Reviews

2023 March Reading Challenge
Prompt: read a book written by a female or nonbinary author

cw/tw: animal death, child abuse, gaslighting, abelism/ableistic language, racism/racist language

Holy shit. Holy. Fucking. SHIT.

I don't even know where to begin or what to even say. This book absolutely blew me away, along with my half-baked expectations. I thought I was gonna get the usual Gothic haunted house story, but fucking hell I got more than that. I won't say this is the greatest Gothic horror book ever, but its definitely up there with The Animals at Lockwood Manor as one of my top faves.

The pacing was solid, the writing was great, the story was insane without being overly convoluted, the twists and turns were insane, and the horror was so strong. I never, ever want a wooden figurine anywhere near my house, EVER. I have no idea how this woman made figurines scarier than dolls, nor how splinters can be so disturbing, but holy shit she did it.

But above all else, what this book succeeded in doing is showing the horrors of gaslighting, abuse, trauma, and isolation. Dear God, this book was so difficult to read because if you take away the horror elements, so much of what happens in this book is possible and THAT is fucking terrifying.

There is so much more that could be said, but I'm leaving it at that. This book blew my expectations out of the water and is now a contender for my favorite horror book. I highly recommend, but pay mind to the cw/tw I posted at the beginning.