C. J. Daley
As always, my endless thanks to Shortwave Media for the physical ARC.
A group of 7 students, 2 group leads, and 1 director head into the woods for a backpacking trip. 10 people. So how the hell do they set up camp on the first night with 11 total? Something is clearly wrong, but they all seem to remember each other like there isn’t an extra. Those in charge even remember everyone from the pre-trip dinner, but how could that be possible?
This is an incredibly simple, creepy, eerie premise. It’s also short, so it had to be all about atmosphere. Which can be quite hard to capture in so short a time. This is where I originally struggled personally. I was creeped out, and my brain was screaming “alien” but I didn’t necessarily feel that creeping unease. Truthfully, I did get really sick during the reading of this one, which prolonged the time it took to finish, so that could honestly be on me. The one singular thing that I still struggle with though is the author harping on them using a 10-seat passenger van. I just found it odd that the main character needed to grasp that as his holy ground for knowing. Coming from the times of being a teen while only one friend drove, only smushing in a single other person doesn’t feel farfetched to me. Two smaller women or men sharing a backseat? That could easily have explained it, but the author had the main character take the 10 seats as confirmation. And maybe there’s a point to that that I am simply missing, but I feel like a well placed sentence explaining it away would have helped. As the instructor, is he such a stickler for safety and rules that he’d never seat an extra person perhaps?
I also wouldn’t have said no to another 30 pages or so. I feel like we get snippets of the students, but not all of them, and maybe not necessarily deep enough to have a decision be made on who the extra was. And maybe with his prying, one of them would have thought to ask “why are you asking this?…I was talking with so and so and they said you asked them that too…” and that would have added a layer of tension more to the atmosphere. But again, perhaps that is the point—the author’s subversion, or even perversion, of expectations.
Mildly spoilery (but also not) below:
Now the real surprise for me comes from the ending. At first, I thought it was okay but rather simple. Now, NOW I can’t stop freaking thinking about it. They said only ten of them are leaving the woods no matter what, that was the decision. Who in their right mind (especially because they clearly aren’t) could make that call? How would you live with it, not knowing if you were really right or not? Did you do the right thing, or did you condemn the world, unleashing something that was never meant to leave those woods? Oh my god, I seriously can’t get it out of my head, and therefore, it’s continually grown on me. There’s no answers here, no comforting end. If you can’t trust your own mind, your memories, what else can’t you trust? Can’t we trust?
As always, my endless thanks to Shortwave Media for the physical ARC.
A group of 7 students, 2 group leads, and 1 director head into the woods for a backpacking trip. 10 people. So how the hell do they set up camp on the first night with 11 total? Something is clearly wrong, but they all seem to remember each other like there isn’t an extra. Those in charge even remember everyone from the pre-trip dinner, but how could that be possible?
This is an incredibly simple, creepy, eerie premise. It’s also short, so it had to be all about atmosphere. Which can be quite hard to capture in so short a time. This is where I originally struggled personally. I was creeped out, and my brain was screaming “alien” but I didn’t necessarily feel that creeping unease. Truthfully, I did get really sick during the reading of this one, which prolonged the time it took to finish, so that could honestly be on me. The one singular thing that I still struggle with though is the author harping on them using a 10-seat passenger van. I just found it odd that the main character needed to grasp that as his holy ground for knowing. Coming from the times of being a teen while only one friend drove, only smushing in a single other person doesn’t feel farfetched to me. Two smaller women or men sharing a backseat? That could easily have explained it, but the author had the main character take the 10 seats as confirmation. And maybe there’s a point to that that I am simply missing, but I feel like a well placed sentence explaining it away would have helped. As the instructor, is he such a stickler for safety and rules that he’d never seat an extra person perhaps?
I also wouldn’t have said no to another 30 pages or so. I feel like we get snippets of the students, but not all of them, and maybe not necessarily deep enough to have a decision be made on who the extra was. And maybe with his prying, one of them would have thought to ask “why are you asking this?…I was talking with so and so and they said you asked them that too…” and that would have added a layer of tension more to the atmosphere. But again, perhaps that is the point—the author’s subversion, or even perversion, of expectations.
