Imaginary Friend

Paperback

Status

Available

Call number

813.54

Genres

Horror

All Topics

Fiction

Publication

Grand Central Publishing

Description

Single mother Kate Reese is on the run. Determined to improve life for her and her son, Christopher, she flees an abusive relationship in the middle of the night with Christopher at her side. Together, they find themselves drawn to the tight-knit community of Mill Grove, Pennsylvania. It's as far off the beaten track as they can get. Just one highway in, one highway out. At first, it seems like the perfect place to finally settle down. Then Christopher vanishes. For six awful days, no one can find him. Until Christopher emerges from the woods at the edge of town, unharmed but not unchanged. He returns with a voice in his head only he can hear, with a mission only he can complete: Build a tree house in the woods by Christmas, or his mother and everyone in the town will never be the same again. Soon Kate and Christopher find themselves in the fight of their lives, caught in the middle of a war playing out between good and evil, with their small town as the battleground.… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member Cats57

I really must commend all the readers and reviewers that read and loved this book. I am at 81% right now and have the most incredible headache from reading this tome! I don't know what is pushing me more -the fact that I can't 'not' finish an ARC? That everyone else loved it and I am really

disliking it? That I have more questions than the book has answered?

My problems are many:

Firstly, I am a Baby Boomer and that means my favorite horror writers will always be Stephen King, Robert McCammon and those of that ilk. I am not averse to reading new horror authors if they can be unique. When a modern author tries to do what they (the original kings of the horror genre) did and can't do it well and I can see it in the first 100 pages or so, it does not bode well.

Secondly, I have issues with some of the, well for lack of a better term, the time period. It is supposed to be (I am assuming) modern times. But some of the things the author talks such as Special Education, Floods or High Waters for pants, or amazement at a school having a computer lab rings of the entire book being written back in the '70s, not just the first few chapters which do take place in the '50s.

Thirdly, many many characters and more than I could keep straight as well as the different...er...dimensions, moods, evil people and what-not. I also had a lot of problems relating these characters to 7-year-olds.

Lastly, The usage of capitalization in the middle of words is unique and is what finally brought this migraine on. It, in my opinion, is extremely difficult to read in this manner, but I can see why the author wants us to read these parts with difficulty. A bad move -he could have used italics but I'm not the author.

IF I finally finish the entire book and I change my mind about any of this I'll let you know.

*ARC supplied by the publisher.

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LibraryThing member DrApple

If I had written a review after the first 400 pages, it would have been a rave. It is very reminiscent of Stephen King. A boy makes an "imaginary friend" in the woods who tells him he must build a treehouse. He enlists his friends, but things get consistently scarier and more

dangerous.
Unfortunately, the book is a little over 700 pages. Almost the entire second half of the book is an endless resolution. Things get more and more horrifyingly and end with a literal battle between good and evil. I was extremely tired of this book by the time it was over.

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LibraryThing member lyrrael

This turned weirdly religious. o.O

LibraryThing member Kiaya40

Thank you to Libro.fm and Hachette Audio for letting me listen and review this audiobook. I don’t do much with horror usually but thought this one sounded interesting.

I was hopeful and wanted to like this book but it didn’t click for me very much. I’ve heard others mention this to be similar

to Stephen King’s writing so if that’s your kind of thing then you should check this out. Also I would recommend the audio if you read it.

This is a weird horror story and trippy. I got a few layers of story lines throughout this book with Christopher, his Mom, and the other various characters. There was a few kinda creepy or scary parts but not much.

Christopher and his Mom moved to this town to get away from an abusive ex boyfriend. Christopher struggles with learning issues in school and being the new kid while his Mom tries to make ends meet.

Christopher gets an imaginary friend after he disappears into the woods one day and is missing for almost a week and does things his friend tells him to do and all about his experiences with this imaginary friend, life, school, his new friends and such.

A better synopsis is here, taken from Libro.fm -

We can swallow our fear or let our fear swallow us.

Single mother Kate Reese is on the run. Determined to improve life for her and her son, Christopher, she flees an abusive relationship in the middle of the night with her child. Together, they find themselves drawn to the tight-knit community of Mill Grove, Pennsylvania. It's as far off the beaten track as they can get. Just one highway in, one highway out.

At first, it seems like the perfect place to finally settle down. Then Christopher vanishes. For six awful days, no one can find him. Until Christopher emerges from the woods at the edge of town, unharmed but not unchanged. He returns with a voice in his head only he can hear, with a mission only he can complete: Build a tree house in the woods by Christmas, or his mother and everyone in the town will never be the same again.

