If I was forced to make a choice between "like" and "dislike" for this book, I guess I'd say that I liked it. It's far from being the best book ever put out in the YA field and it's nice in a non-filling "popcorn and potato chips" sort of way. I'd go so far as to say that if this had been released back in the 80s or 90s, back when Point Horror and Point Thriller was at its height of popularity, odds are that this would have been one of their top sellers. 
 The problem? This isn't the 80s or 90s anymore and what readers of YA (adult or teen) want and expect from their writing has changed somewhat. It also doesn't help that throughout this novel I got the impression that this book could have been so much more than what it is. That's really what disappointed me the most about this book: that it never fully lives up to its potential. It's like the kid everyone expected to go to Harvard for a medical degree deciding to go to Wossamotta U and becoming a realtor. 
 One of the first things that I noticed straight away is that the symbolism for the Big Twist is pretty obvious. I won't really say what it is, but very early in the book you're introduced to Barnaby Charon and told that Camden is going to Lethe Academy. While some might say that I caught on to this because I'm an adult, I have to say that I read quite a bit of mythology when I was a child and teen. I would have noticed this symbolism as a teenager and I'm fairly certain that today's teens would as well. I can overlook this for the most part because part of the book's theme is having our characters see the obvious, but this is really just a symptom of an ongoing problem during TLA. 
 We're sort of led around by the nose when it comes to the plot and its characters. For the most part everyone is painted up to be a pretty basic character, as are the themes. This wouldn't be so bad except that this book is aimed at 12+ year old readers. 
 In the end I can't really hate this book. Despite it never living up to its full potential, it's still a fairly enjoyable book and there are some slightly disturbing parts to it, mostly surrounding the character of Mark. The ending is fairly bittersweet, which I liked. I just wish that Applegate had been able to really flesh this book out and make it into the type of book it was really trying to be. Although in her defense, I can't help but wonder if this was a constraint by the publisher, as it's still fairly common for YA publishers to hand their authors a set outline and page limit and then tell them to get started. 
 I'd recommend this as a fairly light read for YA fans and while I think that most will probably like it well enough, I think that the majority will long for something a bit more filling. This is definitely something I'd recommend to get from the library.