Mildly spoilery (but also not) below:
Now the real surprise for me comes from the ending. At first, I thought it was okay but rather simple. Now, NOW I can’t stop freaking thinking about it. They said only ten of them are leaving the woods no matter what, that was the decision. Who in their right mind (especially because they clearly aren’t) could make that call? How would you live with it, not knowing if you were really right or not? Did you do the right thing, or did you condemn the world, unleashing something that was never meant to leave those woods? Oh my god, I seriously can’t get it out of my head, and therefore, it’s continually grown on me. There’s no answers here, no comforting end. If you can’t trust your own mind, your memories, what else can’t you trust? Can’t we trust?
Huge thanks to Scholastic Press for the physical ARC!
I started this one at the same time as listening to 80s Ghosts by V.S. Lawrence. It also features paranormal investigating, just like the opening of this one. I loved the old school feel with the camcorder and its almost Blair Witch opening scare. I really thought for a second I was going to have dueling ghost novels, but LSU quickly deviates, which really surprised me. I was drawn in by the title, the obvious Scooby Doo vibe, and I was not expecting this to become a slasher investigation story.
To address the elephant in the novel…this is not really Scooby Doo-like in my opinion. And it’s trying to be, which then became a problem for me, as I had trouble drawing comparisons. The title is of course a very typical SD trope and there’s a blurb chosen that specifically references SD as well. There are four friends investigating, and even a dog, although they don’t include the dog when in public. Two girls and two boys and when they meet the new girl they even guess her name might be Daphne. It just didn’t encapsulate that spirit of SD in the way I wanted. It tried to be a darker, more adult (more like teen) version, but with the truly great Meddling Kids out there, this was a hard one to live up to.
It is however, a perfectly easy and enjoyable read. There is suspense, tension, and even stakes with some flip-flopping Scream-esque twists. The description of the ghoul did feel very SD with its almost cartoon style blue glow and manor filled with hidden entrances and tricks. It also gave an updated, modern take with its male best friends turned boyfriends, but then again it all felt very easy. Not that every story needs the relationship (especially queer ones) to be this incredibly arduous and eggshell-walking experience, it just didn’t add much. They were pure in a novel that’s pretty dark, but then again, the friend group has a pureness to begin with.
I think I’d gladly read another to see how this develops, as there were some well thrown in red herrings, but as it stands I’d love the see the multiple POV take on a more necessary feel. Much of this novel felt a bit empty.
Huge thanks to Scholastic Press for the physical ARC!
I started this one at the same time as listening to 80s Ghosts by V.S. Lawrence. It also features paranormal investigating, just like the opening of this one. I loved the old school feel with the camcorder and its almost Blair Witch opening scare. I really thought for a second I was going to have dueling ghost novels, but LSU quickly deviates, which really surprised me. I was drawn in by the title, the obvious Scooby Doo vibe, and I was not expecting this to become a slasher investigation story.
To address the elephant in the novel…this is not really Scooby Doo-like in my opinion. And it’s trying to be, which then became a problem for me, as I had trouble drawing comparisons. The title is of course a very typical SD trope and there’s a blurb chosen that specifically references SD as well. There are four friends investigating, and even a dog, although they don’t include the dog when in public. Two girls and two boys and when they meet the new girl they even guess her name might be Daphne. It just didn’t encapsulate that spirit of SD in the way I wanted. It tried to be a darker, more adult (more like teen) version, but with the truly great Meddling Kids out there, this was a hard one to live up to.
It is however, a perfectly easy and enjoyable read. There is suspense, tension, and even stakes with some flip-flopping Scream-esque twists. The description of the ghoul did feel very SD with its almost cartoon style blue glow and manor filled with hidden entrances and tricks. It also gave an updated, modern take with its male best friends turned boyfriends, but then again it all felt very easy. Not that every story needs the relationship (especially queer ones) to be this incredibly arduous and eggshell-walking experience, it just didn’t add much. They were pure in a novel that’s pretty dark, but then again, the friend group has a pureness to begin with.
I think I’d gladly read another to see how this develops, as there were some well thrown in red herrings, but as it stands I’d love the see the multiple POV take on a more necessary feel. Much of this novel felt a bit empty.
Thanks to the publisher and netgalley for the audio ARC. This one was on my radar for a while, so I’m stoked I had the chance to bump it up my TBR.
I started this one at the same time as reading a paperback of Let’s Split Up by Bill Wood. It also opens up with a paranormal investigation, and even featured a camcorder, giving it that old school feel. I really thought for a second I was going to have dueling ghost novels, but LSU quickly deviated.