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LibraryThing member lost_in_here

It started off okay but it lost its way halfway through and dragged on far too long.

LibraryThing member brianinbuffalo

Any novel that exceeds 500 pages — and especially one that tops 750 — faces a high bar in this reader’s mind (sorry, Stephen King). Chbosky’s twist-filled tale is creative, well-written, thought-provoking— but simply too long and occasionally maddeningly repetitive. I’ve said this

before about otherwise fine books: “Imaginary Friend” would have benefited from a disciplined editor who consistently reminded the writer that “less is more” in many cases. By the time I reached Chapter 90 and realized there were still a couple hundred pages left, I was tempted to call it quits. There were ample unexpected twists, but it started too feel like a giant roller coaster with one too many peaks and dips. True, the story moved into intriguing territory by Chapter 102 (no spoilers in this critique). But by the time I reached Chapter 129 (yes, 129), I found myself muttering, “God, please let this end.” With fewer pages, fewer characters and fewer chases, “Imaginary Friend” could have been a riveting horror tale. In it’s current bloated form, it’s mediocre at best.

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LibraryThing member Dianekeenoy

: This book has been hyped as “vintage Stephen King” and I am definitely a Stephen King fan. Single mother, Kate Reese and her seven year old son, Christopher are running away from another abusive relationship. They drive until they find themselves in the tight-knit community of Mill Grove,

Pennsylvania. It’s far off the beaten track with one road in and one road out.

At first, it feels like the perfect place to settle down…then Christopher disappears for six days. When at last, he steps out of the woods, he’s not hurt but he hears a voice in his head which is telling him that he must build a treehouse in the woods by Christmas or else.

I have to say that the first 500 pages weren’t bad, but after that, it became a real slog and I am a fan of huge books! A reviewer on LT summed it up perfectly for me when he said, “Repetitive: So much hissing, urine-stained pants, and street-blocking deer. Not to mention all those ‘mailbox people’ standing around holding string with their sewn-up mouths.” I grew to hate those mailbox people! Then, I started to count the stories that I’ve read before that I could find in this book including the last line which had me shout, “for Pete’s sake, not Rosemary’s Baby, too!”

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LibraryThing member bookwyrmm

I never would have expected that the author of The Perks of Being a Wallflower could write horror that fits with the likes of Stephen King and Joe Hill.

LibraryThing member Carolesrandomlife

I really enjoyed this book! This is a big book and somewhat intimidating due to its length. It is a big story though and I felt like all of those pages really were necessary. I have not read this author's previous novel but as soon as I saw this book, I knew that I needed to get my hands on a copy.

My instincts were right and this book ended up being a wonderful experience.

Christopher and his mother, Kate, begin this journey in the middle of the night fleeing Kate's abusive boyfriend. They end up in a small town in Pennsylvania where Kate starts a job at the nursing home and Christopher starts making friends at school. They live in a hotel room and Christopher appreciates all of the small things his mother does for him. Then Christopher goes missing for an entire week and everything changes.

This is Christopher's story but it is also the story of all of the town's residents. We get to learn the backgrounds, the secrets, and motivations for all of the key players in town. Each piece of knowledge adds to the overall story and I loved it when a piece of the puzzle snapped into place. I thought that the story was really imaginative and there were some pretty amazing twists that I never saw coming. The cast of characters was quite large and very well done.

Christine Lakin did a fabulous job with the narration. She handled a very large cast of characters incredibly well with each character sounding unique. I thought that she added a lot of excitement into the story as well as the character's emotions. She has a very pleasant voice that was easy to listen to for hours at a time. This was my first experience in listening to her narration work and I was very impressed.

I would recommend this book to others. I thought this was a very well done story that was entertaining from beginning to end. I am thinking it might finally be time to give The Perks of Being a Wallflower at try.

I received a review copy of this book from Grand Central Publishing and I borrowed a copy of the audiobook from my local library.

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LibraryThing member erikschreppel

All in all I enjoyed this book. Very good story, but did have two issues. First was the age of the children characters didn't fit their actions/vocabulary at times. And second it needed an editor, dragged in spots. Would have been much better with 200 pages trimmed. But still an entertaining read.

