I have been given this book a while back and I have tried to read it on multiple occasions with no success. I have read a chapter at a time but haven’t been hooked and unfortunately will need to DNF it. I hope down the road when I am in the mood for this kind of book I can try picking it up again and giving it another go.

Skye has always been the knight in shining armor that her little sister Deirdre needed. After moving clear across the country, she hopes for a fresh start in their new, remote neighborhood, leaving behind the childish games she and her sister used to play for new friends. But Deirdre is being weirder than ever, fixated on the swampy stretch of woods behind their house and constructing terrifying and monstrous sculptures out of sticks and bones.

Then Deirdre disappears and one of her creatures, now animated by some unknown force, comes scratching at Skye’s window in the middle of the night. Skye knows that nothing will stop her from bringing Deirdre home, not her new friends, well-meaning parents or the secrets she’s been keeping. Although she tries to keep herself from getting wrapped up in the fantasy world her sister has created, she is eventually drawn into something dark, creepy and all-together unexpected.

Flashing between past and present, Here There Are Monsters by Amelinda Bérubé was dark and intriguing from the very start. Although this isn’t the type of book that I would normally read, I’m glad that I gave it a chance. I truly enjoyed the writing, even when it made it hard for me to leave the bed to just use the bathroom. It was just so creepy. Especially the creatures that Deirdre created - the descriptions of them gave me goosebumps every single time!

My biggest problem with the book was that I didn’t really care much for Skye or Deirdre. Skye was kind of awful and Deirdre wasn’t any better. I think most of the time, Skye used her sister being weird and needing protection as an excuse to get away with doing terrible things. Plus, for the whole first half of the book, she didn’t even care that her sister was missing. And Deirdre was so selfish and rude. She didn’t want Skye to have any friends outside of her. I’m all about co-dependency but this relationship was a bit much for me, even when they weren’t exactly speaking to one another anymore. Fortunately, I don’t need to unconditionally love a character to enjoy their story.

With good pacing and smooth writing, Here There Are Monsters was a quick and enjoyable read. I would definitely recommend it to fans of creepy atmospheres and thrilling dark tales. Especially ones about how easy it can be to get wrapped up in your own fantasy and how quickly those fantasies can become nightmares if allowed.

Started off well but got muddied down midway. Disjointed.

Also Skye is kind of the worst. I think it would have been better without her. Give me this story from Deirdre's perspective.

This Story is hard to wrap my head around there a lot to it and not everything is fully explained like was it some waking dreams those kids were having? I don't know, but I do know it creepy and it makes you think twice about going in the wood alone twice let alone with someone with you. The Author does a great job making the main character's sister seem creepy and a bit crazy like she needs some mental help. She also makes the main character not fully likable she herself is slightly on her crazy side and don't know how to take responsibility for her actions. Overall I really enjoy this creepy read that I wasn't fully sure of what in the world was going on.

This book was unexpected, but as I do not want to give away the ending, I will say that I found the characters to be realistic and compelling, and the story carried me along. It did not end as I was expecting, but that's a good thing, because the ending did give me a lot to think about. Overall, I think this is a good read that delves into the topics of mental health and the role of escapism in our lives.

Here There Are Monsters is not the worst book I read. There were too many things going on in this book. If it didn't have the monsters in it, this book would have been terrific as a young girl dealing with her missing sister and her own troubled past. Take out the older sister and this would have been a great fantasy that was about
a young preteen dealing with her imaginary world becoming real,. The writing was great just too many things happening.

The book is creepy and it's got the right horror factor but unfortunately I couldn't care about the characters and the book fell flat.
A well written book but not my cup of tea.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

[M]aybe the Queen of Swords ins't a monster. Maybe she never was. Maybe she just needed monsters to fight.

Thank you Netgalley and Sourcebooks Fire for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review! I am just going to take a moment here to talk about this absolutely amazing cover. A young girl with a terrifying and ritualistic mask - is it her head, is she wearing it? It is entirely the selling point for me, even if I have an interesting history with Sourcebook's young adult imprint.

