The Burning Girls – C.J. Tudor

Not to sound all “Annie Wilkes” but I am C.J. Tudor’s “number one fan”. I have read every single one of her books and have loved each. I love that she references Stephen King in most, if not all, of her books. The Burning Girls does not disappoint. What if your town were haunted by a tragic act that happened 500 years ago? This is what happens in Chapel Croft.

GoodReads Summary:

An unconventional vicar moves to a remote corner of the English countryside, only to discover a community haunted by death and disappearances both past and present–and intent on keeping its dark secrets–in this explosive, unsettling thriller from acclaimed author C. J. Tudor.

Welcome to Chapel Croft. Five hundred years ago, eight protestant martyrs were burned at the stake here. Thirty years ago, two teenage girls disappeared without a trace. And two months ago, the vicar of the local parish killed himself.

Reverend Jack Brooks, a single parent with a fourteen-year-old daughter and a heavy conscience, arrives in the village hoping to make a fresh start and find some peace. Instead, Jack finds a town mired in secrecy and a strange welcome package: an old exorcism kit and a note quoting scripture. “But there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed and hidden that will not be known.”

The more Jack and her daughter Flo get acquainted with the town and its strange denizens, the deeper they are drawn into their rifts, mysteries, and suspicions. And when Flo is troubled by strange sightings in the old chapel, it becomes apparent that there are ghosts here that refuse to be laid to rest.

But uncovering the truth can be deadly in a village where everyone has something to protect, everyone has links with the village’s bloody past, and no one trusts an outsider

Not a shock that I give this book 5 stars. It is a must read so make sure to add this to your TBR!! NOW!!! Do it!!!…. Please. 🙂

Golem – PD Alleva

First of a special thanks to PD Alleva for sending me this book in return for an honest review.

Y’all… THIS BOOK! I read a lot of horror genre and it is rare that a book scares me. This one definitely caused a couple of nights of checking shadows.

Amazon Summary:

A haunting tale of suspense, loss, isolation, contempt, and fear.

On November 1, 1951, war hero John Ashton was promoted to detective. His first assignment: find the district attorney’s missing daughter. But his only lead is Alena Francon, a high society sculptor and socialite committed to Bellevue’s psychiatric facility.

Alena has a story for the new detective. A story so outlandish John Ashton refuses to heed the warning. Alena admits to incarnating Golem, a demonic force, into her statue. A devil so profound he’s infiltrated every part of New York’s infrastructure. Even worse, he uses children to serve as bodily hosts for his demonic army, unleashing a horde of devils into our world. 

When Alena’s confidant, Annette Flemming, confirms the existence of Golem, John is sent on a collision course where fate and destiny spiral into peril, and the future of the human race hangs in the balance. 

The Devil Is In The Details!

Fans of The Silence of the Lambs, Clive Barker, John Connolly, old Stephen King, and Anne Rice will be fascinated by this edge of your seat psychological horror thriller with a story that rips out the heart of humanity and throws it on a slab to be feasted on.

If you do not believe in the Devil, you will after reading this book!

It is a definite add to you TBR list.

The Insect Room – Felicity Hughes

RELEASE DATE: FEBRUARY 15, 2022

Book Blurb: He took them in, but could they ever leave?

Lord Rupert Lacy gives Caz the creeps. But her hippie mother and dreamy younger sister have fallen for this act and accept his invitation to move in. While it’s a step up from living in a van, the dilapidated mansion scares Caz. As she explores its lonely corridors, she begin to suspect that the reclusive aristocrat is hiding a dark secret. Haunted by strange noises and bizarre dreams, Caz tries to warn her family. Only nobody is listening.

In thrall to Lord Lacy, her mum begins to believe that Caz is unhinged and need medicating. Increasingly desperate and isolated, the teenager feels compelled to take drastic action. Will it be enough to save them before it’s too late?

The Insect Room is a coming-of-age suspense that will keep you guessing right up until its shocking ending.

The Insect Room by Felicity Hughes was a fantastic debut! It was a thrill ride that was hard to put down and the ending had me questioning everyone. I loved the hint of inspiration from Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca. To me there is nothing better than reading about a creepy house and the creepy people that live there.

Thank you Felicity for allowing me to read your debut in exchange for an honest review.

This one definitely need to be added to your TBR list or just drop everything and read this one February 15th! You won’t regret it.