LibraryThing member Sharn

A case of the wrong genre. This is listed as horror on GR when it’s clearly fantasy with a touch of horror. I avoid fantasy. I’ve learned that I never like them. A plastic bag, a cloud in the sky, mailbox people... really? I listened to it on audio. It was read well but over 20 hours of it

nearly killed me.

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LibraryThing member jmchshannon

What a creepy book! It did get a little too religious/preachy for my personal preferences. I don’t like it when stories like this become nothing more than a sermon about heaven and hell, but that is me. Still, I did enjoy it until they revealed the forces behind the disappearances, and it gave me

strange dreams while reading it. That is what you hope to experience in any horror story.

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LibraryThing member jnmegan

Fans of 2009’s Perks of Being a Wallflower (the book and popular movie based on it) by Stephen Chbosky might be surprised by his recent foray into a completely different genre—adult horror. Chbosky has been busy in recent years as a screenwriter, but it has been 10 years since the release of

that debut YA novel. It was worth the wait: Chbosky has given readers a marvelous tome of a book with Imaginary Friend. Reminiscent of the best early works of Stephen King, Imaginary Friend brings back that experience of feverishly whipping through thick and well-worn copies with a combined sense of terror and delight. The homage to King is obvious, but Chbosky skillfully alludes to his predecessor while bringing a unique perspective and style of his own—one that may even surpass his model. As the novel opens, Christopher Reese and his mother are moving to Mill Grove as they try to find some reprieve from the string of bad circumstances that followed his father’s death. The small town appears ideal as a place to hide and begin anew, but of course, it also happens to have a dark history of suspicious and supernatural child disappearances. Imaginary Friend features the prototypical young boy with special powers that emerge and harness his strong moral core and innate goodness. He is tasked with leading a misfit group of friends in a seemingly hopeless quest to save the world from imminent takeover by an evil force. Christopher humbly bears responsibility for saving the world and protecting his loved ones, even if it means that he must sacrifice himself. Chilling and exciting from beginning to end, Chbosky uses this familiar setup to build a story that excels at not only bringing thrills, but also manages to be inspirational and uplifting as well. The 700+ pages fly by, leaving a breathless reader satisfied but wishing for more. Great for fans of sprawling stories with a large cast of excellently developed characters and anyone who yearns for a book truly worthy of their time.

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LibraryThing member sprainedbrain

I was so excited to get a copy of this book through NetGalley. I loved Chbosky’s Perks of Being a Wallflower, and the premise of this new book sounded very Stephen King, which translates to very my-kind-of-book. I had just been approved when my 15-year-old daughter also picked it as her BOTM

add-on for October, so clearly this was meant to be.

Single mom Kate Reese is running from an abusive man and a heartbreaking past with her seven-year-old son, Christopher. They are both drawn to a tiny, out of the way town in Pennsylvania, and Kate is determine to start fresh and provide her son with a good life. Both are haunted by the suicide of Christopher’s father, who was also the only good man Kate every knew. Just as they are settling in, Christopher vanishes for 6 days after being mysteriously led into the woods outside of town by unknown forces. When he comes out, he can’t remember his time there, but he has a voice in his head that only he can hear and a strange mission to complete to save his mom and the town.

First things first: this is a BIG book (720 pages), and I have seen some reviews that say it’s too long or slow. That was most definitely not my experience reading Imaginary Friend. I though the pacing was perfect, and the tension builds throughout in a slow, perfect burn. There is honestly nothing I would rather have been cut from the story, as everything seems very deliberate and purposeful. I was so drawn in to this story that I also downloaded the audiobook so that I didn’t have to stop reading when I couldn’t sit down, and I finished the story in less than 3 days.

The writing is really, really good. The characters are so well-developed and complete. At the beginning of the book, Christopher is clearly written like a young child who is possibly dyslexic, struggling with school, confused about the loss of his father, and worried about his mom; after his return from the woods, he is most definitely changed, which is evident from not only his ‘spontaneous genius’ but from his more mature character voice. Chbosky effortlessly slips between many different character narratives as the town slides into terrifying chaos.

For me, the mark of a truly great read is the books ability to take me through a range of feelings. I cared about Kate, Christopher, and his friends. I felt for many of the townspeople, and I giggled, smiled, cried, and was truly frightened. The comparisons to King are likely because of the horror elements, but I was very pleased with how this book delivered the total experience I treasure as a reader. Just like Stephen King does for me so often.

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LibraryThing member SimplyKelina

I was sent this book from the publisher/publicity team. My ratings and reviews will be my own personal opinions and are in no way influenced by publishers or authors who may have sent me books to review.

