Solid setting here. There is something inherently creepy about a low budget fun center. This one goes a bit far, though. It's a bit of an on-going joke, how low budget Krazyland is. I'll grant it this - once the rules are established the plot sticks to them. The thin spots work in very specific ways. It's creepy but not properly scary. And not overly compelling.

While Krazyland is a good read, describing it as a "scary story for fans of Neil Gaiman" misses the mark. The alternate world of Krazyland is imaginative and probably frightening through younger eyes. This is a quick, entertaining read.

KRAZYLAND – by Mar Romasco-Moore – Ages 8-12 – 3.5 Stars

‘Uncle Steven bought it two years ago, and since then, practically every family event has been held in the neon-painted party room. My uncle could at least have owned a normal business. Maybe an ice-cream shop or a movie theater, so I would benefit from unlimited soft serve or free matinees. Instead, he owned Krazyland.’

Krazyland Kids Indoor Playplace is a fear-filled ride of the expected and unexpected; that is when you fall into the Nowhere world beneath the multicolored ball pit with twelve-year-old Nathan and Krazyland employee Mercy—who’s been there before—now in search of a missing child in a place where creepy arcade games come to life.

Overall I love the premise and enjoyed the book with its Coraline vibes, but by stories end, it felt a bit unfinished, not in a cliffhanger way, leaving me with more questions than answers.

Thank you, NetGalley and Random House Children’s Books (Delacorte Press), for providing me with an eBook of KRAZYLAND at the request of an honest review.

I got approved for this book a couple weeks ago and decided to save it for the week before Halloween. My license date for this book was not supposed to expire until tomorrow October 25, but it expired as I was halfway through it, so that was kind of not fair. It still shows I have 2 and a half hours but won’t let me open it. I will update my review when I can actually read it.

This was fun! I gave it three stars but if half stars were a thing on NetGalley, it would be 3 1/2. I went into this book mostly blind. I thought the cover was intriguing and after i requested it, I realized it was a middle school level book. So I wasn’t completely sure where this was gonna go.

Overall, I liked it! I thought the concept was fun. Ball pits are such a nostalgic thing to me so the idea of there being a completely different world hidden at the bottom of one was really fun. There were some very vivid descriptions in the other world that definitely grossed me out (the ocean of oil) and some that were just hilarious. Bertha was a really fun character and I wish she was fleshed out a little more.

I will say the ending drags a bit for me. Also, I got hints early on about Mercy’s grandfather but we never really get a thorough explanation on his actions. It kind of just felt like it was thrown in. Other than that, i think this is a fun read if you’re trying to find things similar to a Goosebumps reading level with minor spooks. Thank you to NetGalley for the digital ARC! All opinions are my own.

Thirteen years old Nathan doesn’t want to go to a birthday party at Krazyland. The child is his younger cousin, Jenny. His Uncle Steven owns Krazyland. And had his son Kyle is his help, When Jenny’s birthday cake is put on the table, Kyle pushes Nathan’s face into the cake. When a parent come to get their son and go home, he is not to be found. Uncle Steven asks him to check the ball pit again, he finds the kid. The kid doesn’t want to go home. Later another child goes missing and can’t be found, he goes back to the ball pit again when Mercy, a hired helper for Uncle Steven, asks Nathan a question. Then Nathan says well, do you know where the kid is and says I might. Then tells him not to follow her. Nathan watches her jump in the ball pit and disappears. Nathan follows her. He finds himself confused — what it this place. She explains that they are “nowhere.” When they find the kid, he doesn’t want to go back to “reality.” He says to them “reality is boring.” Nathan ends up saying that they will take him for his ice cream sundae when they go back. He agrees and goes back. Sadly, he doesn’t get his ice cream sundae.

There is much more to the story but I want you, the reader, to discover information that I haven’t given, plus there is more to the story. Each chapter ends on a cliffhanger. It is full of action and adventures. How are Nathan and Mercy deal with the hole in the ball pit? The novel is horror due to the “nothing” place. It is also full of humor It’s also has mystery as part of the story. I love the things learned about Kyle and others. The author has done a marvelous job of writing this novel.

