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versmonesprit's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
0.25
Writers really have to start figuring out what book they want to write, before publishing it. Because This Shitty Book Between Us has no clue which route to take: a city technohorror, a snowy surreal horror, or a failed creepypasta?
On that note, publishers really have to stop putting money on stories that wouldn’t even have made it as creepypastas, from which Moreno seems to have pulled the Slenderman-like image of the… demon? entity? who the fuck knows. Probably not even Moreno himself.
I was so excited to read this book, the hype, the blurb, the cover all came together to form a blazing anticipation. It started off at least readable, and soon became boring with far too much family history that kept hindering the horror aspects of the book, which were centred around a fictional Alexa. And despite this, and the very silly fictional name Moreno found for it (Sahara Itza, really?), it somehow didn’t feel like Black Mirror, which was definitely a plus. But then it got all the more slobbery with Thiago whining about his dead wife, and it made me feel like a stinky sweaty man was being a crybaby right next to me. Needless to say, the book never made me care the least bit about Thiago or his dead wife or their families, not even as fictional human beings. I felt zero pity for them. All Thiago had for a personality was movie references (again, yuck, men who reference movies do not deserve rights) and sheer, disgusting, repulsive, thick-skulled stupidity. Oh and the most idiotic victim complex over being a fully grown ass man who thought he was being victimised for not having learnt Spanish despite being Mexican. Stop crying and whining you sleazy manbaby, you can learn Spanish as an adult if your parents weren’t there to teach you! “Waaah, everything makes me a victim, waaah,” would pretty much be a good summary for this book tbh.
The allusions and descriptions were incredibly irritating for how amateur they were too. Like I’m sorry, but the moment you repeat “Virgin Mary blue” it becomes pure bad writing, not that the narrative voice fitted it the first time either. And a Saint Bernard being described through other animals incessantly, namely cows and orcas, like “his orca tongue”… stop. Walk away from the keyboard. Look straight into your eyes in a mirror and ask, “Man what the fuck?” Be fucking serious and ask, “Why am I clowning on my own book?” Do it. Apparently sometimes it’s warranted.
But before we even get to the Saint Bernard, there’s the road from Chicago to the Colorado mountains. And you know what? It was good. The liminality and the eeriness of it, the momentary glimpse at a creature that was described so well it freaked me out… So good. But we can’t have that, no. We can only eat shit in This Horrendous Piece of Writing Between Us. So after a whole part of the book dedicated to the most boring wake and whatnot, we need to have YET ANOTHER flashback to it. Because fuck us that’s why. Because just when things were getting good, we have to listen to more about Vera, probably the most fucking boring fictional person without an inkling of a personality. The dog is a much more developed character than Vera. The dog is infinitely more lovable than Vera, which isn’t a statement of a great magnitude in itself since Vera is at like, a negative thousand right now.
Speaking of the dog… sorry not sorry if this constitutes a spoiler (which it kind of does but also what were you expecting would happen to the dog on the cover of a badly written horror novel) but I do not want to read any sort of violence, let alone an incredibly graphic one, against an animal EVEN IF it’s just a demon or whatever wearing the corpse and not even a reanimated possessed animal. You might think “Oh come on, if this is the reaction he managed to evoke, clearly Moreno did something right.” You would be an idiot though. Because that’s theeee lowest hanging fruit for horror. Hurt the animal for cheap reactions. It‘s what everyone incapable of writing actually scary shit does. Go for the animal. Here’s an advice to all writers: don’t. A very sad death is the limit. The poor dog died because Thiago is a moron. That’s where you draw the line. Now go and write actually good horror.
But you know what? Still. STILL the surreal horror with the wall and the nighttime snowy mountain and forest scape… STILL that was good.
But remember what I said? We can’t have that. We only get the shittiest crappiest book possible. NOT a good one, not an alright one.
So anyway, after that climax, we have to do something very fucking dull again. We have to do a million flashbacks that make us say “God, I wish Diane had dropped Vera on her head as a baby so we wouldn’t have to read this shit.” We have to get FUNNY at this point, because fuck us that’s why. I already explained that, we get fucked here. Keep up. Moreno MUST ruin his own book, now shush and read a bit of Ghost Busters because that tonally makes sense! Totally! Eat shit.
And then Moreno gives us just a tiny bit of promising stuff, just so the dying ember lights up again in us, just so we say, “OK fine, one last chance Gus. Make this good and you’re completely forgiven.” Except no, Moreno doesn’t want your forgiveness. He wants you to eat shit. So after yet another high intensity climax, we must read Thiago going back to Chicago, attending a boring ass funeral (because that totally makes sense for a character that just witnessed interdimensional horror, just sit at a church and talk to your stepfather-in-law), having a boring ass drink, having a boring ass demon or whatever encounter.
