Hope

"We all live in a kind of continuous dream,” I told him. “When we wake, it is because something, some event, some pinprick even, disturbs the edges of what we’ve taken as reality.”

1) This book definitely lives up to the hype. 2) AGHHH I wish I didn't listen to the audiobook. The narrator felt so calm and objective that it really took away from how everything was spiraling around her in such a confusing way, which is what the best part of this book is. I get that she's a biologist, and her accepting what's happening to her and around her is part of what's so appealing, but the writing style already reflects that, so the bland voice of the narrator just made it feel really one note. Which really sucks, cause I think if I had read this instead of listening to the audiobook it would have been a 5 star for me. I think I'll probably re-read it on my kindle next year.

When you see beauty in desolation it changes something inside you. Desolation tries to colonize you.

Anyways, this short book packs a punch. The book takes place in Area X, in which an expedition group of scientists enter in order to explore it. The group consists of the psychologist, the surveyor, the anthropologist, and our MC, the biologist. This is only the second book I've read where none of the character's get names, only titles, and just like with Nightbitch, I thought it was really effective. Because we're not getting to know the characters, their only importance is their role, and other than that they serve as a vessel for the reader to gain context about this strange area they're in. Even The Biologist's most important and prominent traits are somehow related to her being a biologist, which we see a lot when she reflects on her and her husband's relationship.

I am just the biologist; I don’t require any of this to have a deeper meaning.

The book is so short and the plot is so... weird... that saying anymore will ruin the fever dream-like quality of slowly delving into this universe and uncovering it's secrets, so I think it's best to go into this one as blind as possible.

Summary: it's giving cosmic alien biologist major wet dream. Love it.

The longer we stay in this bathroom, the tighter the tension grows. It will not hold forever. Sooner or later, something is going to break.

Something or someone.

Okay, so this was nothing mind blowing, per say, but it was short and sweet and, I thought, pretty interesting. I understand it's really hard to write something with a lot of depth when your characters are not just isolated in general, but stuck in a single, small room for the whole book. Considering the setting, I thought the slow build of dread and that fever dream feeling were pretty good.

If they hate each other so much, they should just kill themselves, do the whole world a favour.

This book takes place in a small bathroom for it's entirety, Mel and her mother, father, and younger brother taking shelter when a tornado warning is sent out. We quickly learn that her mom and dad are not happy together, and her dad is quite the asshole.

I hadn't confessed the deep shame I felt being my father's daughter.

That's right, calling all my "bad ending: you're your father's daughter" girlies. Anyways, a fucking tree crashes through their roof and traps them in their bathroom. Sucks to suck, but insurance will cover it and help will come when the storm ends, right? Well, as Mel starts worrying about something her and her friend Amy did and no help comes, we learn it may not be as simple as that. Did her and Amy do something to cause this? And, what even is this?

Trying to remember the ritual now gives me a headache, or maybe I already had a headache. Starvation is rotting me from the inside out.

Her reminescing about her and Amy's relationship was the weakest part, I think. I love me some queer horror, us gals can get freaky, but it didn't really make me go "omfgggg" like I think the author wanted it to. It had potential, but didn't quite reach it.

If worms burst from her mouth I would greedily slurp them down my own throat and ask for seconds. Nothing that belonged to her would ever be repulsive in my eyes.

I mean, never mind "would you still love me if I were a worm," THAT'S what I call love, lmao.

Anyways, you've got isolation, rituals, body horror, family horror, (spoilers) cannibalism, and a slow but eventual descent into madness. It wasn't a masterpiece, but I thought it was pretty a'ight, not sure why the rating is so low. It could've probably been a little freakier, and the ending definitely felt like a bit of a cop out. However, when I flipped to the last page of text, ngl it did send a bit of a shiver down my spine, it sent me back to my creepypasta days. Considering how short it was, it was worth the read.

"What if it wasn't me who was really dead all this time? What if something else was inside me, and that's what was dead?"

This book was so hyped, and my favourite horror trope ever is isolation horror, especially if it's cold/wintery vibes. It ticked isolation, cold, abduction, survival, slasher, creature feature.

So how did it have so many awesome elements and still ended up just being a little meh to me? I'm really not sure. The audiobook was good, so I don't think that's at fault, I can't exactly pinpoint it. It was still good, but I feel like I was really disappointed that the creature felt really one note and wasn't as involved as I thought it would be. I was REALLY hoping that there would be some metaphor about her being the monster and she needed to turn into it to get away from her husband or something, but nope, it was just a big furry thing in the woods :p

If you're a thriller fan looking to get into horror, this is a great book to get you started, since it kind of read like horror disguised as a thriller. There was nothing I disliked about the book other than the monster never being described/explained (sometimes that works really well, but it worked against it in this case, it just felt kinda like a cop out), but it's still an interesting combo of tropes.