Reviews with content warning for Blood - The Sanatorium

Holy moly, this book was a lunchbox letdown.

To start, it was unnecessarily long. A good edit could have cut 15-20% of the text and still maintained the story. The entire chapter on the protagonist using the Find My Phone app could have been two paragraphs, tops.

The story was also convoluted, and there were too many sub-plots. And the red herrings weren’t so much red herrings as the protagonist jumping to wrong conclusions, over and over again.

Worst of all, the villain’s motives were clichéd and out-of-the-blue.

The themes of trauma, guilt and complicated family were good and added depth to the characters. And there were other good themes and ideas in the book, but overall they were too disparate to come together into a cohesive story.

Content Warnings

elyssajoh's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.0

Content Warnings

starrysteph's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

This was a huge miss - especially considering the concept. I was prepared for atmospheric horror in isolation, and I got a boring, lengthy read.

The setting is a Sanatorium with a dark history (now converted into a modern hotel), hidden deep in the snowy mountains with shoddy cell service and avalanches barring escape. Sounds terrifying, right? Not here.

The pacing was maddeningly slow, the character development was nonexistent, and the men were walking red flags. The reason this is two stars instead of one is because I did appreciate some of the descriptive writing & as mentioned above, thought the concept was excellent.

Our main character, a detective dealing with lifelong panic attacks (starting with the death of her little brother as a child and amplified after a botched case), is shockingly inept. She does ... well .. just about everything wrong during her "investigation". And she is on the verge of tears throughout most of it, doubting herself and whining about her situation. I did not believe Elin was ever a detective (more like a casual true crime podcast listener).

Onto the mystery itself, which was painfully drawn out and filled with common tropes.

No spoilers, but the killer reveal and motivation was baffling. Totally far fetched - and the "clues" were ridiculous. Then, there's a tacked-on epilogue with a cliffhanger clearly intended to leave readers craving more Elin (it didn't work).

This should have been a super high stakes read, and the setting should have been actually utilized (why wasn't the Sanatorium given any characterization?). It's too bad.

CW: murder, death, medical trauma, child death, rape, panic attacks, abortion, kidnapping, confinement, force institutionalization, psychosis, mental illness, torture

Content Warnings

sabrinainbookland's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

The only reason I pick this book up is because it was a Reese’s book club pic. I always love her recommendations, so I always tried to give those books a shot. This one was no different.

The story was ok, the plot was a bit confusing at times, a lot of things happening al at once. I think it focus to much on the main character personal problems than on the mystery itself.
The main character we are following wasn’t the best. I think I hadn’t had enough time to like her or care if she was going to die in the book.

The writing was good and the scenery was very vived, with I liked quite a lot.

The epilogue was interesting and makes me questions if there will be a sequel to this story. Because it there isn’t , what was the point of the epilogue?

The plot wasn’t the best thing in the world but it did make me want to know what would happen in the end.

The ending was underwhelming and I honestly expected a lot more from this story considering that it was a Reese’s Book Club Pick.

This is a books that I would recommend if you like a mystery/thriller book that isn’t complicated to follow, with a small cast of characters and don’t mind if the paced of the book is moderate, not fast but also not painfully slow.

Content Warnings

More...