The Last House on Needless Street – Catriona Ward

What can I say… If the “King” of Horror and Suspense, Stephen King, recommends it you know it is a must read!!

I wasn't sure what to think of this book at first.  It had me texting my book buddies to see if they had read it so I could talk about it.  Unfortunately, they haven't read it.  But they are definitely adding this to their TBR because it was fantastic.  I loved the perspective of all the characters and it had me guessing from the start until the end when everything came together.  Highly recommend!

The Next Wife – Kaira Rouda

Thank you MB Communications and Thomas & Mercer for sending me this ARC! This book comes out May 1, 2021 and you NEED to pre-order this NOW!! If you are looking for a book that will keep you up at night with suspense, then this is the book for you.

Goodreads Summary:

There is no limit to the lies, suspicion, and secrets that can poison the perfect marriage in this twisting novel of suspense by USA Today bestselling author Kaira Rouda.

Kate Nelson had it all. A flourishing company founded with her husband, John; a happy marriage; and a daughter, Ashlyn. The picture-perfect family. Until John left for another woman. Tish is half his age. Ambitious. She’s cultivated a friendship with Ashlyn. Tish believes she’s won.

She’s wrong.

Tish Nelson has it all. Youth, influence, a life of luxury, and a new husband. But the truth is, there’s a lot of baggage. Namely, his first wife—and suspicions of his infidelity. After all, that’s how she got John. Maybe it’s time for a romantic getaway, far from his vindictive ex. If Kate plans on getting John back, Tish is one step ahead of her.

She thinks.

But what happens next is something neither Kate nor Tish saw coming. As best-laid plans come undone, there’s no telling what a woman will do in the name of love—and revenge.

I give this book 5 stars but it is really off the charts good. The Next Wife takes “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” to a whole other level! Holy Heck! This book has 3 very strong women and then there is John…. lol.. poor, poor John. He might be part of the success of his business but this poor guy is an idiot!

Loved this book and will definitely be picking up some of Kaira Rouda’s other books.

Nightmare – Chad Nicholas

If I had to review this book with one word it would be WOW! This is the debut novel for Chad Nicholas but you could never tell it. This is a twisty thriller with a little crime, a little horror and a whole lot of CREEPY. My favorite genres are Horror and Thrillers and this fit both perfectly.

Goodreads Summary:

Had it come back? No, it couldn’t have. He had buried it for good. Or at least that’s what Scott told himself. But what if it had? Was that why the scarecrow now watched him?

But the more Scott tries to ignore it, the more the evidence begins to pile up. So do the bodies. Because sometimes, the dead don’t stay buried. Sometimes the monster survives.

As the bodies mount, and the secrets of his past grow more haunting, Scott must do whatever it takes to save his family. But what if by doing so, they find out what happened all those years ago? What if they realize what he did?

Scott learns that there is no escape from his own past, or the crows that have crawled out of it. He can only watch, as his life is turned into a living nightmare.

Thank you Chad Nicholas for giving me the opportunity to read this debut and trusting in my honest review. I can’t wait to read all your future books!

The Drowning Kind – Jennifer McMahon

So I am kinda a HUGE fan of Jennifer McMahon’s. I have read ALL of her books, except for 3 and they are on my TBR list. She has a way with the creepy that only a handful can do well. The Drowning Kind definitely does NOT disappoint! This is scheduled for publishing April 6, 2021 so go ahead and pre-order this one!!!

Goodreads Summary:

Be careful what you wish for.

When social worker Jax receives nine missed calls from her older sister, Lexie, she assumes that it’s just another one of her sister’s episodes. Manic and increasingly out of touch with reality, Lexie has pushed Jax away for over a year. But the next day, Lexie is dead: drowned in the pool at their grandmother’s estate. When Jax arrives at the house to go through her sister’s things, she learns that Lexie was researching the history of their family and the property. And as she dives deeper into the research herself, she discovers that the land holds a far darker past than she could have ever imagined.

In 1929, thirty-seven-year-old newlywed Ethel Monroe hopes desperately for a baby. In an effort to distract her, her husband whisks her away on a trip to Vermont, where a natural spring is showcased by the newest and most modern hotel in the Northeast. Once there, Ethel learns that the water is rumored to grant wishes, never suspecting that the spring takes in equal measure to what it gives.

