Chuck Wendig: "The Staircase in the Woods" (ARC Review)

Title: The Staircase in the Woods [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Chuck Wendig [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Supernatural, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2025
Age: 18+
Stars: 4/5
Pros: Brilliant, exciting twist on a popular urban legend and a beloved horror trope.
Cons: The characters aren't easy to like, for different reasons (though it's kind of the point). The political tirades feel random and out of place. The somehow-open ending may not sit well with some readers.
WARNING! Violence, hate speech, suicidal ideation, self-harm, sexual abuse (off-page), emotional abuse, parental abuse, parental neglect, drug and alcohol addiction, bullying, animal abuse. Lots of blood, gore and disturbing imagery, bug horror, vomiting.
Will appeal to: Those who enjoy mind-blowing (and hard-hitting) portal fantasies with a psychological angle. Those who like double-timeline narratives.

Blurb: Five high school friends are bonded by an oath to protect one another no matter what. Then, on a camping trip in the middle of the forest, they find something extraordinary: a mysterious staircase to nowhere. One friend walks up - and never comes back down. Then the staircase disappears. Twenty years later, the staircase has reappeared. Now the group returns to find the lost boy - and what lies beyond the staircase in the woods...(Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Random House Worlds/Del Rey for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

STAIR STRUCK

Apparently, staircases to nowhere in the middle of the woods aren't a rare sight, and in time have become an object of fascination spawning whole threads on sites like Reddit or Quora. Wendig drew on the urban legend according to which these staircases would be portals to other dimensions, wove it with a beloved horror trope (estranged childhood friends reunite to get closure and defeat an old evil), and produced a deliciously disturbing, nightmarishly captivating and completely addictive haunted-house maze, where friendships are tested and individuals must rise above their fears and flaws if they want to get out. (Mind you...don't expect actual ghosts - there are other ways for a house to be haunted...). Told in a now-and-then narrative across a twenty-something-years divide (the author references Covid, so I'd say, more like twenty-five than the twenty accounted for in the synopsis), the story introduces us to five friends who, as teens, swore an oath to always have each other's back, and after a drugged and drunken night in the woods when a member of the group vanished at the top of a supernatural staircase, slowly drifted apart, only to band together as adults in order to solve the mystery when a similar structure reappears.

Now, if you're into (hellish) supernatural mazes, literal twists and turns, videogame-style challenges and psychological horror, it doesn't get much better than this. Granted, this book is disturbing and gross at times (well, MOST times), but it's also creative and addictive and sort of exhilarating. The ending, while not coming with a pretty bow, gives you closure about the things that matter most. If it were only for these aspects, TSITW would be a 5-star read for me. [...]

Mira Grant: "Overgrowth" (ARC Review)

Title: Overgrowth [on Amazon | on Amazon UK | on Goodreads] (Note: I got my copy from the UK-based publisher Daphne Press, so I'm using the UK cover and I'm linking to Amazon UK along with Amazon.com)
Series: None
Author: Mira Grant [Site* | Goodreads]
   *[Note: as I'm writing this review, the Mira Grant site hasn't been updated for a few years]
Genres: Sci-Fi
Year: 2025
Age: 18+ (but it can be read by mature teens)
Stars: 5/5
Pros: Fascinating, thought-provoking, refreshingly diverse (trans rep, Mexican-American rep).
Cons: The main conflict and the ending may feel problematic to some, depending on how one reads them. 
WARNING! Toddler death (on page), transphobia, death/violence/guns, blood and gore/vampirism, imprisonment, bug horror.
Will appeal to: Those who like first-contact narratives with a twist. Those who enjoy stories of outsiders and found families. Those who are fascinated by alt-biology scenarios.

Blurb: Since she was three years old, Anastasia Miller has been telling anyone who would listen that she's an alien disguised as a human being, and that the armada that left her on Earth is coming for her. Since she was three years old, no one has believed her. Now, with an alien signal from the stars being broadcast around the world, humanity is finally starting to realize that it's already been warned, and it may be too late. The invasion is coming, Stasia's biological family is on the way to bring her home, and very few family reunions are willing to cross the gulf of space for just one misplaced child. What happens when you know what's coming, and just refuse to listen? (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Daphne Press for providing an ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

PLANTED

In the vein of classics like Little Shop of Horrors, Invasion of the Body Snatchers and The Day of the Triffids, but with a huge twist (the point of view here is the alien's), Mira Grant's return to full-length fiction is a first-contact-meets-coming-of-age story packed with thought-provoking questions and social/cultural commentary. Set in a very near future (2031) over the span of a month, it chronicles the days preceding a plantlike alien armada's invasion of our planet, and the invasion itself, through the eyes of a hybrid character - alien in nature, human in appearance and by nurture - who both knows (and states) she's an alien and at times doubts she's deeply deluded...but mostly, simply, KNOWS. Then again, she has a lot of questions about herself and her origins, especially because more than thirty years have passed since when she allegedly fell on Earth and claimed the body of three-years-old Anastasia, and her people - who equipped her with a compulsion to announce their invasion plans - are taking their sweet time coming back for her. [...]

