Reviews - Beneath The Trees Where Nobody Sees

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1.45k reviews for:

Beneath The Trees Where Nobody Sees

Patrick Horvath

4.17 AVERAGE

wordsarepower's review

4.0

dark funny mysterious medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

martinviles's review

5.0

dark lighthearted mysterious reflective tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: N/A

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

No one knows that Samantha Strong, store-owner and long time resident of Woodbrook, is a murderer. An 'appointment' in the city every few months is enough to muffle the voices in her head and let her live quietly. The last thing she wants is to disturb the peace of her little town. But when a series of increasingly grizzly murders rips through Woodbrook, Sam worries that the police could catch the wrong killer.

For a story so short, this pulls off a lot. With it's fast pace, it immediately immerses the reader within the world, immediately in the main character's head. Horvath relies heavily on imagery for the story-telling, rather than Sam's narration. Her narration is used sparingly. The more imaginative and surreal images are often shown with little explanation, letting the viewer piece it together.

Aside from the imagery, the characterisation is amazing as well. Specifically the contrast of Sam and her rival, whom are similar, but fall on different ends of a spectrum. While both intelligent and quite grusome in their killings, Sam is rather tidy, careful, and sparing. She attacks randomly, never too much at once, calculated and always sure to keep it away from her home. The murderer tearing through Woodbrook however is reckless, they look to make a spectecal, to make the town scared. While Sam seeks to blend in, her rival seeks to terrify and loom over the townsfolk.

I will admit, I expected this book to be longer. While it does a great job on exploring the situation and characters, it's brief. For all the depth given to Sam and the Woodbrook murderer, other characters, suspects, residents in the town are left to fall to the side. For all it's depth, it would be nice to see this more as a simmer, rather than the fast paced story it can feel like.

harrowharknonagesimus's review

4.0

dark tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

aviisarchive1's review

3.0

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

abnerd's review

4.0

dark funny mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

ichthyomancer's review against another edition

5.0

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

this is such a wonderful short read. you wouldn’t expect it to build up tension because of it’s length but it really does keep you on the edge of your seat the whole time.

Content Warnings