80s Ghosts features Chrissy Rodriguez, a down-on-her-luck paranormal investigator trying to make it big. I was so excited to get into this, and the parallels to my own ghost hunting story, BestGhost, made it even more enjoyable from the jump. Chrissy has the chance to investigate Merlin High with her crew, and although funds are already tight, she’s determined to make this work. A couple hotel room bookings later, they pack up into their very own Mystery Machine (a great nod IMO) and take off. As you can typically suspect in ghost hunting stories, there is not much discovery in the first couple nights. We get the set up, the backstory, the mystery, the tension, and maybe just the beginnings of a hint of haunting. And that’s just how I like it.
The novel has a bunch of nods to the 80s, some of which worked for me as a 90s kid as well. The overall description of how the kids acted back then, especially toward each other (something that I feel has certainly changed) kind of felt akin to Carrie. The mall scene brought back nostalgia for a time when cruising the various stores was the IT place to be. When pizza, a soda, and movies were only a couple bucks.
The novel is also unique in the sense that it blended a few things that are not typical for ghost hunting stories. Or at least I didn’t expect them. Chrissy has nightmares throughout that are part haunting/part clairvoyance, each one growing in intensity. There are multiple twists, not just ones including the spirits left behind, and it’s even a revenge story! While I did think to myself that they must have been some incredibly powerful ghosts to pull it all off, it’s certainly pulse pounding. There is redemption, a smidge of romance, character growth, and forgiveness. A lot of real life ghost hunting shows say they do it to help trapped spirits move on to the afterlife, and this one is no different…well except for the confirmed ghosts.
Great for fans of the 80s, Buzzfeed Unsolved/Ghost Files, and all things paranormal. It was nice to see someone follow a dream, even if it was at the stake of financial ruin, and it was nice to rope in Chrissy’s finding herself and acceptance.
Thanks to the publisher and netgalley for the audio ARC. This one was on my radar for a while, so I’m stoked I had the chance to bump it up my TBR.
I started this one at the same time as reading a paperback of Let’s Split Up by Bill Wood. It also opens up with a paranormal investigation, and even featured a camcorder, giving it that old school feel. I really thought for a second I was going to have dueling ghost novels, but LSU quickly deviated.
80s Ghosts features Chrissy Rodriguez, a down-on-her-luck paranormal investigator trying to make it big. I was so excited to get into this, and the parallels to my own ghost hunting story, BestGhost, made it even more enjoyable from the jump. Chrissy has the chance to investigate Merlin High with her crew, and although funds are already tight, she’s determined to make this work. A couple hotel room bookings later, they pack up into their very own Mystery Machine (a great nod IMO) and take off. As you can typically suspect in ghost hunting stories, there is not much discovery in the first couple nights. We get the set up, the backstory, the mystery, the tension, and maybe just the beginnings of a hint of haunting. And that’s just how I like it.
The novel has a bunch of nods to the 80s, some of which worked for me as a 90s kid as well. The overall description of how the kids acted back then, especially toward each other (something that I feel has certainly changed) kind of felt akin to Carrie. The mall scene brought back nostalgia for a time when cruising the various stores was the IT place to be. When pizza, a soda, and movies were only a couple bucks.
The novel is also unique in the sense that it blended a few things that are not typical for ghost hunting stories. Or at least I didn’t expect them. Chrissy has nightmares throughout that are part haunting/part clairvoyance, each one growing in intensity. There are multiple twists, not just ones including the spirits left behind, and it’s even a revenge story! While I did think to myself that they must have been some incredibly powerful ghosts to pull it all off, it’s certainly pulse pounding. There is redemption, a smidge of romance, character growth, and forgiveness. A lot of real life ghost hunting shows say they do it to help trapped spirits move on to the afterlife, and this one is no different…well except for the confirmed ghosts.
Great for fans of the 80s, Buzzfeed Unsolved/Ghost Files, and all things paranormal. It was nice to see someone follow a dream, even if it was at the stake of financial ruin, and it was nice to rope in Chrissy’s finding herself and acceptance.
Loved the cover immediately, so I am so thankful I was chosen as an arc reader. Thank you to Tor Nightfire for the physical copy.
Eco horror is on the rise, and the spores and fungus, the sporror, will come for us all! Us a FanFiAddict actually do a lot of talk about all things fungus, especially with Adrian M. Gibson’s debut of Mushroom Blues, and A.J. Calvin being a certified scientist-badass, we are a bunch of fun-gals and fun-guys. So I know several of us were eager to get our hands on this.