And oh yeah, don’t forget, we have to read a demon (or WHATEVER) trying to convince Thiago to put his hand through a wall (not even Moreno knows why probably) by showing him a feast table on an island, wearing flowy romantic shirts or whatever. Yeah, because that is tonally so in place and perfect! Because fuck you that’s why, keep up with this already! Moreno has to ruin This Terrible Crap Between Us, so what better than a romantic tropic island sequence every now and then?? But noo, it’s not paradise though the demon (OR WHATEVER I REALLY DO NOT CARE OMG) insists Thiago will learn to call it that. Except there is no real hint whatsoever that it is actually hellish. “Welcome to hell, where we sit in agony at a feast table on a tropic island, with me, your personal demon, wearing luscious waves and romantic shirts, talking to you sort of sensuously. This is so cruel, right??” I mean yeah, to me, because I hate hot weather, but I’m pretty sure this is a fine ass deal for most everyone. And remember, Moreno never once gives us any real and horrifying reason to the contrary. Just Thiago’s dumb ass sensing stuff, as if any one of us would trust fucking Thiago’s judgement at this point!
So needless to say by now the demon (OR WHATEVER, I DO NOT KNOW BECAUSE CLEARLY NEITHER DOES MORENO) has lost any and all potential scariness, and has instead become purely comical. But please also remember that the demon (OR WHATEVER!) made Thiago a chocolate milkshake on his way to Colorado. The evil entity made CHOCOLATE MILKSHAKE for Thiago omfg Just a silly 😜 evil entity 🤭 yum yum eat up my cutie pie slurp slurp
And finally we need to make sure we have a very stupid ending to crown This Comedy Masterpiece Between Us the silly king 🤭😜 so something terrible is done to the old woman who opened the gateway for the evil entity, but it’s a secret you and I don’t get to read about, because Moreno could not be bothered to think that up. Just eat shit, you’re never finding out what happened there. Moreno can only write graphic gory violence against animals, not against humans. We ONLY get cheap shots here. Nothing good.
Actually, fuck you, the whole ending is a third secret thing now 🤭 There’s no real point to Thiago’s possession. He gets an afterlife because the evil entity feels like it. We’re told it’s hellish but never really shown anything other than a feast table on an island. The best part?? The evil entity has actually bent space time to create time loops! Thiago’s in the walls. Thiago’s cancelling the alarm so Vera dies. Thiago’s on the platform with a face split in two to reveal razor teeth so the kid can turn around and freak out and push Vera down the stairs. Thiago’s been the unseen force the Itza’s been talking to. Because for some reason Vera and Thiago are important enough for the evil entity to torment this way. But anyway, this evil entity powerful enough to create time loops.. can’t do shit unless Thiago puts his hand through the wall. Because fuck you that’s why, I’ve already said it several times, keep up. If Thiago hadn’t put his hand through the wall, it wouldn’t have been a time loop? Question mark, because that’s what happens when authors decide to write time loop stories without understanding the implications. It’s one sure way to flush the rotting corpse of your book down a stinky shitstained toilet. If you make a really huge mess out of your book that no one will be able to make sense of, maybe then they won’t notice just how badly written this whole story is. It’s ingenious. If only.
To make matters worse as if that’s possible, the book ends with an “Itza quick start guide” that just says “Pull me out of the wall” after a point, probably to confuse the reader more (“Wait now, are all the Itzas possessed? Did we not need the gateway for summoning the evil entity? Is this back to a technohorror?”) so we REALLY can’t make sense of anything and so we might not recognise just how shitty this is.
To emulate the book: Put my fucking head through the wall. Put my fucking head through the wall. Put my fucking head through the wall. Put my fucking head through the wall. Put my fucking head through the wall.
On that note, publishers really have to stop putting money on stories that wouldn’t even have made it as creepypastas, from which Moreno seems to have pulled the Slenderman-like image of the… demon? entity? who the fuck knows. Probably not even Moreno himself.
I was so excited to read this book, the hype, the blurb, the cover all came together to form a blazing anticipation. It started off at least readable, and soon became boring with far too much family history that kept hindering the horror aspects of the book, which were centred around a fictional Alexa. And despite this, and the very silly fictional name Moreno found for it (Sahara Itza, really?), it somehow didn’t feel like Black Mirror, which was definitely a plus. But then it got all the more slobbery with Thiago whining about his dead wife, and it made me feel like a stinky sweaty man was being a crybaby right next to me. Needless to say, the book never made me care the least bit about Thiago or his dead wife or their families, not even as fictional human beings. I felt zero pity for them. All Thiago had for a personality was movie references (again, yuck, men who reference movies do not deserve rights) and sheer, disgusting, repulsive, thick-skulled stupidity. Oh and the most idiotic victim complex over being a fully grown ass man who thought he was being victimised for not having learnt Spanish despite being Mexican. Stop crying and whining you sleazy manbaby, you can learn Spanish as an adult if your parents weren’t there to teach you! “Waaah, everything makes me a victim, waaah,” would pretty much be a good summary for this book tbh.