This started off so strong. I was hooked and flew through the first few hundred pages. I was

really loving the story and everything that was going on. However; around half way through everything was getting too repetitive. It was a little too slow and there was not enough happening to keep my interest. I wanted to know how everything ended, so I did skip to the end. But, all and all, I really DNF this around the half way point.

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LibraryThing member Carol420

I had to feel a great deal of empathy for 7 year old Christopher. He hasn't had an easy life in these few years. He's escaped an abusive relationship with his hard working mother only to find himself without any real friends...and the key word here is "Real". He's the victim of bullying at school

and now he hosts a voice in his head that he thinks of as his friend... that's telling him to do some really strange things....like build a tree house for his "friend" before Christmas...or else. Life continues to get stranger and stranger for Christopher and the town as imagination and reality become hopelessly entangled. The book was absolutely humongous... 720 pages. While the idea of Christopher's "friend" and his interaction with "it" could have been built on and developed into something that was believably horrifying..it meandered off into the field of the impossible to even begin to believe. I gave it 3.5 stars because it wasn't a bad book. Just a hopelessly drawn-out affair that contained so many parts that happened over and over again and were really out in left field...even for a horror book.

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LibraryThing member CJ82487

Another one to blame pandemic brain on, because it took me far to long to finish. What an engrossing story nonetheless. This is one of those books that you would love to have made into film only to dread what it would look like because it would probably ruin the story. Haunting, rich, terrifying,

mind twisting, and overwhelming deep.

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LibraryThing member thereserose5

I really enjoyed this book! The horror was very well done with supernatural elements, yet still feeling too real at times. However, the age of the main character wasn’t right. I would say he seemed closer to 12 than 7. This book also felt like the author had 8 million ideas for what could happen

in the story to each individual character and no one around him said maybe that was unnecessary. The book definitely could have had the same impact at half the length. It is an impressive mastery of horror though that he managed to keep that creepy feeling for 700 pages.

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LibraryThing member kbranfield

3.5 stars.

Imaginary Friend by Stephen Chbosky is a "hold onto your hat, it's going to be a bumpy ride" horror novel.

Fleeing an abusive relationship, Kate Reese and her seven year old son Christopher sneak away in the night to move to Mill Grove, Pennsylvania. The small town has an excellent school

system which is important to Kate. Christopher soon settles into school and dodges bullies while making friends with Eddie Anderson and twins Mike and Matt. After a string of lucky coincidences, Kate purchases a house on the edge of the Mission Street Woods. Despite repeated warnings to stay out of the woods, Christopher disappears for a week after he is lured into the woods by an otherworldly force. He has no memory of what happened during the time he was missing and life soon resumes for mother and son.

However, Christopher is not quite the same following his misadventure and while some changes are welcome, others are very worrisome. After becoming fixated on building a tree house in the woods, Christopher enlists Eddie, Matt and Mike to help him with the elaborate construction project. With dire warnings that life will end on Christmas Day, Christopher is soon embroiled in a dangerous race against time to help the Nice Man defeat the Hissing Lady.

The entire premise of the novel is extremely intriguing and the world building is phenomenal. The main characters are appealing but some of the secondary characters are a little one-dimensional. The horror elements are brilliantly executed and truly spine tingling. The suspense builds to an incredible pitch as danger erupts in Mill Creek and the residents mysteriously fall ill just days before Christmas. Christopher remains tightly focused on his attempts to do the Nice Man's bidding in order to save himself and everyone around him.

Imaginary Friend is an ingenious horror novel that is clever yet also overly long (721 pages), unevenly paced and a bit repetitive. Late in the novel, a HUGE plot twist takes the story in a completely unexpected direction. A "good vs evil" battle ensues and plunges the reader into an alternate world. With even more shocking and diabolical turns, nothing is as it seems and Christopher, Kate and their friends are enmeshed in an epic fight that has decidedly religious overtones. Stephen Chbosky keeps readers on the edge of their seats as the novel comes to an action-packed conclusion.

