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yvo_about_books's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
4.75
Finished reading: April 19th 2024
"Oh, how we all complain about the sleepless nights when our kids are little. But when the monsters under the bed turn out to be real, we're the ones who have nightmares."
*** A copy of this book was kindly provided to me by Netgalley and Orenda Books in exchange for an honest review. Thank you! ***
I've been a fan of Johana Gustawsson's writing ever since I started reading the Emily Roy & Alexis Castells series. All three books blew me away, and I've been looking forward to read more of her books ever since. Add the fact that I have a weak spot for a gothic thriller with a remote and spooky setting, and I've been highly anticipating my time with Yule Island. To say that this story didn't let me down is probably the understatement of the year... It's a gloriously atmospheric read with a set of twists that hit me with a sledgehammer. WHAT a read!
I'm going to keep this review short, because Yule Island is one of those books where it's best to go in blind and let the author take you on a journey. Johana Gustawsson is a master at crafting the most intricate plot that will completely lead you astray, only to hit you with twists that will make your jaw drop to the floor. The 'holy guacamole' is most definitely back! There was a certain point at the 70% mark or so that had me literally staring at the page, unable to believe what I had just read. I love it when an author is able to completely turn the plot on its head and make me doubt everything I thought was true about a story!
If you like a well written and atmospheric setting, you are definitely in for a treat with the Storholmen island. The remoteness, the mansion and its secrets, the brutal crime that happened right outside... It's such a perfect backdrop for a gothic thriller, and its descriptions truly enhanced the reading experience for me. I also loved the incorporation of Norse mythology and references to Viking culture, which is an element I can always appreciate and it was fascinating how it was woven into the plot.
Yule Island uses a multiple POV structure, but it is easy enough to keep them all apart and follow their stories. The characters are all flawed and have their secrets, but somehow it is still quite easy to warm up to them or at least be intrigued by what they are hiding. The way the plot is woven together is simply sublime, and it's impressive just how successfully the author is able to completely mislead the reader along the way. Especially the second half is explosive and simply impossible to put down, and I loved every single moment of the journey.
It comes as no surprise when I say that I have no doubt that Yule Island will appear on my list of 2024 favorites, and I can highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys highly atmospheric and cleverly constructed gothic thrillers. A word of thanks to David Warriner is also in order for the flawless translation, enabling me to read this French masterpiece.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child abuse, Kidnapping, Self harm, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Violence, Murder, Vomit, Abandonment, Addiction, Blood, Cancer, Car accident, Child death, Classism, Confinement, Alcoholism, Body shaming, Emotional abuse, Gore, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Animal death, Death, Gaslighting, Mental illness, and Sexual harassment
twicomb's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
4.0
Recipe For a Dark Holiday Read: take this book on winter vacation in a snowy cabin in the woods, and read with a big mug of steaming coffee and a plate of crispy Swedish vaniljkakor (vanilla cookies).
It's a twisty whodunnit set on a remote island of Sweden, where the answers that art appraiser Emma Lindahl is searching for may be closer than she realizes. But on Storholmen, nothing is at it seems, and as the nights grow longer and the snow grows deeper, she's going to discover that her sister's long-ago death on this very same island is at the center of a bloodcurdling series of murders that are still going on today.
I'm a fan of great thriller novels. I like them confusing, mysterious, and not too gory. This title does a good job of satisfying on all those counts. It did get a little *too* twisty in some places...I found myself getting confused a few times while trying to follow all the events, keep track of varying timelines, and multiple characters. It doesn't help that these are often presented without clarifying information about the dates or locations (in order to keep twists more of a surprise when revealed), but until you get to those twists, you just find yourself a bit muddled as to what's going on. But the overall pace of the book kept moving along well enough for me to remain interested. The ultimate reveal was...without going into spoilers, I'll just say that I would have liked more "why" behind what happened. Why was this thing done? Why did that person make that decision? We find out the Who, What, Where, and When...but never really the Why. That irked me a little since if you're going to read an entire book about a series of terrible murders, you expect there to be some payoff explaining why it all happened. But nonetheless, I enjoyed the journey and the twisty turns along the way.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this eARC for unbiased review.