Philip Fracassi: "The Third Rule of Time Travel" (ARC Review)

Title: The Third Rule of Time Travel [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Philip Fracassi [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Sci-Fi, Thriller/Mystery, SPOILER - click on the Spoiler button below if you want to know, since revealing the other genre would ruin your reading experience...If you want to go into the book without knowing anything vital about it, I recommend not reading the Labels at the end of my review either. No need to worry though - the review itself will be spoiler-free...
Year: 2025
Age: 18+ (but it can be read by mature teens)
Stars: 4/5
Pros: Engaging variation on the time-travel trope, with a strong human angle and a transcendental core.
Cons: The side characters are slightly underdeveloped. The metaphysical interlude can feel disorienting.
WARNING! Plane crash, car crash, guns, blood and gore, loss of parents and a sibling, loss of a spouse, stillbirth, trauma, grief, implied misogyny.
Will appeal to: Those who prefer their time travel to be emotion-driven and not necessarily physical (or literal). Those who enjoy a philosophical twist to it.

Blurb: Scientist Beth Darlow has built a machine that allows human consciousness to travel through time - to any point in the traveler's lifetime - and relive moments of their life. An impossible breakthrough, but it's not perfect: the traveler has no way to interact with the past. After Beth's husband, Colson, the co-creator of the machine, dies in a tragic car accident, Beth is left to raise Isabella - their only daughter - and continue the work they started. Mired in grief and threatened by her ruthless CEO, Beth pushes herself to the limit to prove the value of her technology. Then the impossible happens. Simply viewing personal history should not alter the present, but with each new observation she makes, her own timeline begins to warp. As her reality constantly shifts, Beth must solve the puzzles of her past, even if it means forsaking her future. (Amazon excerpt)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Little, Brown Book Group UK/Orbit for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

EMOTIONAL VOYAGE

Time-travel stories are always entertaining and thought-provoking no matter what, but I was pleasantly surprised by the spin Fracassi put on the trope. As it turns out, you can produce an exciting specimen of time-travel narrative even by having your characters remain fixed in place and only be able to revisit moments of their past...at least if you up the ante by throwing a couple more ingredients into the mix (one of which shall remain unnamed, to avoid spoiling your fun), and ultimately allowing said characters a different kind of agency than the reader would expect. As much as the adventures of a person displaced in a different era or physically reliving the same day can be fun, there's something to be said for a more psychological - and in this case, even philosophical - approach to being untethered from your present. I know, I know...I'm being cryptic, but spoilers are just around the corner. Suffice to say, while Beth is a stationary character, the trips her consciousness makes (and the ones her late husband made before her) spin a twisty (and emotional) web while apparently warping her present - first in subtle ways, then with catastrophic consequences - and won't make you miss the thrill of "real" time travel. [...]

Dan Hanks: "The Way Up Is Death" (ARC Review)

Title: The Way Up Is Death [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Dan Hanks [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Supernatural, Multiverse, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2025
Age: 18+
Stars: 4.5/5
Pros: Inventive and cinematic; hard-hitting yet moving and ultimately hopeful.
Cons: Given the large cast of characters (and the very nature of the story), not all of them get to be sufficiently developed.
WARNING! Blood and gore, dismemberment, torture, near-drowning, human combustion/explosion, body horror, eye horror, rat horror, death of a loved one.
Will appeal to: Those who are in for a wild, brutal yet poetical adventure/mystery that doubles as a reflection on humanity, life and the future.

Blurb: When a mysterious tower appears in the skies over England, thirteen strangers are pulled from their lives to stand before it as a countdown begins. Above the doorway is one word: ASCEND. As a grieving teacher, a reclusive artist, and a narcissistic celebrity children’s author lead the others in trying to understand why they’ve been chosen and what the tower is, it soon becomes clear the only way out of this for everyone…is up. And so begins a race to the top, through sinking ships, haunted houses and other waking nightmares, as the group fights to hold onto its humanity, while the twisted horror of why they’re here grows ever more apparent – and death stalks their every move. (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Angry Robot for providing an ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

MORE TO IT

This book's premise is impossible to resist if you're the kind of reader whose mantra is "the weirder the better", but I'm here to confirm that, if you take a chance on TWUID, you won't regret being lured in, and you'll end up getting more than you bargained for. The short-and-sweet version of such premise: thirteen everymen and women from the UK (or just passing through) are pulled from their lives and forced to ascend an impossible tower in the skies, all while trying to fathom the how and (especially) the why in the process. From videogame settings to spaceships, from haunted houses to tropical beaches, a series of equally impossible locations (but ones that are somehow tailored to the travellers' past experiences) have the characters play a deadly game of escape rooms, of which they have to figure out the rules as they go. Exciting, isn't it? But if you tend to need a little more meat on your stories' bones, or if the cosmic horror premise and the content warning list left you on the fence about giving TWUID a chance, there are a couple more things you need to know. One: for a book that sheds so much blood and put its characters through the wringer, Hank's latest is surprisingly comforting and life-affirming. Two: for a book that relies so much on nightmarish experiences and frantic escapes, and even comes close to jumping the shark a couple of times (one of which quite literally 😂), TWUID is (also) surprisingly deep, so that you end up forgiving it for not making you care more for its characters (more of that below) or not giving you all the answers (if you're the type of reader who needs them, because to be honest, they're NOT the point here). [...]

