Long Live the Pumpkin Queen
By Shea Ernshaw
Genre: Young Adult Fiction, Fantasy Fiction, Horror Fiction, 311 Pages
Available in Hardcover, Kindle, Audiobook
First Published: Aug. 2, 2022
Rating: (4.7/5) Stars
Halloweentown’s beloved pumpkin king and ragdoll have arrived once again, with an all-new shocking and sensational novel focused on the aftermath of Sally and Jack’s wedding.
In “Long Live The Pumpkin Queen,” Sally embarks on a quest for temporary solitude from her new hectic life since being crowned Queen Sally of Halloweentown, where she discovers a secret door leading to a new realm called Dreamtown. This doorway not only unleashes a new fear on Halloweentown, but also a new quest for Sally. One that involves saving Halloweentown, facing her fears, answering age-old questions and discovering more about herself than she ever dreamed possible.
Author Shea Ernshaw penned this novel, forging it into the genres of young adult, fantasy fiction and horror fiction, and released it on Aug. 2, 2022. This story gracefully relates to topics like forgiveness and family and delightfully examines the timeless complications of the mixture of love and life. It also touches on sensitive topics such as loneliness and low self-esteem, as well as a more dark and terrifying topic of kidnapping.
Ernshaw does a brilliant and beautiful job at taking readers deeper into Halloweentown and expanding on the minds of its characters, while simultaneously entertaining them with some new creative and clever characters and realms.
This book finally gave fans the long-awaited origin story of Sally from Tim Burton’s “The Nightmare Before Christmas.” Ernshawn also does an impeccable job with her use of imagery and capturing the mannerisms and essence of each character, while maintaining a clear and natural writing style.
On the downside, the story’s progression felt too slow during a few scenes, but compensated for that with the major twists that were revealed and kept the reader hanging on.
This story, of course, also left room for another sequel.
This novel got a 4.7 out of 5 stars rather than a solid 5 out of 5, but overall, it was an exceptional sequel to Tim Burton’s prequel and provided several delightful and extravagant surprises and scenes. This spook-tacular novel hands-down makes a wonderful book to read in the winter moonlight.
Fans of Tim Burton’s “The Nightmare Before Christmas” will absolutely enjoy this fantastic sequel.
