♡ Spooky Settings

♡ Great Representation

♡ Beautiful Writing Style

For the record the writing was beautiful in this book, C.G. Drews writing style was genuinely so gorgeous!  The representation in this book is also amazing.  It deals with things such as sexual identity, eating disorders, and mental health all of which are written so well.  Not to mention how stunning the cover of this book is which is the reason I looked into the synopsis in the first place.

However, having said that I didn’t really like this book.  Some of the horror parts felt like they didn’t mesh well with the rest of the story.  I feel like I’m missing something after reading the last few chapters.  The psychological horror vibes only appeared in the last quarter of the book.  I was expecting it to be a little more intense in the beginning, however, it was rather mundane.

Most of this book focuses on the main character, Andrew longing for his best friend, dealing with his sexual identity, and working on his self acceptance in general.  And while I enjoyed the importance of some parts of it, I just feel like it flopped.  For romance being a major part of the plot it felt lacking and boring to read.  I would love to have seen more desire or actual romance instead of the intense and to the main characters knowledge one sided pining. There were a few parts I thought were good but then I blinked and they were over.

The same thing seemed to happen with the horror/creepy aspects.  Something would happen but it never really went anywhere.  

The ending was especially disappointing.  I kept waiting for it to get better and it never did. The ending itself (without spoilers) was frustrating to piece everything together and honestly I’m still kinda confused as to what happened.  The hint that it all could be in Andrew’s mind or that the monster were real and no one but Andrew and Thomas knew about them?  The back and forth of that was just aggravating.

Either way, thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Spice Level: n/a

POV: Third Person

Release Date: 29, October 2024

Rep: Asexual (Main Character), Bisexual (Love Interest)