I Know What You Did Last Summer | Chapters 1-6

    I'm reading a horror fiction book that is called "I Know What You Did Last Summer" by Lois Duncan. The story is about four teenagers: Barry Cox, Helen Rivers, Julie James, and Raymond Bronson. They were having a party at night and Barry was the one who drove them back after the party was over. He hit a 10 years old boy who was riding a bike and ran. Barry suggested that they should keep this accident a secret because they still have a future to protect. Helen agreed to the pact but not Julie and Ray. Julie doesn't want to be a part of that pact at all, but Ray listened to Barry after all the arguments, and considering Barry is his best friend, Ray agreed to it, and the pact was formed. The story takes place in a town in the U.S.

    The story started with Julie receiving a letter from a good East Coast college that she wanted to go to. She wanted to get out of the town to a new place, meeting new people, new things to do, and she won't remember about the accident that happened last summer. When she was getting ready to leave her house to go to school, her mom told her that she got a second letter, she opened it and stared at it, she hoped that it's a dream but it's not, her legs felt weak that she had to hold the edge of the table to steady herself. The letter with one short sentence printed on it: "I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER." Julie visited Helen after seeing that letter, and Helen called Barry over. They were all in a panicked because they thought that someone knows about the accident. Barry reassured the girls that it is just a prank and if anyone who knew about the accident, they would reported it to the police instead of writing notes. Julie went home after that, and Ray was there. Ray returned after a year away in California, he looked older than he used to and he grown a beard. They talked to each other, Ray wanted to get back with Julie but she doesn't want to and she's dating Bud, who served in the army and just got back from Iraq. On the next day, while Helen was sunbathing, she met with a guy named Collingsworth Wilson, who just moved into the apartment, she called him Collie. After this meeting with him, she went up to her apartment, and she saw a magazine cutout of a little boy on a bicycle. Ray also receives a newspaper clipping about Daniel Gregg, the boy that they hit-and-run. Ray thought that it has finally caught up and he wasn't surprised because deep inside him, he knows that this is going to happen. It was the reason why he went away and why he had come back. He's now reminiscing about all the fun days and lovely days he had with Julie, but that love was gone after that one summer's night. On Memorial Day, Barry got a call from someone and he went outside after the call. He walked to the athletic field, then a flashlight suddenly went on and directed into his face. There was enough noise from the fireworks that no one is going to know that the next sound was a gunshot. The bullet tear through Barry's stomach and into his spine, he collapsed.

    By just reading the first chapter, it already got me hooked in with the last sentence which is "I know what you did last summer." It made me want to know more about the book and trying to figure the story as I'm reading. The use of suspense in this story was smart because the story always leaves me with uncertain thoughts about what about to happen next, and it always gets me hooked in so much that I can't stop reading the book. The intensity when each character reacts to something was somehow realistic to me because every person always said something different from their thoughts. In their minds, they might be insulting, and saying bad things to the other person but when they talk to the person, they'll always try to say something nice. But in this book, letting the readers know what the characters are thinking helps the readers understand more of the characters' feelings and feel the uncertainty of each character.