It's a twisty whodunnit set on a remote island of Sweden, where the answers that art appraiser Emma Lindahl is searching for may be closer than she realizes. But on Storholmen, nothing is at it seems, and as the nights grow longer and the snow grows deeper, she's going to discover that her sister's long-ago death on this very same island is at the center of a bloodcurdling series of murders that are still going on today.
I'm a fan of great thriller novels. I like them confusing, mysterious, and not too gory. This title does a good job of satisfying on all those counts. It did get a little *too* twisty in some places...I found myself getting confused a few times while trying to follow all the events, keep track of varying timelines, and multiple characters. It doesn't help that these are often presented without clarifying information about the dates or locations (in order to keep twists more of a surprise when revealed), but until you get to those twists, you just find yourself a bit muddled as to what's going on. But the overall pace of the book kept moving along well enough for me to remain interested. The ultimate reveal was...without going into spoilers, I'll just say that I would have liked more "why" behind what happened. Why was this thing done? Why did that person make that decision? We find out the Who, What, Where, and When...but never really the Why. That irked me a little since if you're going to read an entire book about a series of terrible murders, you expect there to be some payoff explaining why it all happened. But nonetheless, I enjoyed the journey and the twisty turns along the way.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this eARC for unbiased review.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Kidnapping, Blood, and Murder
Minor: Dysphoria, Torture, and Animal death
thesapphiccelticbookworm's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Child abuse, and Murder
Moderate: Grief, Kidnapping, and Violence
shelfofunread's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
Having previously enjoyed both the contemporary Roy and Castells series and The Bleeding, Johana Gustawsson’s first foray into historical gothic, I was excited to see that her latest novel, Yule Island, combined the two genres to offer a contemporary gothic thriller set amidst the darkness of a Scandinavian winter.
The first in what promises to be a new series of mysteries set in and around the Lidingö archipelago, Yule Island follows art expert Emma Lindahl as she travels to the island of Storholmen to appraise the antiques of the reclusive – and fabulously wealthy – Gussman family . The small, close-knit, and seemingly friendly community of Storholmen has been rocked by the recent discovery of ‘the woman in the ice’: a young woman whose death appears to have some concerning parallels to the ritualistic murder of ‘the hanging girl’ nine years previously.
Before long Emma’s appraisal of the Gussman’s artefacts has turned up more secrets. Determined to uncover the truth, she joins forces with Detective Karl Rosen to discover what the Gussman family have to hide. But nothing on Storholmen is quite as it seems and, with both Emma and Karl keeping their true interest in the case from each other, it isn’t long before their investigations plunge them in a tangled web of horrifying secrets, Viking rituals, and tainted lore.
As with Gustawsson’s previous novels, Yule Island is not for the faint-of-heart. Although never gratuitous, the ritualistic nature of the killings mean that there is some fairly graphic imagery at times and, later on in the novel, there is a disturbing scene that features ritualistic abuse of a minor, as well as mentions or descriptions of kidnap/torture, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, and alcoholism.
Despite the dark themes, Yule Island elicits empathy for its characters and admiration for its setting. Ably translated from the French by David Warriner, the writing is tight, pacy, and precise, with vivid descriptions of Storholmen and its surroundings. The warmth and friendliness of the community living in and around the archipelago really comes across on the page, as does the natural beauty of the island and its wider surroundings.
Similarly, although neither character is without their flaws, I found myself warming to both Emma and Karl as well as to Viktoria, the third of the novel’s narrators. Each has their own unique perspective on the case – and their own secrets – and weaving together the relationship between their different narratives provided more than one jaw-dropping twist!
Talking of twists, there were a couple of times when I was genuinely floored by the revelations Gustawsson expertly reveals. Talk about did not see that coming!! That said, my only critique of the novel is that one of the twists – which I shall not, of course, reveal here – stretched the grounds of plausibility a little bit too much for me. Not to the extent that my overall enjoyment of the novel was impacted but enough to make me question the rigour of the standards for holding public office in the novel’s version of Sweden!