The author does a solid job with laying the scene. It’s slow, as it is the real world. People may go missing, but nothing supernatural happens here. That, and we may need a tad of atmosphere to built up. I enjoyed the idea of Erin Harper heading for a little work away from work. She tells her boss there’s a new hotspot on the rise, one they must cover before someone else does, but truly she wants to turn her journalistic feelers out for her photographer and friend, Hari’s podcast. When too many disappearances for one town come to light, could her brother possibly have been lost out there too?
I was a tad shaky on the followup, the build, and the climax. On the one hand, don’t we all love determination, perseverance, and overcoming odds? On the other, I found myself wondering why THESE characters were pushing so hard for this. Erin has her brother to think about, but their qualifications otherwise are that they are hikers? When one character said no and left, I was like hello, sensibility! But in all seriousness, when fungus hiveminds become real, you protect the townspeople.
The owner of the Airbnb Erin stays at really came to mind to me like Lisa Emery’s portrayal of The Dama in The Walking Dead: Dead City. All high collared and mighty, but then ready to get her hands dirty. And while at first I wasn’t loving the hivemind mushroom-fugue-state chapters, they grew on me more and more and the reaching mycelium or hyphae brought to mind that first runner you see at the neighbor’s house in HBOs The Last of Us…which is just chef’s kiss spooky stuff.
This is a good story and it’s not overly long. It’ll grip your attention and you can easily rip through it…if you can handle the rot, decay, water logged skin, and eerie, creeping mushrooms.
Loved the cover immediately, so I am so thankful I was chosen as an arc reader. Thank you to Tor Nightfire for the physical copy.
Eco horror is on the rise, and the spores and fungus, the sporror, will come for us all! Us a FanFiAddict actually do a lot of talk about all things fungus, especially with Adrian M. Gibson’s debut of Mushroom Blues, and A.J. Calvin being a certified scientist-badass, we are a bunch of fun-gals and fun-guys. So I know several of us were eager to get our hands on this.
The author does a solid job with laying the scene. It’s slow, as it is the real world. People may go missing, but nothing supernatural happens here. That, and we may need a tad of atmosphere to built up. I enjoyed the idea of Erin Harper heading for a little work away from work. She tells her boss there’s a new hotspot on the rise, one they must cover before someone else does, but truly she wants to turn her journalistic feelers out for her photographer and friend, Hari’s podcast. When too many disappearances for one town come to light, could her brother possibly have been lost out there too?
I was a tad shaky on the followup, the build, and the climax. On the one hand, don’t we all love determination, perseverance, and overcoming odds? On the other, I found myself wondering why THESE characters were pushing so hard for this. Erin has her brother to think about, but their qualifications otherwise are that they are hikers? When one character said no and left, I was like hello, sensibility! But in all seriousness, when fungus hiveminds become real, you protect the townspeople.
The owner of the Airbnb Erin stays at really came to mind to me like Lisa Emery’s portrayal of The Dama in The Walking Dead: Dead City. All high collared and mighty, but then ready to get her hands dirty. And while at first I wasn’t loving the hivemind mushroom-fugue-state chapters, they grew on me more and more and the reaching mycelium or hyphae brought to mind that first runner you see at the neighbor’s house in HBOs The Last of Us…which is just chef’s kiss spooky stuff.
This is a good story and it’s not overly long. It’ll grip your attention and you can easily rip through it…if you can handle the rot, decay, water logged skin, and eerie, creeping mushrooms.
I had the opportunity to listen to this one through the Indie Ink Awards and I’m super glad I did. The narration by Richard Pendragon was stellar—great voice work and depth of character.
This is an urban fantasy with spice, both things that usually aren’t for me, but this was done very well. I know it’s a rough comparison to make at this point as many people want nothing to do with them (myself included) but for me this was one of the most successfully integrated urban fantasy’s featuring an almost entirely secondary world since reading Harry Potter. In the same way The Soul’s Aspect by Mark Holloway captures the school essence from HP, Mawce has done so on our own city streets. Glamours or magically enhanced items do little tricks on human minds that keep them seeing “normal” things, but behind closed doors, the entire world is magic. And this is of course enhanced by the main character’s shop and home, the Belamour, being a magic entity itself!