Krazyland was such a fun book! I loved the story building and the setting, and most of the characters were so fun to read.

It wasn’t what I was expecting from the description to be honest, but it was still an enjoyable story. The world building and especially “Nowhere,” was so creative and Nathan and Mercy were so fun. I thought I was going to hate Big Bertha and her character but the ending made me really enjoy that character!

The only issues I really had was it felt like the twist with Mercy’s grandfather came out of nowhere? It felt out of
place, and especially with him not wanting to go back and then just being fine with it + how it affected Mercy were just…odd. That and Jake’s character as a whole- he was just annoying and it felt like adding on top of other things to have him bully Nathan so much.

I did really enjoy this though- it’s such a fun middle-grade fantasy book and I definitely want to recommend it in the future!

Scheduled to post 10/8/22.

KRAZYLAND was a fun, silly middle grade horror book that I quite enjoyed. I got a little turned around when the doubles came into play, but it evened out pretty quickly and I settled back into the madness.

To say that, as a kid, I never imagined the ball pit being a gateway to somewhere else would be me lying. I love that it's being done here, and in a 'Are Your Afraid of the Dark' sort of way that turns reality into something warped and creepy and literally ready to eat you. I loved the spiders that tried to stop Nathan (mirrored on a game in Krazyland where you basically do Whac-A-Mole with spiders and use your feet instead of a mallet) in their little colored sneakers. Big Bertha was kind of terrifying, and I liked how Nathan pointed out how messed up it was that Bertha is treated as a villain simply because she's bigger. I support that message in there.

I think this book could have been even darker, but that's my own demented horror brain going places that it probably shouldn't go for a middle grade novel. The fake people that could be pulled into the real world added a somewhat sinister edge to everything, even though they really weren't used that way. I picked up on it, anyway. 

The book isn't particularly earth-shattering or groundbreaking, but it doesn't need to be. It's fun and creepy and will make you look at ball pits differently. And I can say, as an insurance underwriter, an activity center like this that DOESN'T regularly clean their ball pits is horrifying enough. I was really amused by the bizarro world that Nathan ended up in (multiple times), especially with the man-eating chicken wing sharks and evil mozzarella sticks.

There's not a ton of character development, at least from Nathan. Mercy has a bigger arc than he does. And I don't quite understand her "allergies." I think it would have been fine if she just had narcolepsy, but it kept going back to being allergic to the world. While I am empathize with the sentiment, here it just played out kind of odd and unnecessary. Despite that, KRAZYLAND is fun and promises a good time.

4

For anyone who grew up going to Chuck E Cheese, or any other arcade venue, this book takes the fun of the games and flips them into an alternate universe. This was a hold-your-breath, frightening, and energizing adventure through an outer space-like world with giant spiders who stomp people, and Big Bertha, a scary doll with a huge appetite.

The underlying theme is how closely AI can copy our reality, and what are some of the consequences of this? I really enjoyed the story and appreciated that the characters were able to save themselves at multiple points in the book and return to real life, before choosing to reexplore or save others. I also appreciated the fact that a stereotypically beloved character (a grandfather who had recently passed away) was not presented this way, and took on villainous characteristics.

This was an entertaining read, and I know I won't be jumping into any ball pits anytime soon!

Are you looking for a book that will make you nostalgic for McDonald’s Playlands and arcade games? I should probably mention that there are some run-ins with some huge spiders and other creepy, nightmarish things that thankfully don’t exist outside the pages of this book, but that just adds to the fun of this new middle-grade book, in my opinion.

Krazyland has long been a place that kids love to gather and play for hours, and Nathan is finally old enough not to be scared of some of the more realistic games that he used to avoid. Now he realizes that though some of the games might seem realistic, everything inside the building is just for fun and perfectly safe. But what if there’s a side to Krazyland that even the owner doesn’t know about? Unfortunately, Nathan becomes acquainted with this alternate reality version of the entertainment center when kids start to disappear.