That one, very minor niggle, aside however, I raced through Yule Island. I loved the way in which Gustawsson grounded the threads of the story in Norse mythology, and admired her masterful control of the various interweaving story strands and timelines. The conclusion to the mystery was satisfying but also left me wanting more of these characters so I can’t wait to see where the series goes next!
Packed with mystery and suspense, Yule Island hits the ground running and doesn’t let up until the final page. For fans of Gustawsson, this is the perfect blend of her previous work: a ‘greatest hit’ that combines the forensic thrills of the Roy and Castells series with the gothic stylings of The Bleeding. For fans of Scandinavian noir more generally, this is the perfect entry point to the work of a talented and compulsively readable writer.
NB: This review also appears on my blog at https://theshelfofunreadbooks.wordpress.com as part of the blog tour for the book. My thanks go to the publisher for providing a copy of the book in return for an honest and unbiased review.
The first in what promises to be a new series of mysteries set in and around the Lidingö archipelago, Yule Island follows art expert Emma Lindahl as she travels to the island of Storholmen to appraise the antiques of the reclusive – and fabulously wealthy – Gussman family . The small, close-knit, and seemingly friendly community of Storholmen has been rocked by the recent discovery of ‘the woman in the ice’: a young woman whose death appears to have some concerning parallels to the ritualistic murder of ‘the hanging girl’ nine years previously.
Before long Emma’s appraisal of the Gussman’s artefacts has turned up more secrets. Determined to uncover the truth, she joins forces with Detective Karl Rosen to discover what the Gussman family have to hide. But nothing on Storholmen is quite as it seems and, with both Emma and Karl keeping their true interest in the case from each other, it isn’t long before their investigations plunge them in a tangled web of horrifying secrets, Viking rituals, and tainted lore.
As with Gustawsson’s previous novels, Yule Island is not for the faint-of-heart. Although never gratuitous, the ritualistic nature of the killings mean that there is some fairly graphic imagery at times and, later on in the novel, there is a disturbing scene that features ritualistic abuse of a minor, as well as mentions or descriptions of kidnap/torture, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, and alcoholism.
Despite the dark themes, Yule Island elicits empathy for its characters and admiration for its setting. Ably translated from the French by David Warriner, the writing is tight, pacy, and precise, with vivid descriptions of Storholmen and its surroundings. The warmth and friendliness of the community living in and around the archipelago really comes across on the page, as does the natural beauty of the island and its wider surroundings.
Similarly, although neither character is without their flaws, I found myself warming to both Emma and Karl as well as to Viktoria, the third of the novel’s narrators. Each has their own unique perspective on the case – and their own secrets – and weaving together the relationship between their different narratives provided more than one jaw-dropping twist!
Talking of twists, there were a couple of times when I was genuinely floored by the revelations Gustawsson expertly reveals. Talk about did not see that coming!! That said, my only critique of the novel is that one of the twists – which I shall not, of course, reveal here – stretched the grounds of plausibility a little bit too much for me. Not to the extent that my overall enjoyment of the novel was impacted but enough to make me question the rigour of the standards for holding public office in the novel’s version of Sweden!
That one, very minor niggle, aside however, I raced through Yule Island. I loved the way in which Gustawsson grounded the threads of the story in Norse mythology, and admired her masterful control of the various interweaving story strands and timelines. The conclusion to the mystery was satisfying but also left me wanting more of these characters so I can’t wait to see where the series goes next!
Packed with mystery and suspense, Yule Island hits the ground running and doesn’t let up until the final page. For fans of Gustawsson, this is the perfect blend of her previous work: a ‘greatest hit’ that combines the forensic thrills of the Roy and Castells series with the gothic stylings of The Bleeding. For fans of Scandinavian noir more generally, this is the perfect entry point to the work of a talented and compulsively readable writer.
NB: This review also appears on my blog at https://theshelfofunreadbooks.wordpress.com as part of the blog tour for the book. My thanks go to the publisher for providing a copy of the book in return for an honest and unbiased review.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder
Moderate: Torture, Kidnapping, Child abuse, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Self harm, Physical abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Body horror, and Animal death
Minor: Alcoholism, Alcohol, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Pedophilia, and Sexual content
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