Melissa Caruso: "The Last Hour Between Worlds" (ARC Review)

Title: The Last Hour Between Worlds [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: The Echo Archives (1st of 3 books)
Author: Melissa Caruso [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Multiverse, Supernatural, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2024
Age: 16+ (the characters are all adults, and the book is indeed marketed to adults, but it can be read by mature teens)
Stars: 4/5
Pros: Fresh take on the multiverse trope with strong world-building. Engaging characters. Honest motherhood-vs.-job perspective that still encourages women not to be reduced to the mother role.  The story leaves plenty of room for a new installment, but doesn't end on a cliffhanger.
Cons:  Things only start to get exciting when the characters plunge deeper into the layers of reality. A couple of twists are easy to figure out in advance.
WARNING! Blood, body horror, stabbing, fire, bugs.
Will appeal to: Those who enjoy modern fantasy, (deadly) alternate realities/time loops, enemies-to-lovers romances that don't swallow the plot, and new moms being badass.

Blurb: Star investigator Kembral Thorne has a few hours away from her newborn, and she just wants to relax and enjoy the year-turning party. But when people start dropping dead, she’s got to get to work. Especially when she finds that mysterious forces are plunging the whole party down through layers of reality and into nightmare. Most people who fall this far never return. Luckily, Kem isn’t most people. But as cosmic powers align and the hour grows late, she’ll have to work with her awfully compelling nemesis, notorious cat burglar Rika Nonesuch, for a chance to save her city - though not her night off. (Amazon excerpt)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Little, Brown Book Group UK for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

STEPPING UP

I have to preface this review by saying I'm a huge fan of alternate realities and time loops, but I tend to like them more when they're encapsulated in a sci-fi or magical-realism context. I do read fantasy from time to time (low/contemporary/urban), but I have to be completely sold on the book's premise...which was the case with Caruso's take on multiverse, so I took a chance on it - and I'm so glad I did. Basically, the setting is a world similar to our own - albeit steeped in magic and giving off an early-20th-century vibe - except in this world twelve layers of reality exist: the root universe, or Prime, and its eleven Echoes, getting more and more grotesque and dangerous the farther you stray from their paradigm. While it took a bit for the story to get going (I understand that the world-building had to be established, and it makes sense that the main character would look for answers at the party before she faced the outdoors and their mind-bending horrors, but the first couple of Echoes were a tad lackluster), it ultimately found its footing and became exciting and addictive, piling up layers (ha!) of horror, mystery, action, romance, plus character development and more world-building. [...]

Daniel Church: "The Ravening" (ARC Review)

Title: The Ravening [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Daniel Church [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Supernatural, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2024
Age: 18+
Stars: 4/5
Pros: Intriguing premise. Badass and resourceful heroine. Tight action. Fascinating dreamworld.
Cons: The supernatural aspect is a lot less prominent than one would expect, until late in the story. The main character can be abrasive and goes from mistrust to love in a jiffy. The "historical" interpolations are a bit tedious and not really necessary. There's a questionable sex scene, and a string of repetitions ("babe", "girl" "stupid cow") that get old fast.
WARNING! Blood, gore, violence, murder, dismemberment, near-drowning, fire. Familial trauma, kidnapping, imprisonment, forced pregnancy, attempted suicide, homophobia, bullying, copious swearing. Contains a detailed F/F sex scene.
Will appeal to: Those who enjoy a mixture of thriller and supernatural with plenty of action. Those who can get behind a tough female character without a maternal bone in her body.

Blurb: Jenna's life has always been a fight. From the traumatic and mysterious loss of her mother on a dark woodland road when she was fifteen, to the abusive and controlling boyfriend she's recently escaped, she has learned that trust hurts you in the end. Now Jenna's found what she hopes is happiness with her new girlfriend, Holly. But the world is full of darkness - some of it ancient, some of it closer to home... Evil, and those who serve it, will not let Jenna go. (Amazon excerpt)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on Edelweiss. Thanks to Watkins Publishing LTD/Angry Robot for providing an ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

MAGICAL CRESCENDO

I'll be honest: I expected The Ravening to be less of an action-y thriller and more of a "classic" supernatural haunting. But though I would have liked to spend more time in the dreamworld Church created because it was super-cool (and because that's how I roll 😉), I appreciated how he slowly introduced more and more supernatural cues into a seemingly average (well, in a manner of speaking) abduction-and-escape story, only to finally give the fantastical elements center stage and reveal the mythological foundations of his narrative (I'm not going to be more specific in order to avoid spoilers, but basically, Church put a wild and creative spin on a well-known classical myth). It's a testament to the author's ability to weave a tale that never lets up - and to come up with a flawed, yet relatable and strong heroine - if I was able to enjoy a story employing one of my less favourite narrative devices (the aforementioned abduction-and-escape), so chances are that those of you who aren't fond of this kind of stories will be entertained enough to read on, and get to the supernatural bits in all their glory 🙂. [...]

Katrina Monroe: "Through the Midnight Door" (ARC Review)

Title: Through the Midnight Door [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Katrina Monroe [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Supernatural, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2024
Age: 18+
Stars: 4.5/5
Pros: Creative twist on the magical/evil house trope. Excellent characterisation.
Cons: The supernatural experiences inside the house could have been fleshed out more. A familial problem gets resolved too easily. There's some confusion about the characters' ages (though for all I know, it might have been fixed in the finished version).
WARNING! Blood and gore, implied suicide, self-harm, abuse/child abuse (not sexual), poverty, child loss, kidnapping, stalking, manipulation, alcoholism, vomiting, car-crash imagery, bug horror, fires. On the mental-health side: PTST, paranoia, OCD, depression, grief, guilt, generational trauma.
Will appeal to: Those who enjoy a visceral examination of trauma and strained sisterly relationships on the backdrop of an atmospheric supernatural thriller.

