Krystal Sutherland
Publishing date - 6th April 2021
Seventeen-year-old Iris Hollow has always been strange. Something happened to her and her two older sisters when they were children, something they can’t quite remember but that left each of them with an identical half-moon scar at the base of their throats.
Iris has spent most of her teenage years trying to avoid the weirdness that sticks to her like tar. But when her eldest sister, Grey, goes missing under suspicious circumstances, Iris learns just how weird her life can get: horned men start shadowing her, a corpse falls out of her sister’s ceiling, and ugly, impossible memories start to twist their way to the forefront of her mind.
As Iris retraces Grey’s last known footsteps and follows the increasingly bizarre trail of breadcrumbs she left behind, it becomes apparent that the only way to save her sister is to decipher the mystery of what happened to them as children.
The closer Iris gets to the truth, the closer she comes to understanding that the answer is dark and dangerous – and that Grey has been keeping a terrible secret from her for years.
Iris has spent most of her teenage years trying to avoid the weirdness that sticks to her like tar. But when her eldest sister, Grey, goes missing under suspicious circumstances, Iris learns just how weird her life can get: horned men start shadowing her, a corpse falls out of her sister’s ceiling, and ugly, impossible memories start to twist their way to the forefront of her mind.
As Iris retraces Grey’s last known footsteps and follows the increasingly bizarre trail of breadcrumbs she left behind, it becomes apparent that the only way to save her sister is to decipher the mystery of what happened to them as children.
The closer Iris gets to the truth, the closer she comes to understanding that the answer is dark and dangerous – and that Grey has been keeping a terrible secret from her for years.
I picked this book up on a whim because it was on the Waterstones buy one get one half price table and it was signed by the author. This is very different from my usual reads and it has made me realise it is a genre I want to explore more.
We learn early on that two of the three sisters are LGBT, so it was lovely to see sapphic representation in a novel without any love interests.
I found the plot spooky but not scary. The majority of the scary aspects of the novel happened in the last 50 pages. I'm not a horror fan and i found the scary aspects very manageable. Leading to me believing this is an appropriate horror book to give to young teens who like horror. As the gore was not too intense. This aim towards younger audiences also made it great for people who are worried about the horror genre.
I personally didn't find there to be any plot twists. I worked out all reveals a page or so before the characters did however, I think this was a choice by the author and I don't think the plot reveals where meant to be too shocking. As ultimately this book was an incredible exploration of grief specifically the grief that comes from familial loss. This obviously means that the books comes with trigger warnings for suicide, kidnapping, and death of a loved one. However nothing was gone into graphic detail but if you are very sensitive. This is not the book for you
What made the book so special was the incredible characters. I really felt for all of them even those who were unlikeable. Everyone was morally ambiguous therefore the characters get very realistic inside a very fantastical plot and they really grounded the novel.
I read this book in two days. It was an easy 5 star read. I would recommend it to everyone even those who, like me, don't read horror novels.
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