fellow schoolmate and resident jock/popular guy, who’s intrigued with the idea of things that go bump in the night. The story switches perspectives from Mary to Adam and back again, which was refreshing on Cabot’s part (characters from her previous works tend to ramble). While short, the piece is highly entertaining and shows real promise for a series adaptation – let’s keep our fingers crossed!
The Corsage by Lauren Myracle (12/15)
If you enjoyed reading The Monkey’s Paw by W. W. Jacobs, you’ll enjoy this horror adaptation by Lauren Myracle (author of the controversial ttyl series). Frankie’s a gal who’s determined to have her longtime crush Will ask her to the prom, but he seems to be biding his time. Frustrated, she decides to employ the powers of a creepy corsage attained from an ever-so-cryptic fortune teller. I think we all know by this point that cryptic fortune tellers never bode well in any sort of story – death and disembowelment with a cackling “I told you so!” echoing in the background usually follows a few scenes later – but this one takes the cake. Madame Z keeps her uterus in a jar on the shelf.
Ahem. Shelf uterus aside, Frankie decides to put her three wishes to good use by – what else? – wishing for Will to take her to the prom. What she doesn’t know is that every wish comes with a terrible price. Will dies a grisly death by falling from the watertower (“I told you so!”) in the midst of spray painting a message asking Frankie to go to the prom with him. Overcome with grief, Frankie makes her second wish: for Will to come back to life. You’ve probably read enough urban fantasy to know that the resurrection of a rotting corpse 13 days gone is never a good idea.
The ending was hella disturbing, though I can’t say I didn’t see it coming. Not for the faint of heart.
Madison Avery and the Dim Reaper by Kim Harrison (14/15)
Madison Avery and the Dim Reaper kicks off the story to the Madison Avery series. The story opens with Madison at the prom, playing uncooperative date to her geek friend, Josh. When she ends up getting snubbed by Josh, Madison ends up in the arms of sexy pirate Seth (it’s a themed dance, mind. Just in case you lot go off on some swashbuckling, Jack Sparrow tangent after reading that bit), who’s got an agenda of his own – killing her.
Madison wakes up soon after in the morgue, only to meet with Lucy and Barnabas, members of the Reconnaissance Error Acquisitions Personnel Evaulation and Recovery: REAPER. As it turns out, Madison was killed before a time, and her abrupt death isn’t something she’s all too happy about. She ends up running into evil pirate Seth once more, and things go downhill from there. Through an unexpected turn of events, Madison manages strike a deal and remain in the human world, but she’s officially dead – no more food and sleep for her. Her story continues in Once Dead, Twice Shy.
Kiss and Tell by Michele Jaffe (9/15)
Miranda Kiss (what’s with all the “M” protagonists in this anthology?) has unique superpowers – of which includes superhearing, which means that she can eavesdrop on conversations without even trying, detect changes in heartbeats, and overhear her longtime crush… well, crushing her hopes. Ouch.
Miranda’s job as a Luxury Transport chauffeur lands her in a pickle when she picks up troublesome 14 year old Sibby Cumean, who’s somehow determined to kiss any (and I do mean any) guy she can possibly get her hands on. Things do pick up after a bit: Sibby turns out to be some sort of prophet and there’s some prom crashing and kidnapping excitement in it all, but it just wasn’t enough to keep me consistently interested. While Miranda was a likeable heroine, her interactions with Sibby were throughly painful to read (mostly because Sibby just annoyed the hell out of me) and the teenspeak acronyms casually thrown in every few pages gave me a headache. Who on earth talks like that, honestly?
Hell on Earth by Stephenie Meyer (13/15)
Finally, a story that unfolds in its entirety at the prom. Hell on Earth features half-angel Gabe Christensen, a guy at prom whose date seems to have abandoned him in pursuit of greener pastures. He finds himself inexplicably drawn to demoness Sheba (in her human disguise), who’s intent in wreaking havoc and bringing misery to everyone at the prom. Cue fisticuffs, arguing, cheating (in a non-academic sense), wardrobe malfunctions, and bad music – all the makings of prom hell.
Hell on Earth was an entertaining read – it’s nice to see Meyer branching out into other aspects of urban fantasy. The stark contrast between the goodness of Gabe’s angelic soul and Sheba’s vindictive, damned one certainly drew me in. The road to love between a demoness and an angel is rocky one, indeed.
See also: Once Dead, Twice Shy
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