Blurb: The Finch sisters once spent long, hot summers exploring the dozens of abandoned properties littering their dying town - until they found an impossible home with an endless hall of doors…and three keys left waiting for them. Curious, fearless, they stepped inside their chosen rooms, and experienced horrors they never dared speak of again. Now, years later, youngest sister Claire has been discovered dead in that old, desiccated house. Haunted by their sister's suicide and the memories of a past they've struggled to forget, Meg and Esther find themselves at bitter odds. As they navigate the tensions of their brittle relationship, they draw unsettling lines between Claire's death, their own haunted memories, and a long-ago loss no one in their family has ever been able to face. With the house once again pulling them ever-closer, Meg and Esther must find the connection between their sister's death and the shadow that has chased them across the years...before the darkness claims them, too. (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Poisoned Pen Press/Sourcebooks for providing an ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

SISTERS IN HARMS

Haunted/cursed/magical/evil houses have been a horror trope for ages, and 2024 in particular turned out to be rife of novels that put them front and center - I've read three in the last weeks alone, and that's only the tip of the iceberg. This is why it's all the more remarkable that some authors are still able to spin a fresh story around spooky mansions, as it's the case with Through the Midnight Door. I'll be honest though - in this book, it's the complex, often frayed relationship between three sisters (and their characterisation as individuals, or with regard to other people) that steals the scene. That's not to say that the house portion of the story doesn't deliver, though I expected a tad more (I'll come to that in a minute), and there's no denying that the other supernatural occurrences sprinkled throughout the novel are appropriately chilling - but the sisterly dynamic remains the core of the narrative, and a strong one at that. Through the Midnight Door weaves sibling rivalry/dependency, dysfunctional and toxic relationships, familial trauma, mental health issues, yet it's an uplifting story in what its protagonists are doing their best to bring justice to their dead sister, conquer the darkness that's trying to engulf them, and ultimately, find their way back to each other. [...]

Cherie Priest: "The Drowning House" (ARC Review)

Title: The Drowning House [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Cherie Priest [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Supernatural, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2024
Age: 18+
Stars: 4/5
Pros: Creative premise. Interesting, atmospheric mix of thriller and supernatural (namely, Norse mythology). Strong characterisation/character dynamics.
Cons: The protagonists' bickering and ego trips can get annoying at times. A couple of plot points lack strong foundations.
WARNING! Near-drowning, human remains, fires/explosions.
Will appeal to: Those who like a slow-burn, creepy mystery (but with a frantic climax) on the backdrop of old friendships and even older family secrets.

Blurb: A violent storm washes a mysterious house onto a rural Pacific Northwest beach, stopping the heart of the only woman who knows what it means. Her grandson, Simon Culpepper, vanishes in the aftermath, leaving two of his childhood friends to comb the small, isolated island for answers - but decades have passed since Melissa and Leo were close, if they were ever close at all. Now they'll have to put aside old rivalries and grudges if they want to find or save the man who brought them together in the first place - and on the way they'll learn a great deal about the sinister house on the beach, the man who built it, and the evil he's bringing back to Marrowstone Island. (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Poisoned Pen Press/Sourcebooks for providing an ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

DOUBLE ROOM

How many books can you count that start with a housewreck? To the best of my knowledge, there are none; so I was immediately drawn to this story, where a dilapidated mansion washes up on a small town's shore causing the death of an old woman, Mrs Culpepper - not for the reasons you may expect - and the disappearance of her nephew Simon. I mean, the concept is awesome...though the aforementioned house ends up being of less consequence than I anticipated, while Mrs Culpepper's house is more central to the story (not only because Melissa and Leo, the two main characters, camp out in there). There are two levels to the mystery of the ominous mansion on the beach: one of them isn't particularly hard to crack, even before we get the wreckage's backstory (I'm referring to its origins - though where it's coming from NOW it's a different kettle of fish altogether, and we never get an answer for that, even if I have a theory), the rest is revealed bit by bit via some appalling discoveries the two protagonists make inside the other house, the one where they're staying, and thanks to some sniping of their own. The juxtaposition of typical thriller structure and supernatural content (namely, Norse magic/mythology) works very well, and the flashbacks into Melissa, Leo and Simon's childhood/young adulthood under Mrs Culpepper's wing are not only integral to the story (and necessary for character development), but also charming and poignant. [...]

Abigail Miles: "The Building That Wasn't" (ARC Review)

Title: The Building That Wasn't [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Abigail Miles [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Multiverse, Sci-Fi, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2024
Age: 16+ (the book is geared towards adults, but can be read by mature teens)
Stars: 4/5
Pros: Merges a few sci-fi tropes and puts a clever and creative spin on them. Employs a peculiar writing style.
Cons: The pace is slow at times. There's an impalpable distance between the reader and the characters.
WARNING! Blood, torture (mostly off-screen), violence, domestic violence (off-screen), fires, claustrophobic spaces.
Will appeal to: Those who enjoy a creepy twist on the multiverse theory peppered with a generous dose of mad science, a sizeable amount of family secrets and a dash of romance.