It’s incredibly representative, with gay, bi, trans characters throughout—all in prominent roles that are NOT ruled by the inclusion of their orientation. And while sex scenes just are not my cup of tea in books, there was definitely a well built tension in the book leading up to the moment. For me though, maybe just a few less moments…as there are several.
There is also some disability and neurodivergent rep as well, with Mael suffering from autism and magical synesthesia. While the first made me think like wow, magical people from magical lands still deal with the same stuff as humans, the second felt like an even cooler blend. He can sense, picture, even see people’s magical aura through his synesthesia and I thought that was just one of the cleverest little twists ever. The rep in general is handled well by someone showcasing it (at least IMO) as it seemed to inform the character more than control them.
The plot itself involves a human, Leo, hiring Mael to help track down a stolen dragon egg. The dragon egg belongs to his niece, and it is a bond that is meant to secure her place in the magical world. This leads to some interesting investigating, although as Mael’s best friend, a vampire, is an actual magical cop, I almost found myself wishing for a little urban fantasy/crime fiction blend. As you can imagine, the amount of power and effort needed to steal an actual dragon egg means that whoever took it won’t give it up easily.
Regardless, there’s tension, there’s suspense, there’s action, and there is a hell of a lot of tenderness bled throughout this one. Absolutely worth checking out.
I had the opportunity to listen to this one through the Indie Ink Awards and I’m super glad I did. The narration by Richard Pendragon was stellar—great voice work and depth of character.
This is an urban fantasy with spice, both things that usually aren’t for me, but this was done very well. I know it’s a rough comparison to make at this point as many people want nothing to do with them (myself included) but for me this was one of the most successfully integrated urban fantasy’s featuring an almost entirely secondary world since reading Harry Potter. In the same way The Soul’s Aspect by Mark Holloway captures the school essence from HP, Mawce has done so on our own city streets. Glamours or magically enhanced items do little tricks on human minds that keep them seeing “normal” things, but behind closed doors, the entire world is magic. And this is of course enhanced by the main character’s shop and home, the Belamour, being a magic entity itself!
It’s incredibly representative, with gay, bi, trans characters throughout—all in prominent roles that are NOT ruled by the inclusion of their orientation. And while sex scenes just are not my cup of tea in books, there was definitely a well built tension in the book leading up to the moment. For me though, maybe just a few less moments…as there are several.
There is also some disability and neurodivergent rep as well, with Mael suffering from autism and magical synesthesia. While the first made me think like wow, magical people from magical lands still deal with the same stuff as humans, the second felt like an even cooler blend. He can sense, picture, even see people’s magical aura through his synesthesia and I thought that was just one of the cleverest little twists ever. The rep in general is handled well by someone showcasing it (at least IMO) as it seemed to inform the character more than control them.
The plot itself involves a human, Leo, hiring Mael to help track down a stolen dragon egg. The dragon egg belongs to his niece, and it is a bond that is meant to secure her place in the magical world. This leads to some interesting investigating, although as Mael’s best friend, a vampire, is an actual magical cop, I almost found myself wishing for a little urban fantasy/crime fiction blend. As you can imagine, the amount of power and effort needed to steal an actual dragon egg means that whoever took it won’t give it up easily.
Regardless, there’s tension, there’s suspense, there’s action, and there is a hell of a lot of tenderness bled throughout this one. Absolutely worth checking out.
Thanks to the author and Savage Realms Press for the eARC! This one sounded like it shared a sinister world with my own novel, so I was super intrigued. I really wanted to review by release day, and I was close, but I had some stuff come up.
Chapter one opens in the past, the kind of set up that may be labeled a prologue in SFF. It shows an event that would stain the town of Cedar Mills for years to come. It immediately feels like a tightly focused creature feature, which is one of my favorite horror subgenres. Then it shifts, giving the reader a mixture of POVs from high school kids to a disgraced detective. It’s a little strange at first, but the author ends up making it work.
This felt like the inverse of my own writing, where I mentioned supernatural but didn’t dive in, this one does it all. It’s a full on supernatural story that steps its toes into crime fiction. It’s a cool take on blending horror subgenres. That’s where this story really shined: the horrors. The creature, known as 43, whose description brought to mind Creature from the Black Lagoon, is a semi-aquatic badass—one that loves stabbing government agents in the head with its claws. And I even liked how the author gives us the full explanation of what it is by the end, spinning into an almost full blown scifi horror.