Nathan and a few young employees get roped into helping search for the missing kid, and though they search in the ball pit and the huge slides, they don’t find anything and while they’re looking, Nathan loses his phone in the ball pit. After a brief search for his phone, he concludes that it sunk to the bottom of the pit. That’s when things start to get really weird, exposing a side of Krazyland scarier than he’d imagined.

Krazyland is a really fun book that is full of twists and turns and will appeal to a wide range of readers. Reading this book as an adult, I did feel like there was a lot of detail that could have been added to make this story feel a little more complete but it’s an entertaining read nonetheless!

Review of a Digital Advance Reading Copy from Random House Children’s Books

I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

***

While I'm certainly not the target demographic for this book, I found it to be just the right amount of creepy adventure for a middle grade kid.

Starting in a seemingly dilapidated arcade/play place set the scene for the strange underworld beneath. I particularly enjoyed the underworld Bertha and wish there'd been more to her story. She was creative and unsettling as a character, but I wanted more in the way of "what even" and "why". Again, though, I'm not the key audience for this and a child may not have those questions.

All in all, this was an enjoyable read.

"I gasped. 'Where are we?'
'Nowhere,' she said.
'What?'
'Nowhere,' she repeated.
'How are you so calm?' I demanded.
'It’s okay,' she said. 'Don’t worry. I’ve been here before.'”

I had no expectations going into this. I had never read the author before and the book blurb left much to the imagination--in a good way. I was pleasantly surprised.

I picked this as my second Halloween read because it looked fun, quirky, still a bit summery, and yet utterly unsettling. I was right on all accounts. The writing is full of personality as are the characters. The imagery is grand and a lot of it I won't soon forget. This story was so entertaining, so unique, and I so enjoyed all the weirdness. My one and only negative: the book needs a good proofreader.

While I'm not the intended audience for this book, I still found it to be quite entertaining! I think kids who enjoy Goosebumps or other middle grade horror will really enjoy this. There's a fair amount of action and it has a medium pace to it. This would be a fun read for a parent and child together, I can see some of the explanations maybe being a bit hard to understand depending on age so it might be fun to be able to explain some of the concepts a bit further in a way the child can understand. The characters are relatable and I think it'll be easy for some kids to really see themselves as the protagonist. I would definitely purchase this for my child to read.



Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Children's for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

oh how I wanted to like this book- I did like it the first half, but then it just fizzled like a deflating balloon towards the end. I really felt like Mar could have wrapped this book up in 100 pages, easily.

The premise is fantastic- Nathan hates Krazyland, ball pits, big plastic spiders and all. But then he realized that another world exists beneath Kraztown’s ball pit. A world that reminded me a little of A Wrinkle in Time.

Some of the side characters I could have done without. But they got the story across. I don’t think that I would recommend this book to my 8 year old daughter because she would probably grow bored halfway like I did. I would like to thank NetGalley for giving me this free ARC.

Krazyland was such a unique book. I've never read a book quite like this book. I finished this book I one sitting. this story wasn't as spooky as I thought it was going to be but I still enjoyed the occasional creepy things going on in the book. I'd definitely recommend this book to any kid who doesn't like creepy books but this one definitely wouldn't scare them.

I feel like this book was very slow. There wasn’t enough suspense. It wasn’t completely terrible but I feel it needed more fast moving action especially for younger readers.

I think this is a pretty good spooky book for middle grade kids. It has good believable characters and the writing style holds your interest.

Krazyland was a fun, fast-paced creepy story about “Nowhere” existing beneath the ball pit of Krazyland. The games and prizes have come to life in “Nowhere” and kids are going missing. I think overall this was an entertaining, quick, middle grade read.

Well, one way to explain this story is to say it was interesting and I think even that is an understatement. I'm sure my kids would like it more than I did though.
It didn't particularly "grab" me or suck me in, however it did get right into it, which I liked. I didn't care much for some of the characters, but that's me.

I had a difficult time with this one. I think maybe it just wasn't my kind of book. I was anticipating something more creepy or spooky but the story was more oddball to me. I wish the character and the world were a bit more developed as well. This may be of interest to readers that enjoy their "scary" stories more silly and strange as opposed to creepy or spooky.