Blurb: When Everly Tertium encounters a strange man in the park claiming to be her grandfather, she is invited to visit a mysterious apartment building. There, she finds herself in a constant state of déjà vu, impossibly certain that she’s already lived through these moments, already been introduced to these people, and already visited all of these rooms and floors. So why does she have no idea what’s happening to her? The longer she stays in the building, the more Everly becomes convinced there is more going on than meets the eye. Something is off, time seems to pass differently, and the people living there seem trapped. Slowly, Everly begins to wonder if she is trapped too. But would she even want to leave, if she could? (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on Edelweiss. Thanks to CamCat Books for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

THROWN FOR A LOOP

The Building That Wasn't is one of those books - the ones you can't review at length lest you reveal too much. One of the genre label I used for it is a spoiler in itself, though it doesn't even begin to encompass the...peculiarity...or madness...of the situation as a whole. By way of introduction, suffice to say that, while the plot relies on a few familiar sci-fi tropes and themes, it combines and twists them (along with some new, intriguing ideas) into a complex, claustrophobic, at times brutal, yet ultimately hopeful tale. In a way, The Building That Wasn't reads almost like a modern (and dark) fable, due to both the writing style and the fractured timeline. As a matter of fact, the narrative weaves back and forth in time, with different characters at the forefront (briefly but effectively including the building itself, which is really cool), and though I guess some of the event depicted will make more sense on a second read, Miles managed to create an engaging web of mystery while giving out a piece of the puzzle at a time, if you pay attention. I must admit I was fooled when it comes to the identity of the mysterious Warden, who runs the building, because there could have been at least another contender for that role (I mean, in my opinion...even if a certain detail should have alerted me, but I interpreted it in a different way), and I didn't expect the story to unfold the way it did; but even if I had, it would have been worth my time nevertheless. [...]

Brandon Jones: "Whirly World"

Title: Whirly World [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Brandon Jones [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Afterlife, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2023
Age: 14+ (I shelved it as Adult because of the characters' age, and it's indeed marketed to that demographic, but it can be read by teens)
Stars: 5/5
Pros: Inventive, entertaining, humorous and emotional.
Cons: Due to the large number of characters, not all of them feel fully realised. The ending doesn't give all the answers.
WARNING! Drowning, fires, claustrophobic settings. We see a character collapse to death in a flashback.
Will appeal to: Those who love creative afterlife settings, carnival rides and accidental heroes.

Blurb: Theme-park blogger Jason Green is dead and his spirit is stuck inside Whirly World, his favorite place to be. What should be a dream come true turns into an abstract nightmare as Jason confronts malevolent forces trapping him there. Desperate to escape, he has to befriend the other ten ghosts inhabiting this afterlife, from a disgruntled hostess crushed under a revolving stage, to a bereft security guard that still thinks it's 1983, and combine their strange powers to dig up the park's mysterious past. (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: this title was up for grabs on NetGalley (in the Read Now section). Thanks to Emet Studios (Brandon Jones) for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

FUN FAIR

Afterlife meets theme park with a side of superpowers and time loops, all wrapped in a mystery: a recipe for fun, though peppered with some emotional moments (what with the characters being, you know, dead). For one, the premise is creative and intriguing: eleven employees or patrons of a famous amusement park who died on its grounds find themselves trapped in a ghostly version of the same park. Among them is Jason, a theme-park blogger who in life was probably the biggest Whirly World fan, but isn't necessarily thrilled not to be able to leave the place for mysterious reasons - not to mention, he can't even remember how he died. He sets on exploring the surroundings (which leads to a series of frustrating discoveries - frustrating for him, but again, making for lots of fun on the reader's part), and one by one he runs into his fellow resident ghosts, which creates some amusing dynamics (since Jason has written about their deaths in his blog, and coming face to face with some of them brings out the fanboy in him, if for a moment. [...]

Nadi Reed Perez: "The Afterlife of Mal Caldera" (ARC Review)

Title: The Afterlife of Mal Caldera [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Nadi Reed Perez [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Afterlife
Year: 2024
Age: 18+
Stars: 4/5
Pros: Creative, riotous yet soulful spin on a series of classic afterlife/rock lifestyle tropes. A love letter to hope and life from the other side of the veil.
Cons: Too focused on the ghostly sex and partying (though it comes with the worldbuilding, to an extent).
WARNING! Suicide/attempted suicide, drug use, alcoholism. Familial abuse, depression, hospital internment, infidelity/promiscuity, grief.
Will appeal to: Those who like life-affirming stories, coming-of-age narratives (even after death) and found families.