The allusions and descriptions were incredibly irritating for how amateur they were too. Like I’m sorry, but the moment you repeat “Virgin Mary blue” it becomes pure bad writing, not that the narrative voice fitted it the first time either. And a Saint Bernard being described through other animals incessantly, namely cows and orcas, like “his orca tongue”… stop. Walk away from the keyboard. Look straight into your eyes in a mirror and ask, “Man what the fuck?” Be fucking serious and ask, “Why am I clowning on my own book?” Do it. Apparently sometimes it’s warranted.
But before we even get to the Saint Bernard, there’s the road from Chicago to the Colorado mountains. And you know what? It was good. The liminality and the eeriness of it, the momentary glimpse at a creature that was described so well it freaked me out… So good. But we can’t have that, no. We can only eat shit in This Horrendous Piece of Writing Between Us. So after a whole part of the book dedicated to the most boring wake and whatnot, we need to have YET ANOTHER flashback to it. Because fuck us that’s why. Because just when things were getting good, we have to listen to more about Vera, probably the most fucking boring fictional person without an inkling of a personality. The dog is a much more developed character than Vera. The dog is infinitely more lovable than Vera, which isn’t a statement of a great magnitude in itself since Vera is at like, a negative thousand right now.
Speaking of the dog… sorry not sorry if this constitutes a spoiler (which it kind of does but also what were you expecting would happen to the dog on the cover of a badly written horror novel) but I do not want to read any sort of violence, let alone an incredibly graphic one, against an animal EVEN IF it’s just a demon or whatever wearing the corpse and not even a reanimated possessed animal. You might think “Oh come on, if this is the reaction he managed to evoke, clearly Moreno did something right.” You would be an idiot though. Because that’s theeee lowest hanging fruit for horror. Hurt the animal for cheap reactions. It‘s what everyone incapable of writing actually scary shit does. Go for the animal. Here’s an advice to all writers: don’t. A very sad death is the limit. The poor dog died because Thiago is a moron. That’s where you draw the line. Now go and write actually good horror.
But you know what? Still. STILL the surreal horror with the wall and the nighttime snowy mountain and forest scape… STILL that was good.
But remember what I said? We can’t have that. We only get the shittiest crappiest book possible. NOT a good one, not an alright one.
So anyway, after that climax, we have to do something very fucking dull again. We have to do a million flashbacks that make us say “God, I wish Diane had dropped Vera on her head as a baby so we wouldn’t have to read this shit.” We have to get FUNNY at this point, because fuck us that’s why. I already explained that, we get fucked here. Keep up. Moreno MUST ruin his own book, now shush and read a bit of Ghost Busters because that tonally makes sense! Totally! Eat shit.
And then Moreno gives us just a tiny bit of promising stuff, just so the dying ember lights up again in us, just so we say, “OK fine, one last chance Gus. Make this good and you’re completely forgiven.” Except no, Moreno doesn’t want your forgiveness. He wants you to eat shit. So after yet another high intensity climax, we must read Thiago going back to Chicago, attending a boring ass funeral (because that totally makes sense for a character that just witnessed interdimensional horror, just sit at a church and talk to your stepfather-in-law), having a boring ass drink, having a boring ass demon or whatever encounter.
And oh yeah, don’t forget, we have to read a demon (or WHATEVER) trying to convince Thiago to put his hand through a wall (not even Moreno knows why probably) by showing him a feast table on an island, wearing flowy romantic shirts or whatever. Yeah, because that is tonally so in place and perfect! Because fuck you that’s why, keep up with this already! Moreno has to ruin This Terrible Crap Between Us, so what better than a romantic tropic island sequence every now and then?? But noo, it’s not paradise though the demon (OR WHATEVER I REALLY DO NOT CARE OMG) insists Thiago will learn to call it that. Except there is no real hint whatsoever that it is actually hellish. “Welcome to hell, where we sit in agony at a feast table on a tropic island, with me, your personal demon, wearing luscious waves and romantic shirts, talking to you sort of sensuously. This is so cruel, right??” I mean yeah, to me, because I hate hot weather, but I’m pretty sure this is a fine ass deal for most everyone. And remember, Moreno never once gives us any real and horrifying reason to the contrary. Just Thiago’s dumb ass sensing stuff, as if any one of us would trust fucking Thiago’s judgement at this point!
