Review: Cryer's Cross

Cryer's Cross by Lisa McMann

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I have a problem with this book. According to Goodreads, the ebook is 240 pages long. That seems like a decent length, comparable to McMann's other's titles. However, when I read this book on my nook, it was 159 pages--including several pages of copyright information at the front of the book. It's possible that I read this book in a smaller font than the one it's paginated by, but that usually doesn't alter the number of pages listed. And, it would seem that my edition was the full book, as had a solid conclusion to the story.



The reason I'm going into such detail about this is very simple: I do not think Cryer's Cross was long enough to be sold as a hardcover novel. While I can't do a word count to verify my impression, this seems like a novella, and I'm not very pleased that the publisher decided to sell it for $16.99. While it is a good story, and I did find it deliciously creepy in at least one spot, I would have felt cheated if I had paid $16.99 for it. Thankfully, the nookbook version is selling for $4.99 at bn.com. That's how much I paid, and I do feel like I got my money's worth. However, I would have resented the book if I had paid full price for the hardcover.



Overall, this is a solid novella about a haunting. It fits into the classic parameters of the genre. As an adult reader of YA, I can't say if a teen would find it scary, but the climax of the novel did disturb me. McMann's typical narrative structure--present tense, third person omniscient narration, short sentences--worked nicely to highlight the manner in which Kendall's brain works. Kendall has OCD, and McMann presents a sympathetic and realistic portrait of a girl working to control her anxiety disorder in a town filled with anxiety. My husband has OCD, and it was refreshing to read about a character that has it and is not crippled by it.



I do have one final note to make about this novella: I'm deeply amused by the setting. I live in South Central Michigan (very near Ohio), a little west of the setting for the Wake trilogy. Nearly two years ago, my uncle's family moved from Michigan to Belgrade, Montana, outside Bozeman. Cryer's Cross is also set outside Bozeman. The coincidence of these settings gives me a small chuckle.



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