Blurb: Mal Caldera - former rockstar, retired wild-child and excommunicated black sheep of her Catholic family - is dead. Not that she cares. She only feels bad that her younger sister, Cris, has been left to pick up the pieces Mal left behind. While her fellow ghosts party their afterlives away at an abandoned mansion they call the Haunt, Mal is determined to make contact with Cris from beyond the grave. She enlists the help of a reluctant local medium, Ren, and together, they concoct a plan to pass on a message to Cris. But the more time they spend together, the more they begin to wonder what might have been if they'd met before Mal died. Mal knows it’s wrong to hold on so tightly to her old life. Bad things happen to ghosts who interfere with the living, and Mal can't help wondering if she’s hurting the people she loves by hanging around, haunting their lives. But Mal has always been selfish, and letting go might just be the hardest thing she's ever had to do. (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on Edelweiss. Thanks to Titan Books for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

NEW DIRECTIONS

I have to be honest: the synopsis set my expectations for a different story than the one I got, up to an extent. I figured Mal's attempt to communicate with her sister (and maybe her success in doing so) would be the main focus, along with Mal and Ren's (the medium) doomed love story. It turns out that I was right about the second thing (again, up to an extent) and wrong about the first, because this book encompasses so many more themes and situations - though it mostly boils down to coming to terms with one's own death, forgiving oneself and becoming part of a found family, plus helping the living to change their existence for the better. This could have resulted in a sappy (and fairly typical) tale, except the author made some interesting choices that gave enough of a spin to a series of familiar tropes and managed to keep the narrative sharper and rawer than it could have been. For one, Mal Caldera hadn't reached stardom status yet before she met her untimely death, and she was as flawed and selfish as they come (still is, at the start of her afterlife - though the good thing is, she's self-aware about it). Likewise, if the rest of the cast projects a cliché appearance at first, this soon enough makes room for surprises and unexpected twists (for all purposes, so does the story). The setting and worldbuilding (I'm talking about the afterlife-dimension-on-Earth here) are imaginative and well thought-out, and the ghosts' mythology is the right blend of familiar and fresh. [...]

Quinn Connor: "The Pecan Children" (ARC Review)

Title: The Pecan Children [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Quinn Connor [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Contemporary with a Twist, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2024

Age: 16+ (I shelved it as Adult because of the characters' age, and it's indeed marketed to that demographic, but it can be read by mature teens. There are far more graphic YA books out there)

Stars: 5/5
Pros: Atmospheric, engrossing, spellbinding, inventive, ultimately hopeful.
Cons: Slow first half (if you prefer stories with more than a modicum of action). While the scope of the main twist (and its implications) will take readers completely by surprise, the authors dropped enough clues to have them figure out the basic truth early on. Some questions remain unanswered. The ending may be too open for certain readers.
WARNING! Fires/burns, wounds, near-drownings, some gore. Death of a parent (off-page). A couple of (tame) sex scenes.
Will appeal to: Those who like sibling narratives. Those who enjoy a mixture of cozy and unsettling, beauty and horror. Those who are in for a unique kind of haunting.

Blurb: In a small southern pecan town, the annual harvest is a time of both celebration and heartbreak. Even as families are forced to sell their orchards and move away, Lil Clearwater, keeper of a secret covenant with her land, swears she never will. When her twin Sasha returns to the dwindling town in hopes of reconnecting with the girl her heart never forgot, the sisters struggle to bridge their differences and share the immense burden of protecting their home from hungry forces intent on uprooting everything they love. But there is rot hiding deep beneath the surface. Ghostly fires light up the night, and troubling local folklore is revealed to be all too true. Confronted with the phantoms of their pasts and the devastating threat to their future, the sisters come to the stark realization that in the kudzu-choked South, nothing is ever as it appears. (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: this title was up for grabs on NetGalley (in the Read Now section). Thanks to Sourcebooks Landmark for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

SURPRISE, SURPRISE

The Pecan Children ended up going in a different direction than I had anticipated, and I mean it in the best possible sense. Based on the synopsis (which has all the reasons to be vague, since with books like this one, spoilers are just around the corner), I expected a contemporary story with a strong supernatural core - a troubled sibling relationship on the backdrop of a dilapidated town rife with secrets and malevolent forces. Now that I know what I know, I realise that the synopsis isn't meant to be misleading, and truth be told, it encapsulates the book fairly well...on a level. The fact is, The Pecan Children is SO. MUCH. MORE than its blurb lets on, and even if the authors start dropping a certain set of clues early in the story, I wasn't prepared for the scope and manner of the big reveal - and its implications. In hindsight, the twist is not only jaw-dropping and exciting, but it perfectly fits the claustrophobic, lethargic setting, and it's an equally perfect vehicle for the "allegory of decay in small-town America" the editorial notes promise. Also, in lieu of a supernatural mystery, this book turned out to be a strong specimen of the magical realism genre, though with elements that straddle the line between the two. Another pleasant surprise, since through the magical realism lens, the social commentary and sibling dynamic get to shine in a way that a mere supernatural context wouldn't have allowed. [...]

Seanan McGuire: "Tidal Creatures" (ARC Review)

Title: Tidal Creatures [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: Alchemical Journeys (3rd of 5 books)
Author: Seanan McGuire [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Supernatural
Year: 2024
Age: 16+ (the book is geared towards adults, but can be read by mature teens)
Stars: 5/5
Pros: Fascinating concept. Rich mythology. Characters who transcend the page.
Cons: Complex. On the other hand, the murder-mystery part isn't hard to figure out, once you have the necessary information.
WARNING! Some gruesome deaths/imagery (people melting included).
Will appeal to: Those who loved Book 1 in the series and were less keen on Book 2. Those who need more Roger and Dodger. Those who enjoy a creative, exciting twist on gods incarnate and the heart of creation. 

