"Peculiar" A Word We Should Use More Often

I am a huge fan of multi-media.  I like it when a more traditional form of such as a book, is given a boost by more modern media such as websites, tie-ins and video.  The thing that actually sold me on this book
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs (besides the awesome title) is a very cool video "trailer" I saw for it.  Yep that's right you heard me they are doing trailers for books now.  Check it out.

The book itself looks a lot scarier then it really is.  It combines a very original story with old photographs to create a Twilight Zone of a book.  The story is about a boy Jacob, who has been told stories accompanied by photos by his grandfather since he was small. These were stories about invisible boys, and floating girls, children with all sorts of special abilities.   Jacob always assumed that these were just exaggerations and that the pictures had been altered in some way.  His grandfather is killed by what Jacob sees as a humanoid monster, and everybody else thinks is wild dogs.  His grandfathers last words send Jacob and his father to an island off the coast of Wales.  Jacob explores the island, looking for the orphanage his grandfather was in until WWII when it was bombed.  He finds it abandoned in the woods, destroyed by an air raid in 1940.  He learns that the head mistress Miss Peregrine and all of the children living there were killed in the attack that destroyed the orphanage.  Jacob pokes around and finds more of the pictures like the ones his grandfather showed him.  Each photograph seems to show a child with a peculiar talent. 

Eventually Jacob stumbles into a cave that and he is greeted by many children whom he recognizes from the photos.  (Spoiler Alert)  Turns out that Miss Peregrine is one of many protectors of these peculiar children.  She and others like her have set up little time bubbles all over the world to keep the children safe.  The side effect of this is that they relieve the day of the bombing over and over, the day restarting just as the bomb falls.  Another effect is that nobody ever ages, so although every child should be in their 70's to 80's they all appear to be the same age as when the time loop started.  Jacob's grandfather was a peculiar child who had the ability to see Hollows, beings that were intent on destroying the children and using their energy for the nefarious experiments that resulted in there current state of being in the first place.  Jacobs Grandfather was out of the area when the bomb went off, and subsequently was not included in the time loop.  It seems Jacob has inherited his grandfathers gift and decides to stay with the other peculiar children to help fight off the Hollows. 

I really enjoyed this book, the pictures added a lot of atmosphere to the story.  I have heard a lot of people say it looked to scary for them, but it really is not a horror story at all.  The ending is a little wishy-washy, it doesn't leave you hanging per se, but you can tell it was left open for a possible sequel.  The only problem I could see with that is the concept for this book was so unique that I don't know if it would translate so well a second time.  Overall this book gets four out of five cups of coffee.  I would definitely recommend it, especially if you are looking for a great mix of unusual and familiar.

What do you think of the use of the photos in the book, did it enhance or detract from the story?  What do you think of the "trailer" for the book?  Would this concept work in a sequel?  Are you confused by my rating system yet?