A haunting, twisty, and compulsively readable thrill ride from the author who Chris Bohjalian has dubbed the “literary descendant of Shirley Jackson,” The Drowning Kind is a modern-day ghost story that illuminates how the past, though sometimes forgotten, is never really far behind us.

This book is the equivalent of a rollercoaster and hang on because those dips and dives are big ones! If you have read my previous Jennifer McMahon reviews you will not be surprised that I give this:

The Kingdom – Jo Nesbo

Going to try to get back to my book reviews. 2020 has thrown me for a loop. I, however, have not stopped reading just taken a break on book blogging. So now I have a LOT of catching up to do. 🙂

Just finished The Kingdom by Jo Nesbo. Thanks NetGalley and Knopf Doubleday Publishing for allowing me to read this ARC. The publication date is November 11, 2020 so mark your calendars!

I have been slow to board the Nesbo train. This is only my second book I have read him. The first one I read was The Bat and I LOVED it!! The Kingdom was a little slow at first but definitely picked up.

Goodreads Summary:

Roy and Carl have spent their whole lives running from the darkness in their past, but when Carl finally returns to make peace with it, the two brothers are inexorably drawn into a reckoning with their own demons.

Roy has never left the quiet mountain town he grew up in, unlike his little brother Carl who couldn’t wait to get out and escape his troubled past. Just like everyone else in town, Roy believed Carl was gone for good. But Carl has big plans for his hometown. And when he returns with a mysterious new wife and a business opportunity that seems too good to be true, simmering tensions begin to surface and unexplained deaths in the town’s past come under new scrutiny. Soon powerful players set their sights on taking the brothers down by exposing their role in the town’s sordid history.

But Roy and Carl are survivors, and no strangers to violence. Roy has always protected his younger brother. As the body count rises, though, Roy’s loyalty to family is tested. And then Roy finds himself inextricably drawn to Carl’s wife, Shannon, an attraction that will have devastating consequences. Roy’s world is coming apart and soon there will be no turning back. He’ll be forced to choose between his own flesh and blood and a future he had never dared to believe possible.

This story has lots of twist and turns and ups and downs with these two brothers. They justify a lot of bad ideas but one thing that remains is they always have each others backs. This book is definitely worth putting on your TBR list.

The Invited – Jennifer McMahon

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this Advanced Reader Copy in exchange for an honest review.

I am an avid Jennifer McMahon fan and have read many of her books. All different, all suspenseful. The Invited is one that incorporates a haunting, building a new home and a touch of Ancestry.com. You might think it is a strange combination, but you will be surprisingly mistaken.

Goodreads Summary:

A chilling ghost story with a twist: the New York Times bestselling author of The Winter People returns to the woods of Vermont to tell the story of a husband and wife who don’t simply move into a haunted house, they start building one from scratch, without knowing it, until it’s too late . . .

In a quest for a simpler life, Helen and Nate abandon the comforts of suburbia and their teaching jobs to take up residence on forty-four acres of rural land where they will begin the ultimate, aspirational do-it-yourself project: building the house of their dreams. When they discover that this charming property has a dark and violent past, Helen, a former history teacher, becomes consumed by the legend of Hattie Breckenridge, a woman who lived and died there a century ago. As Helen starts carefully sourcing decorative building materials for her home–wooden beams, mantles, historic bricks–she starts to unearth, and literally conjure, the tragic lives of Hattie’s descendants, three generations of “Breckenridge women,” each of whom died amidst suspicion, and who seem to still be seeking something precious and elusive in the present day.

This book has many twist and turns, which if you have read any of my reviews in the past, you KNOW I LOVE!

Please, do yourself a favor and read The Invited. It might be your first Jennifer McMahon, but it definitely won’t be your last!

Marooned – James Schannep

When author James Schannep reached out to me to read his newest release, Marooned.  (Program note:  He reached out to me October 2018 and I have been so back logged I am just now getting to it.  sigh.. sorry James).  I was really excited.  This is a throwback to the Choose Your Own Adventure books I loved as a kid.  The book was masterfully done.  Everything flowed well no matter which choice you made.

 

Now for my big BUT…

 

This is a case of “It’s me, not you”.  I was not really a fan of the subject.  It was a little too Johnny Tremain meets Treasure Island for me.  I am, however, giving this book 4/5 stars because it is so well done.

Thank you James Schannep for allowing me to read your book in return for an honest review.  Keep up the good work!