Blurb: All across the world, people look up at the moon and dream of gods. Gods of knowledge and wisdom, gods of tides and longevity. Over time, some of these moon gods incarnated into the human world alongside the other manifest natural concepts. Their job is to cross the sky above the Impossible City - the heart of all creation - to keep it connected to reality. And someone is killing them. There are so many of them that it's easy for a few disappearances to slip through the cracks. But they aren't limitless. In the name of the moon, the lunar divinities must uncover the roots of the plot and thwart the true goal of those behind these attacks - control of the Impossible City itself. (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on NetGalley. Thanks to Tor/Forge for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

NEW HEIGHTS

Let's get it out of the way: if you adored Middlegame but felt that Seasonal Fears was a bit of a letdown, you only need to read Tidal Creatures to fall in love with the series all over again. And no, not only because this time Roger and Dodger play a huge part in it (though it does help 😉 😍). For one, the amount of exposition is just right - there's a lot to take in, that's for sure, and some of the concepts are tackled more than once, but you never feel like you're hammered over the head with them when it happens. Every time the god-incarnate situation, the alchemical procedures or the Impossible City (a.k.a. the center of creation) are discussed, the reader is given a new piece of information, or sees a familiar event from a new angle (or from a new character's eyes), so that in the end everything is an essential tassel to the book's mosaic, the same way as the Lunar gods need to come together to become the Moon that shines over the City itself. But this is just one of the reasons why this book restored my faith in the series... [...]

Ryan Leslie: "Colossus" (ARC Review)

Title: Colossus [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Ryan Leslie [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Sci-Fi, Multiverse
Year: 2024
Age: 18+ (please note: it's definitely an adult book as a whole, but readable by mature teens - there are a couple of preludes to sex scenes that either happen offscreen or not at all, and the horror factor shouldn't be a huge issue, given the amount of very dark YA horror out there. See the WARNING! section though)
Stars: 5/5
Pros: Epic, visionary, intriguing blend of fringe science, parallel realities and horror.
Cons: Complex. Requires suspension of disbelief (which is pretty much the norm with sci-fi anyway). Some characters aren't exactly likeable. The ending is open to interpretations.
WARNING! Horror and gore/body horror/bodily fluids. Violence/murder. Drugs/suicide. Heavy drinking.
Will appeal to: Those who have a thing for parallel realities. Those who enjoy tense and imaginative science fiction that pushes the limit.

Blurb: Economics professor Clay West has always explained the world through the lens of his profession. But after his girlfriend Karla takes Dying Wish - a drug that supposedly reveals the nature of reality moments before it claims your life - Clay is devastated. No amount of rationalization can explain Karla's actions. Distraught, Clay joins a mission into the dark emptiness of space where answers are promised to reside. But when the ship begins to malfunction, Clay and the surviving crew members suspect there's more to the mission than they've been told. They've been lied to, and they're drifting into dead space. Clay's memories of Karla haunt him even more than the ship's chaos, and there's something wrong with his memories: he has too many. The ship's Al tells Clay his false memories are a normal side-effect of the hibernation, but to Clay, the memories suggest something far more insidious. He's been on this ship before... (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I received a complimentary eARC from the author, since I had already enjoyed and reviewed his debut novel The Between in 2021. This didn't influence my review in any way.

LARGER THAN LIVES

On his site, Ryan Leslie states that it took him ten years to complete this novel, and let me tell you, I'm not at all surprised. Colossus is an ambitious blend of genres and ideas, spanning Earth, space and parallel universes/converging realities, clones and AI wars, science and philosophy, and last but not least, love and loss. It could have gone very well or very badly, but luckily, the result is impressive, and far less challenging that one might think (I mean, it's still a complex book, but you won't get lost while reading it). Putting his own twist on quantum science and the many-worlds theory, Leslie came up with a story where the scientific angle is just as prominent as the human one, since the two characters/forces that clash during the course of the novel and ultimately engage in a life-or-death battle are - net of the science and the technology that laid the groundwork for such a battle - the product of very human emotions. And I found it fit that the author would devote the first two thirds of his story respectively to the hero's and the villain's genesis (though Clay's section is a mix of real-time plot and flashbacks) - I mean, the general consensus seems to be that Part 2 is a tad too long, or too complex, or less intriguing, but after a couple of chapters, I started to vibe with it, and I ended up finding it both necessary and enjoyable...not to mention, funny at times. The last third is kind of an acid trip in the best way (which I suppose it indeed is, since the infamous Dying Wish makes an apparition 😂), a poignant yet sharp climax steeped in quantum physic and wrapped in a horror nightmare, and if you're into this sort of stuff, it's guaranteed to make your pulse race. [...]

Mallory Pearson: "We Ate the Dark" (ARC Review)

Title: We Ate the Dark [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None so far (though according to a Goodreads reviewer, the author has - had? - a duology in mind)
Author: Mallory Pearson [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Supernatural, Afterlife, Multiverse, Thriller/Mystery
Year: 2024
Age: 16+ (technically an adult book, but it can be read by mature teens. See the WARNING! section though)
Stars: 4/5
Pros: Visceral and lyrical (if dark) celebration of found family, queer love, female friendship, and everything in between.
Cons: Metaphor galore - some of them over the top or bizarre. Open ending, with loose threads that were likely left for a potential sequel to pick.
WARNING! Horror and gore, violence (not of the sexual kind), near-drowning, fire, darkness (in the literal sense), claustrophobic spaces, evil spirit possession, extreme grief. 
Will appeal to: Those who love a story that crosses the space between all-consuming friendship and queer love. 