The trigger happy agents in this reminded me of the supernatural devision from When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy. Their no-loose-ends mentality actually causing more trouble by the end. The inclusion of innocent teenagers also added in a well done layer of emotion and heart to the novel. Regardless of any interwoven romance, four teen friends getting thrown into the deep end was an interesting take that felt kind of like its own thing. These weren’t slasher movie teens that feel and even look like adults, these were starry-eyed and screaming kids, grieving and just trying to make it out alive.
Great action, a scary beast, and a beating heart in the background, making this one a solid read!
Thanks to the author and Savage Realms Press for the eARC! This one sounded like it shared a sinister world with my own novel, so I was super intrigued. I really wanted to review by release day, and I was close, but I had some stuff come up.
Chapter one opens in the past, the kind of set up that may be labeled a prologue in SFF. It shows an event that would stain the town of Cedar Mills for years to come. It immediately feels like a tightly focused creature feature, which is one of my favorite horror subgenres. Then it shifts, giving the reader a mixture of POVs from high school kids to a disgraced detective. It’s a little strange at first, but the author ends up making it work.
This felt like the inverse of my own writing, where I mentioned supernatural but didn’t dive in, this one does it all. It’s a full on supernatural story that steps its toes into crime fiction. It’s a cool take on blending horror subgenres. That’s where this story really shined: the horrors. The creature, known as 43, whose description brought to mind Creature from the Black Lagoon, is a semi-aquatic badass—one that loves stabbing government agents in the head with its claws. And I even liked how the author gives us the full explanation of what it is by the end, spinning into an almost full blown scifi horror.
The trigger happy agents in this reminded me of the supernatural devision from When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy. Their no-loose-ends mentality actually causing more trouble by the end. The inclusion of innocent teenagers also added in a well done layer of emotion and heart to the novel. Regardless of any interwoven romance, four teen friends getting thrown into the deep end was an interesting take that felt kind of like its own thing. These weren’t slasher movie teens that feel and even look like adults, these were starry-eyed and screaming kids, grieving and just trying to make it out alive.
Great action, a scary beast, and a beating heart in the background, making this one a solid read!
This one is sadly a DNF at 84%. I usually am really against ratings or reviews if you (me) don’t read the full story. (If you aren’t me, please gladly do whatever you want!).
I received the audio to judge for the Indie Ink Awards, so I did really want to finish it in full. The narrator, Magnus Carlssen, did do a fantastic job. I wouldn’t say it was a struggle or anything, as I enjoyed a great deal of it, but there was definitely some issues, one of which, I could not come back from.
For one, I was asked to judge LGBTQ rep. Lago, our teenage main character, is announced as gay from the start. He paints his nails and has a female best friend he plays and swims naked with (because obviously he isn’t interested in her, we’re actually TOLD this), and he has a weirdly conservative dad even though we are set in a fantasy world? Other than that set up, the gayness of the character did little more than allow for some very overly depicted sex scenes.
That’s number two. We know this is a fantasy world and that our perceptions and morals and thoughts on age simply “don’t” exist there, but come on, clearly it was written in the real world. The sad but very real truth is teens do explore and have sex, but I do not want, need, or should have any involvement—and this author very clearly chose the age of his protagonist (much of the writing reads as very young adult) and then had MULTIPLE explicit scenes. In some aching, horrifying detail. While their world is described as not wholly accepting of gay people, Lago still manages to have a really weird one night stand in the middle of no where with a full grown man? Then the final scene made me throw in the towel. A character that is described as a 9ft tall immortal being, one that has already existed for time untold, has decided it’s okay to want to have sex with the teenager and then does. The character is very much so parts Beorn and Gandalf, Hagrid and Dumbledore, a wise and knowledgeable character I quite liked at first. But then he’s like those characters only if they were actually groomers.
Number three is the story itself. While the worldbuilding is interesting with the cataclysmic past that ended the ancient times making it feel as if this could be a primitive, yet futuristic and magical earth, every opportunity taken to build is entirely an info dump. Every single time. While it did make parts of the world feel super fleshed out and real, nothing ever seemed to come of it. Part one is basically all about Lago being a child and doing work, there’s not much there and it kind of does drag. Part two is basically Lago fulfilling his entire promise from the opening of the book, seeing as the author decides to subvert expectations by just making all of the characters important to the initial quest die. Part three goes into another subverted journey, but then it just becomes all about development and training, in the style you’d almost expect from a book two in a trilogy. This goes into the third part, where I decided I’d had enough. Lago uses his magical mask, which has only come to him specifically because the author decided to kill everyone else it belonged to, and it helps him change into a kind of half man half Timberwolf that seemingly just suffices to pay off as a sort of voyeuristic furry fantasy of some kind. The use of a teen and weird sex scenes felt almost exploitative and problematic even.
