I’m sharing another instalment of my Mini Review Mondays, the most recent of which was last week. In case you haven’t seen any of my previous posts, I do ‘mini’ reviews of books that I’ve previously read and am now ready to share my full thoughts about.
First up, I’d like to talk about Where Darkness Blooms by Andrea Hannah. Thank you to Wednesday Books for sending me an eARC in exchange for an honest review.
The town of Bishop is known for exactly two things: recurring windstorms and an endless field of sunflowers that stretches farther than the eye can see. And women—missing women. So when three more women disappear one stormy night, no one in Bishop is surprised. The case is closed and their daughters are left in their dusty shared house with the shattered pieces of their lives. Until the wind kicks up a terrible secret at their mothers’ much-delayed memorial.
With secrets come the lies each of the girls is forced to confront. After caring for the other girls, Delilah would like to move on with her boyfriend, Bennett, but she can’t bear his touch. Whitney has already lost both her mother and her girlfriend, Eleanor, and now her only solace is an old weathervane that seems to whisper to her. Jude, Whitney’s twin sister, would rather ignore it all, but the wind kicks up her secret too: the summer fling she had with Delilah’s boyfriend. And more than anything, Bo wants answers and she wants them now. Something happened to their mothers and the townsfolk know what it was. She’s sure of it.
Bishop has always been a strange town. But what the girls don’t know is that Bishop was founded on blood—and now it craves theirs.
Publication Date: 13th March
TW: rape, violence, abuse, death, murder, gaslighting, stabbing
My Thoughts:
Where Darkness Blooms oozes suspense and sinister vibes through its pitch black atmosphere and its maelstrom of personal and collective traumas.
I’m such a sucker for these types of books that are soaked in a supernatural, Gothic, eerie atmosphere. This is a book that just envelopes you in the smoke and the wind of Bishop. It hums with danger and death, creating an uneasy undercurrent from the start. It follows an intriguing slow burner of a mystery, deeply invested in personal connections and entanglements. Hannah creates such a full-blown and entirely immersive setting that really pulled me in. The imagery was so rich and detailed, allowing me to fully lose myself in the story. This is such an addictive and thrilling book, with twists and turns that left me shocked.
This is a book that delves into dark territory at times, so please consider the trigger warnings before reading. These are dealt with sensitively and with nuance. These traumas deeply inform each of the characters. They have such distinct voices, making it easy to follow which character was speaking at any given time. Over the entire course of the book, you feel yourself losing your heart to all of our protagonists and Hannah breaks it all over again. I also loved how interpersonal each of these stories were. Their relationships splinter, fracture and grow as the narrative unfolds. I also really appreciated the representation of mental illness, with anxiety, depression and post traumatic stress disorder. Hannah balances this and other heavy topics wonderfully.
Where Darkness Blooms is a haunting whisper of a book.
Next up, I’d like to talk about Enter the Body by Joy McCullough. Thank you to Dutton Books for Young Readers for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
“At once tender, poetic and ferocious, Enter The Body breathes new life into the Bard’s most tragic heroines. More than a tribute to Shakespeare, this kaleidoscopic, ambitious novel-in-verse gives Juliet, Ophelia, Cordelia, and Lavinia the chance to tell their own stories full of passion, justice, sisterhood, and love. Simply spectacular.”-Michael L. Printz Award winner Laura Ruby, author of Bone Gap
In the room beneath a stage’s trapdoor, Shakespeare’s dead teenage girls compare their experiences and retell the stories of their lives, their loves, and their fates in their own words.
Bestselling author Joy McCullough offers a brilliant testament to how young women can support each other and reclaim their stories in the aftermath of trauma.
Publication Date: 14th March
TW: sexual assault, violence, death, suicide, murder, blood, misogyny
My Thoughts:
Enter the Body is a phenomenal book that I cannot recommend enough.
This was an early contender for one of my favourite reads of this month. It was such a brilliant exploration of Shakespeare’s female characters, giving nuance and light to each of their stories. McCullough gives them the spotlight in this incisive, fierce and fantastic read. This is a fierce book that burns bright with anger and beauty. It is an ode to reclaiming your own narrative and shaping your destiny. McCullough does not shy away from the brutal realities and the trappings of fate that ensnare these characters. It is a world wrecked by patriarchal systems of oppressive powers and there is no way to entirely undo those systems through merely one story. Instead, we are left with a deep-seated rallying cry that reverberated through my bones.
I have often spoken about the emotional intensity I experience with verse writing. This is something that rang true once more here. It was visceral and raw, moving me deeply. You often forget just how much violence is inflicted on these characters, as you are so focused on the heroes of each narrative. The female voices are marginalised and silenced, something which modern adaptations are often combating in their stagings. You also often forget just how young these characters are meant to be. McCullough reminds you through devastating narrative stylings, from Juliet’s naivety to Ophelia’s hope. The flush of youth romanticises so much. However, everyone under this stage is so much younger than you would consider, given modern casting preferences. In Shakespeare’s time, longevity and expectations around age were so vastly different.
Enter the Body is a ferocious and fantastic read that everyone should pick up this year.
Finally, I’d like to delve into HappyHead by Josh Silver. Thank you to Oneworld Publications for sending me an eARC in exchange for an honest review.
We are in an epidemic. An epidemic of unhappiness.
Friends, here is the good news: HappyHead has the answer.
When Seb is offered a place on a radical retreat designed to solve the national crisis of teenage unhappiness, he is determined to change how people see him and make his parents proud. But as he finds himself drawn to the enigmatic Finn, Seb starts to question the true nature of the challenges they must undergo.
The deeper into the programme the boys get, the more disturbing the assessments become, until it’s clear there may be no escape.
Publication Date: 16th March
TW: indoctrination, homophobia, violence, torture, emotional abuse, physical abuse, blood, injury detail
My Thoughts:
HappyHead was a force of nature. Silver has smashed it out of the park with a tense, ominous and addictive thriller.
This book really hit home for me. In an environment where LGBTQ+ rights are increasingly under attack and the transphobic rhetoric in the media intensifies, this book is a gut punch. It solidifies our worst nightmares in a technicolour dystopia that slowly reveals its rotting corruption. This is a book that excels in its creeping dread. From the start, something feels off, but the true darkness is only revealed near the climax. Some of the scenes are shudder inducing. The tension just builds and builds to an unbearable point. These assessments get ever more sinister and you can feel the suspense start to thicken. This gives the book such fast pacing and personally made me speed through the pages.
You can also tell how much heart and soul Silver has poured into this book. His passion permeates every page. This intensifies the emotion and tension of each scene tenfold. For me, his Q & A at the end is a must read. It brought everything back to reality and how close to home this is. This is dystopia for now because it is so believable and scarily accurate to where we could be heading. This passion also extends into creating such nuanced and three-dimensional characters that I fell head over heels in love with. I cared about them deeply and felt every shocking twist rip through them, disrupting their relationships and revealing ulterior motives behind calculated actions. All I know for certain is that I need the next book in my life immediately.
HappyHead was an absolutely incredible read that sadly rings more true with every passing day. It reminds us to fight at all costs.
A Short Book Lover 
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