My Two Cents: YOU INVITED IT IN and YOU NEED TO LEAVE by Sarah Jules

It's not often I write a two-for-one book review, but then again, it's not often that I fly through a pair of books as rabidly or rapidly as I did "You Invited It In" and the sequel, "You Need to Leave," both by author Sarah Jules.

Let me start by saying "You Invited It In" scared the hell out of me. I love reading horror, and I've definitely seen my fair share of books and stories that creeped or grossed me out. There have been plenty that made me feel unsettled, and others written so well, I felt fully engrossed in the plot and setting. But I can't remember the last time a book left me so disturbed I actually turned on the lights and did a quick-take around the room to make sure there was nothing lurking in the dark--until "You Invited It In."

In "You Invited It In," a young widower named Felix is raising his adolescent son, Asher, after the untimely death of his wife in a car crash. When his well-meaning brother, Eli, alerts him to an alleged psychic named Lilith who appears to be bilking money from people who have recently lost loved ones, Felix gets angry and decides to expose her as a fraud.

Offering pretenses of a "haunting," Felix invites Lilith to his home to perform an overpriced cleansing ritual. Although he's sure the whole thing, like Lilith, is completely bupkis, it isn't long after she leaves that strange occurrences suggesting a real begin to take place in Felix's house. When it becomes apparent that the target of the manifestation's escalating manipulation and violence is young Asher, Felix realizes he made a horrible mistake in letting Lilith into their lives--because she hadn't been alone.

This book is terrifying. I know it's cliche to say I couldn't put it down, but seriously: I couldn't stop reading, that's how sensational Jules's writing is. I had to know what happened next. It's like an amusement park ride, one of those water slides that starts of leisurely enough but soon leaves you plummeting down a steep precipice and into raging rapids below. Likewise, Jules lures you in gently, but once you're hooked, she drags you into dark and vicious waters and doesn't let go.

"You Need to Leave" takes place in the months following the events in "You Invited It In." While I can't go into much by way of summary because that would spoil the ending of "You Invited It In," suffice it to say that the dark forces Felix and his family unwittingly tapped into find new ways to follow and torment them.

Like its predecessor, "You Need to Leave" is extremely well-written. While I really enjoyed it, it didn't quite have the same emotional impact as "You Invited It In," at least not for me, but that's because Jules set the bar really high with the first book. She's a phenomenal storyteller, one who understands that although supernatural events scare, the key to a good horror story lies in readers relating to the human characters, and wanting to see them escape unscathed (even if sometimes they don't).

Long story short: Both "You Invited It In" and "You Need to Leave" are fantastic reads. Of the two, "You Invited It In" was my favorite, and it provided some genuinely original, terrifying moments that are going to stick in my mind for a long time yet to come--not to mention probably keep me sleeping with a light on, too. Sarah Jules just leaped to the top of my favorite-authors list, earning herself an "automatic buy" designation with my Amazon account.

"You Invited It In" is available in ebook, paperback, and through Kindle Unlimited here.

"You Need to Leave" is available in ebook, paperback, and through Kindle Unlimited here.