This one is sadly a DNF at 84%. I usually am really against ratings or reviews if you (me) don’t read the full story. (If you aren’t me, please gladly do whatever you want!).
I received the audio to judge for the Indie Ink Awards, so I did really want to finish it in full. The narrator, Magnus Carlssen, did do a fantastic job. I wouldn’t say it was a struggle or anything, as I enjoyed a great deal of it, but there was definitely some issues, one of which, I could not come back from.
For one, I was asked to judge LGBTQ rep. Lago, our teenage main character, is announced as gay from the start. He paints his nails and has a female best friend he plays and swims naked with (because obviously he isn’t interested in her, we’re actually TOLD this), and he has a weirdly conservative dad even though we are set in a fantasy world? Other than that set up, the gayness of the character did little more than allow for some very overly depicted sex scenes.
That’s number two. We know this is a fantasy world and that our perceptions and morals and thoughts on age simply “don’t” exist there, but come on, clearly it was written in the real world. The sad but very real truth is teens do explore and have sex, but I do not want, need, or should have any involvement—and this author very clearly chose the age of his protagonist (much of the writing reads as very young adult) and then had MULTIPLE explicit scenes. In some aching, horrifying detail. While their world is described as not wholly accepting of gay people, Lago still manages to have a really weird one night stand in the middle of no where with a full grown man? Then the final scene made me throw in the towel. A character that is described as a 9ft tall immortal being, one that has already existed for time untold, has decided it’s okay to want to have sex with the teenager and then does. The character is very much so parts Beorn and Gandalf, Hagrid and Dumbledore, a wise and knowledgeable character I quite liked at first. But then he’s like those characters only if they were actually groomers.
Number three is the story itself. While the worldbuilding is interesting with the cataclysmic past that ended the ancient times making it feel as if this could be a primitive, yet futuristic and magical earth, every opportunity taken to build is entirely an info dump. Every single time. While it did make parts of the world feel super fleshed out and real, nothing ever seemed to come of it. Part one is basically all about Lago being a child and doing work, there’s not much there and it kind of does drag. Part two is basically Lago fulfilling his entire promise from the opening of the book, seeing as the author decides to subvert expectations by just making all of the characters important to the initial quest die. Part three goes into another subverted journey, but then it just becomes all about development and training, in the style you’d almost expect from a book two in a trilogy. This goes into the third part, where I decided I’d had enough. Lago uses his magical mask, which has only come to him specifically because the author decided to kill everyone else it belonged to, and it helps him change into a kind of half man half Timberwolf that seemingly just suffices to pay off as a sort of voyeuristic furry fantasy of some kind. The use of a teen and weird sex scenes felt almost exploitative and problematic even.
Huge thanks to Flatiron Books for the physical ARC. I love the cover and colors and this was a cool one to receive.
This novel spans genres in a pretty solid and unique way. It’s deeply rooted in grief, with three of four best friends (whose names start with letters that make up The L.O.V.E. Club) dealing with the loss of the fourth. The story is shown through O, and she can’t really remember anything about what happened. That helps the author pepper in some mystery, and also allows for all the cards to not be present on the table at the start. Their love of video games, which is part of what brought them together, is exploited as they are all transported into their lost best friend, E’s, game-world. It kind of brought to mind the sequel/reboot of Jumanji, but that’s where the similarities stopped. That meshes scifi into the otherwise real-world Calendula, California, but then the levels of the video games present an almost fantasy-style layer on top of the settings the characters know from the world. This is also helped by L and V getting a bow and arrow and a sword, too. Then with the grief, and when some of the information about E comes to light, there is a tinge of horror there.
