Content Warnings: Murder, violence, domestic and child abuse, neglect, sexual abuse, sexual situations, alcoholism, suicide

4.5, this was such a wild ride. I’m SO glad I decided to do the audiobook. I originally chose that method because of how long the book was. I figured this would be the perfect book to listen to while I worked from home during quarantine. Spoiler alert: I was right.

Every time I turned it on, I didn’t want to turn it off. The narrator did a great job of distinguishing between characters and brought just the right amount of creepiness to the audio. Sound effects, whispers, multiple character voices. Oh yes that narrator definitely did THAT.

Plot wise, I don’t want to give a lot away, but I’ll give ya’ll the basics. Christopher Reese and his mom Kate escape from her shitty and abusive boyfriend, Jerry, in the middle of the night. They drive halfway across the country to start a new life and all Christopher wants is for his mother to be happy. He knows they don’t have a lot of money and he knows she wants to give him everything. All he wants is to be able to read, stop feeling so stupid, and make his mom’s life a bit easier. A new school and a fresh start should help with all that right? NOPE. Things get exponentially worse when Christopher disappears after school and is missing for 6 days. His mother is at her wits end, the sheriff has no idea where and how the hell this little boy disappeared and then suddenly…a young Christian girl named Mary Katherine finds him when she….well the important part is that she finds him. Christopher has no idea where he disappeared, why, or what happened while he was gone. What he does know is suddenly he can read, he’s smarter than the other kids in his class, he can see between people’s words and he can’t get rid of his constant headaches. He also knows that something bad is going to happen and he may be the only person who can stop it.

DUN DUN DUUUUUUUUUUN

Okay, so that’s all I’m giving you and trust me that’s all you need for now. There are so many twists and turns in this book it was crazy. I’ve seen some people say that it was too long, but in my opinion the length didn’t bother me. I was never bored while listening and once things really get moving, everything starts to snowball. All of the events are connected whether you realize it or not, just like all of the characters. I loved the relationship between Christopher and Kate, as well as Christopher and his friends. They all really love each other and that comes through in the events of the book. They definitely stick together and with what they’re facing, they certainly need it. I could especially feel the desperation when we switched to Kate’s POV. I felt so bad for her because you could tell she wanted nothing more than to help and understand her son. A lot of elements in this book not only tugged at my creepiness meter, but also at my heartstrings. I’ll admit this may not have been the book for everyone, but it was definitely the book for me.

Some things did frustrate me, like the way the adults acted at certain times. For instance, It’s clear that Christopher has dyslexia. I’m not entirely sure what the timeframe for this book was (I may have missed that tidbit), but I’m fairly certain that people knew and understood what learning disabilities were. Why was this never explained to Christopher or pointed out by the adults? And once Christopher came back from the woods drastically changed, WHY DID NO ONE NOTICE AND SAY HOLD THE HELL UP WHAT IS GOING HERE? There were a lot of coincidences and strange occurrences that couldn’t be explained and no one seemed to want to call attention to them. Also, I know I said the length didn’t bother me, and it didn’t, but I’ll admit that sometimes things did get presented in a roundabout way.

Overall I had a great experience reading this book and I think that the audiobook was a great decision on my part. If you like extremely weird and creepy reads, check this out. Just be sure to pay attention to my content warnings above because things do get disturbing and graphic.