So needless to say by now the demon (OR WHATEVER, I DO NOT KNOW BECAUSE CLEARLY NEITHER DOES MORENO) has lost any and all potential scariness, and has instead become purely comical. But please also remember that the demon (OR WHATEVER!) made Thiago a chocolate milkshake on his way to Colorado. The evil entity made CHOCOLATE MILKSHAKE for Thiago omfg Just a silly 😜 evil entity 🤭 yum yum eat up my cutie pie slurp slurp
And finally we need to make sure we have a very stupid ending to crown This Comedy Masterpiece Between Us the silly king 🤭😜 so something terrible is done to the old woman who opened the gateway for the evil entity, but it’s a secret you and I don’t get to read about, because Moreno could not be bothered to think that up. Just eat shit, you’re never finding out what happened there. Moreno can only write graphic gory violence against animals, not against humans. We ONLY get cheap shots here. Nothing good.
Actually, fuck you, the whole ending is a third secret thing now 🤭 There’s no real point to Thiago’s possession. He gets an afterlife because the evil entity feels like it. We’re told it’s hellish but never really shown anything other than a feast table on an island. The best part?? The evil entity has actually bent space time to create time loops! Thiago’s in the walls. Thiago’s cancelling the alarm so Vera dies. Thiago’s on the platform with a face split in two to reveal razor teeth so the kid can turn around and freak out and push Vera down the stairs. Thiago’s been the unseen force the Itza’s been talking to. Because for some reason Vera and Thiago are important enough for the evil entity to torment this way. But anyway, this evil entity powerful enough to create time loops.. can’t do shit unless Thiago puts his hand through the wall. Because fuck you that’s why, I’ve already said it several times, keep up. If Thiago hadn’t put his hand through the wall, it wouldn’t have been a time loop? Question mark, because that’s what happens when authors decide to write time loop stories without understanding the implications. It’s one sure way to flush the rotting corpse of your book down a stinky shitstained toilet. If you make a really huge mess out of your book that no one will be able to make sense of, maybe then they won’t notice just how badly written this whole story is. It’s ingenious. If only.
To make matters worse as if that’s possible, the book ends with an “Itza quick start guide” that just says “Pull me out of the wall” after a point, probably to confuse the reader more (“Wait now, are all the Itzas possessed? Did we not need the gateway for summoning the evil entity? Is this back to a technohorror?”) so we REALLY can’t make sense of anything and so we might not recognise just how shitty this is.
To emulate the book: Put my fucking head through the wall. Put my fucking head through the wall. Put my fucking head through the wall. Put my fucking head through the wall. Put my fucking head through the wall.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty and Animal death
autumnrevisited's review against another edition
dark
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent, Violence, Animal cruelty, Death, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Xenophobia, Suicide, Mental illness, Blood, Racism, and Suicidal thoughts
queenkath32's review against another edition
dark
emotional
tense
2.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Violence, and Gore
jkar7's review against another edition
I got to 75% and it was decent. Then I started just skimming and quit at 81%. Some people may enjoy books like this, but don't.
What really grabbed my attention was how grief was described. I found it to be quite accurate and I connect that part. And then the book fell off a cliff and it was too ridiculous to continue.
What really grabbed my attention was how grief was described. I found it to be quite accurate and I connect that part. And then the book fell off a cliff and it was too ridiculous to continue.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Animal cruelty, and Animal death
Moderate: Religious bigotry, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Xenophobia, Stalking, Vomit, Racism, Violence, and Suicidal thoughts
magicalrealem's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror
Moderate: Animal cruelty
hannahvardit's review against another edition
fast-paced
4.0
A really affecting book about grief with lots of good scares but ultimately it gets dragged down by the ending which just goes on and on. It’a not even that long a book but it could have been trimmed down by 50, maybe 75 pages, easy.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death and Animal cruelty
bxnnny's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
i wanted to like this book but it honestly fell flat for me. the beginning started off decently - i found the representation of grief to be well done and it hit me hard. but as the story progressed and we're seeing more of the supernatural bits coming out, i was feeling a bit lost. there's no explanation as to what is really going on beyond some very minor speculation and things became somewhat confusing for me towards the end with the dreams and the quick jumps back to reality(?). i felt like there should have been more of a bigger build up to a crescendo ending but it really just fell flat for me.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Animal cruelty, Death, Body horror, Animal death, and Suicidal thoughts
polythenesam's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death and Animal cruelty
jj_tj's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0
Content Warnings
Minor: Animal death, Gore, Animal cruelty, Suicidal thoughts, and Suicide
danimacuk's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Animal cruelty, and Animal death
Moderate: Death and Injury/Injury detail