So there were some things in this that just didn’t work for me. While the bulk of this novel takes place in a video game, none of the actual descriptions of the levels felt like a video game to me. If anything, it could have been a portal fantasy and that might have been sold better. O’s gifted power is a notebook, as of course she is a writer. She is able to elicit help from L and V by writing out what they want to do, and while this may have actually been incredibly well done writing (as in an author pretending to write like a high schooler that thought they were a great writer) a lot of it was confusing and wordy, and seriously cringey. There is also a thread throughout about how much E loved flowers. While there is payoff for its inclusion in the end, as someone that doesn’t know about flowers, it felt like a chunk of this book was using descriptors that brought nothing to mind. Flower names used to enhance mentioned colors felt kind of forced and left me confused.
There were also things that continued to reel me in over and over in how well they were done. Calendula is a Chinese American suburb and the author does a great job of painting exactly what that means. The culture bled into everything around them, their intricacies and secrets, the dos and don’ts (if you will) that are (not so) quiet expectations, the challenges of thriving—or even surviving—there. It felt like a perfect glimpse into a world that wasn’t mine, and It was just enough. I’m all for the representation here as well. The layered in grief really hit for me. While the club had each other, E was truly O’s best-best friend. The kind of friendship where it’s hard to tell where one person begins and the other ends. So when she lost her, she just kind or crumbled, lost herself. I also thought it was clever to show how each girl was grieving separately, because each person carries it differently.
Then what really shone are the friendships. This author allows them to be natural, to be hectic, to be anything but cut and dry and nice and neat. They felt real, and every time they have some kind of revelation together I felt for them. The emotion described is powerful and felt almost like a tangible thing you could hold. These friends love each other. They have lost and they have grown. They may never be the same, but that’s still okay. The writing is imbued with a beautiful take on the world, even though their world is not wholly beautiful itself, and I loved the messiness. There are no even lines or comfy finishes here.
Huge thanks to Flatiron Books for the physical ARC. I love the cover and colors and this was a cool one to receive.
This novel spans genres in a pretty solid and unique way. It’s deeply rooted in grief, with three of four best friends (whose names start with letters that make up The L.O.V.E. Club) dealing with the loss of the fourth. The story is shown through O, and she can’t really remember anything about what happened. That helps the author pepper in some mystery, and also allows for all the cards to not be present on the table at the start. Their love of video games, which is part of what brought them together, is exploited as they are all transported into their lost best friend, E’s, game-world. It kind of brought to mind the sequel/reboot of Jumanji, but that’s where the similarities stopped. That meshes scifi into the otherwise real-world Calendula, California, but then the levels of the video games present an almost fantasy-style layer on top of the settings the characters know from the world. This is also helped by L and V getting a bow and arrow and a sword, too. Then with the grief, and when some of the information about E comes to light, there is a tinge of horror there.
So there were some things in this that just didn’t work for me. While the bulk of this novel takes place in a video game, none of the actual descriptions of the levels felt like a video game to me. If anything, it could have been a portal fantasy and that might have been sold better. O’s gifted power is a notebook, as of course she is a writer. She is able to elicit help from L and V by writing out what they want to do, and while this may have actually been incredibly well done writing (as in an author pretending to write like a high schooler that thought they were a great writer) a lot of it was confusing and wordy, and seriously cringey. There is also a thread throughout about how much E loved flowers. While there is payoff for its inclusion in the end, as someone that doesn’t know about flowers, it felt like a chunk of this book was using descriptors that brought nothing to mind. Flower names used to enhance mentioned colors felt kind of forced and left me confused.
There were also things that continued to reel me in over and over in how well they were done. Calendula is a Chinese American suburb and the author does a great job of painting exactly what that means. The culture bled into everything around them, their intricacies and secrets, the dos and don’ts (if you will) that are (not so) quiet expectations, the challenges of thriving—or even surviving—there. It felt like a perfect glimpse into a world that wasn’t mine, and It was just enough. I’m all for the representation here as well. The layered in grief really hit for me. While the club had each other, E was truly O’s best-best friend. The kind of friendship where it’s hard to tell where one person begins and the other ends. So when she lost her, she just kind or crumbled, lost herself. I also thought it was clever to show how each girl was grieving separately, because each person carries it differently.
Then what really shone are the friendships. This author allows them to be natural, to be hectic, to be anything but cut and dry and nice and neat. They felt real, and every time they have some kind of revelation together I felt for them. The emotion described is powerful and felt almost like a tangible thing you could hold. These friends love each other. They have lost and they have grown. They may never be the same, but that’s still okay. The writing is imbued with a beautiful take on the world, even though their world is not wholly beautiful itself, and I loved the messiness. There are no even lines or comfy finishes here.