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LibraryThing member BeccaNaylor

I'm not typically a horror reader, so I wanted to read this purely based on Chbosky's name recognition. This book grabbed me and sucked me in immediately, and I read the 720 page tome in record time. I needed to know what was happening to these characters. I was invested in the protagonist

Christopher and his mother, and I enjoyed exploring the various characters in the town. I sped through the first 75% of this book, which is around the time Chbosky drops the most significant plot twist. There were some hints dropped here and there about what was coming, but I was hoping that I was wrong and Chbosky was going to surprise me. Religious themes were present throughout the book, but I was still surprised when Chbosky chose to lean completely on the Heaven vs Hell trope. After this point, I was far less interested, and I found myself speed reading the rest of the book. When Chbosky revealed what was going on in the town, he over-explained it, and then the horror element was lost, and the book started to feel too much like Christian fiction. The ending dragged on for too long. It could have easily been pared down to fifty pages instead of two hundred. Overall, it was a solid read, despite the disappointing ending.

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LibraryThing member purple_pisces22

I was so excited to win this from the Goodreads Giveaways that I ignored my TBR pile and started it almost right away and I’m so glad I did. As a fan of Stephen King, I found this to be comparable to many of his books as far as the writing style and storyline.
I’ve seen mixed reviews on this

book and I can understand why. This is definitely a book that you have to be in the right frame of mind to read. Numerous times I did find myself wondering if I actually was reading a Stephen King book. Regardless I did enjoy the book. A young boy, Christopher, disappears and then returns totally changed. He claims he was saved by “a nice man”. He’s not the first child to go missing in these woods, and it’s frightening for all involved. Unbeknownst to those around him, Christopher is still talking to the nice man in the woods. The man has a task for Christopher and he enlists his friends to assist him in this task, against their better judgement. This all has to be done in secret since all the parents have forbid them from going into the woods.
The story culminates quickly in the end, and in my opinion, in true Steven King fashion. A major difference I see though, and this is more towards King’s earlier works, is how the ending is wrapped up nicely without getting too far-fetched and crazy.
I’m not a fan of comparing writers to each other but since I have never read Stephen Chbosky, it’s really the best way I have to describe the writing and the feeling I got while reading.

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LibraryThing member arosoff

I'm not 100% sure how I felt about this one. It took me a while to get into for some reason, but eventually it picked up. It's good, but there's so much here that's just straight out of Stephen King. I've read almost all of King's fiction, and Chris and his mother really pinged my King radar. It

could have used more aggressive editing to tighten it up.

I enjoyed it, but at the same time I kept wondering why Chbosky felt so compelled to write it. I didn't get a huge sense of originality here.

I felt it would be churlish to downgrade it too far, so I'm rounding up instead of down.

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LibraryThing member crazy4reading

I am confused by this book. I was enjoying it at first and then I was confused. I did listen to the audio so not sure if that made it more confusing to me or if the story was just lost. I had trouble trying to figure out if he was dreaming, being held captive, or was dead.

I also felt the book

dragged on and one in the end. I did enjoy the premise of the book and some of the story.

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LibraryThing member SharonMariaBidwell

This is a tough book to rate. The writing is too basic for many adults, yet age appropriate for the protagonist who is a child. Note: The golden rule used to be if the main character was a child, then it was a book for children because publishers believed adults wouldn’t be interested in what

happened to children. We’re somewhat past this now, following on from the success of the Harry Potter books which gained an adult audience. However, there’s not enough to differentiate between the characters in… well, character, or age. And I imagined the children as far older than purported to be. What drives this book — the purpose of the book, if you like — is subtext. I didn’t find the horror in the book all that horrific because of the child-like narrative. The author uses far too many fragmented sentences for every paragraph to be enjoyable. Though I don’t know what I’d cut, this is a HUGE book. Far too long. The subtext covers many things… seems sometimes to talk about how we treat each other, how people operate in society and behave towards their neighbours, our family and friends, as much as it includes religion — a criticism I’ve seen, though I’m left uncertain whether the author is for or against. It touches on the personal note and a bigger picture. The story has stayed with me, but I’m uncertain if I care about that the book offered, and though there was no way I was going to stop reading and I’m an avid and determined reader, the book was too long even for me because it became repetitive in the last quarter. The book has something to say, but the question is whether you’ll want to hear any of it. There are several deliciously creepy parts. There are characters you want to know more about and become invested in, but I’m not sure that for such a long book there was a big enough pay off for the characters I cared about. For every plus, I found a negative. I’m honestly torn. Though the scope is impressive, it left me with a feeling of dissatisfaction. I neither like nor dislike the book.

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LibraryThing member Micareads

I did not like this book. It was 75 chapters too long and had a repetitious and annoying pattern. There are only so many times the same situations can be told, only so many times bad things can happen to the same person. I finished the book only because I had already invested too much time to give

up.

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