Blurb: Five years after Sofia Lyon disappeared, her remains are found stuffed into the hollow of a tree bursting through the floorboards of an abandoned house in the woods. The women who loved her flock home to the North Carolina hills to face their grief. Frankie, Sofia’s twin, is in furious mourning. Poppy is heartbroken. Cass has never felt more homesick. And Marya knows something the rest of them don’t. Determined to find Sofia’s murderer, they share more than a need to see justice done for their friend. As Sofia’s secrets unravel, so do those of the woods, and the women soon realize that Sofia might not be who they thought she was at all. And that whoever - or whatever - killed her is coming after them. (Amazon excerpt)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: this title was up for grabs on NetGalley (in the Read Now section). Thanks to 47North for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

SHADES OF LOVE

Let's address the elephant in the room first, because it's not like it's a secret: We Ate the Dark has a low average rating on Goodreads. Now, I don't mean to invalidate my fellow readers' opinions...but I'm surprised at the number of bad reviews this book is receiving. I get where most of them are coming from (more about that later), but at the same time, I found a lot to love in this story, and I'm going to tell you what it is.

Look, I may be a tad biased, because Pearson put together a lot of my favourite elements for this story: ghosts, haunted houses, alternate universes, a murder mystery, and a found family of women who just won't quit. But there's a lot more in here that I didn't expect and quite liked. Three old friends whose paths diverged after one of them disappeared are brought together by a shocking discovery (another trope I can't seem to tire of), and set on getting justice for one of them, all while trying to forgive and forget the hurt they've inflicted on one another, yet at the same time remember what they used to be for one another. Plus a newcomer with a gift that's more of a burden manages to get accepted into their circle, and does her best to make them realise she belongs with them. Cycling through the voices of all four girls (not to mention those of the missing twin and a separate female character), We Ate the Dark is first and foremost an exploration of female friendship and queer love and the liminal space between the two, from teenhood to new adulthood. I've never had relationship like those in the book, and yet the author was able to make me believe in each and every one of them. While there's no evident homophobia in the story, at least one of the characters tries to forge a more "traditional" sexual identity for herself, setting the whole tragedy in motion. But it's a different tragedy than you'd expect, and the focus of the story remains on the bond among women, the nuances of their relationships, the family that fails you and the one you make for yourself. And here's where Pearson's writing excels, down to the phenomenal single chapter in first person plural. [...]

Gwendolyn Kiste: "The Haunting of Velkwood" (ARC Review)

Title: The Haunting of Velkwood [on Amazon | on Goodreads]
Series: None
Author: Gwendolyn Kiste [Site | Goodreads]
Genres: Supernatural
Year: 2024
Age: 14+ (I shelved it as Adult because of the characters' age in the present, but it can be read by mature teens. There are far more graphic YA books out there)
Stars: 4.5/5
Pros: Original take on the haunted house trope (where the house is a whole street). Riveting, atmospheric and suspenseful. Heartbreaking, but hopeful as well.
Cons: Could have used a little more worldbuilding and character development.
WARNING! Violence, domestic abuse (off-page), pedophilia/sexual abuse (off-page), homophobia, bug horror. 
Will appeal to: Fans of literal and psychological hauntings with a mystery (or more) to crack. Readers who favour dual narratives (past + present), female friendships/would-be-romances and sisterly relationships.

Blurb: The Velkwood Vicinity was the topic of occult theorists, tabloid one-hour documentaries, and even some pseudo-scientific investigations as the block of homes disappeared behind a near-impenetrable veil that only three survivors could enter - and only one has in the past twenty years, until now. Talitha Velkwood has avoided anything to do with the tragedy that took her mother and eight-year-old sister, drifting from one job to another, never settling anywhere or with anyone, feeling as trapped by her past as if she was still there in the small town she so desperately wanted to escape from. When a new researcher tracks her down and offers to pay her to come back to enter the vicinity, Talitha claims she’s just doing it for the money. Of all the crackpot theories over the years, no one has discovered what happened the night Talitha, her estranged, former best friend Brett, and Grace, escaped their homes twenty years ago. Will she finally get the answers she’s been looking for all these years, or is this just another dead end? (Amazon)

Review: First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on Edelweiss. Thanks to Saga Press (Simon & Schuster) for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.

STEP UP THE GHOST

A haunting like no other. After a mysterious incident, a whole street vanished in plain sight (or, it didn't exactly vanish, but since then it has existed inside of a blurred bubble that nothing and no one can access...with a few exceptions), giving a brand new meaning to the expression "ghostly neighbourhood"...and its resident became ghosts themselves - or did they? It makes for an exciting premise and a fantastic setup, and for the most part, the story lives up to them (I have but a couple of minor quibbles that I'll come back to in the second part of my review). First one, then two, in the end all three of the estranged childhood friends who escaped the fate that befell their homes are able to enter the ghostly vicinity - but of course, at a cost; and with each trip, a new piece of the puzzle is revealed. Now, if grown-apart adults returning to their childhood lair, secrets and mysteries, and super-eerie locations/manifestations are your jam, this alone would be worth the admission fee; but like all the best horror stories are wont to do, The Haunting of Velkwood ultimately packs a lot more into its slight frame. [...]