Here There Are Monsters
by Amelinda Berube
Published Date: August 2019
Read Date: June 2019
Format: e-ARC
Genre: YA, Horror, Fantasy
Page Count: 352 Pages
Rating:  3.5/5 Moose

Synopsis 
The night of Halloween, Skye's younger sister Deidre goes missing. Deidre, who is weird and complicated and unable to adjust to their new town and new schools. Deidre, who has always preferred to live in fantasy worlds fighting monsters with her sister Skye, the Queen of Swords.

But Skye doesn't want to live in a fantasy world anymore. She has friends and a life, and wants to be normal. Yet Deidre keeps trying to pull her back in. So when she goes missing, Skye remains torn on finding her sister and trying to move on.

Until the monsters come for her.

Characters
Skye - The older sister who fell asleep early the Halloween night. She is also the Queen of Swords.

Deidre - The younger sister. She's picked on in school, and has gotten increasingly weird since her family has moved.

William - Skye's new friend and crush. Deidre considers him an outsider and doesn't like him.

Rants, Raves, and Reviews
I still don't know how I feel about this book. It has a strange structure, the main sisters are incredibly unlikable, and it takes nearly 50% of the book before the monsters show up. And yet, I still enjoyed it, I think?

The book opens with Deidre missing. Skye was supposed to be watching her, but she fell asleep incredibly early. (Did she actually fall sleep or was it some kind of magic? Who knows!) It is a great opening...that then goes into a flashback, thus cutting into all anxiety build up. It's just hard to worry about a missing girl when every other chapter is a flashback. This is also why it takes so long to get to the monsters, of course.

There is no one likable in this book. Okay, maybe William. But the base family? All terrible. The dad is forgettable, the mom is supposed to be disliked but is also a bit forgettable, and the two daughters are just horrible people, to each other, to everyone else, and to themselves. It is incredibly difficult to read. Seriously, Skye's sister is missing, and she's basically throwing a fit that she has to care? I mean, I know I am a selfish terrible person, but I would put effort into caring that my sister is missing.

Then again, my sisters are more well adjusted than Deidre. We all may be neurotic and balls of anxiety (okay maybe they aren't all), but even at their worst days, they're still better than Deidre. She is just angry and mean. There's a problem when there isn't any redeeming qualities of your main characters.

Skye and Deidre's relationship is fascinating. In some ways, they view their relationship as being the only ones they can rely on. Skye protects Deidre. They're the most important people to each other. But that comes with some major consequences: isolation, bullying, delusion. Deidre builds fantasy worlds where she and Skye are queens: Deidre is the queen of everything and Skye is her champion, her protector. A role that bleeds into real life. A role that Skye no longer wants. A role that monsters are pushing her to take again.

In some ways, I couldn't put this book down. I wasn't pushed to read it, to skip showers and meals for it, but it kept my attention. And once the monsters finally came - real ones, creepy ones, it was definitely leaning more into the horror genre.

This book doesn't have a happy ending, really. I started to realize that it couldn't once the monsters gave Skye her first task to find Deidre. When you're being forced to relive horrible moments publicly, or perhaps kill people in order to find your sister, it cannot end well.

Final Moments 
I still don't know how I feel about this book. It is dark and creepy, it doesn't quite flow right, the characters are a mishmash, and maybe I am currently afraid of the woods. (Thank god I live in Brooklyn.)

I really wish I had liked this book more, but unfortunately it just kind of missed the mark for me. While I enjoyed the creepy setting, I had a hard time really liking any of the characters. For the most part, they were pretty unlikable. On top of that, the ending made me pretty angry, especially the selfishness of the main character, as well as the unecessary graphic description of animal death. It was a pretty unique concept, but overall, it just wasn't for me.

First, a thank you to NetGalley and Sourcebooks for providing an advanced reading copy in exchange for my honest review.

Ever been in a place where even the air is oppressive, where you feel watched and unwelcome, where the trees whisper menacingly? This is the swamp and wooded area where Skye and her family have just moved to allow them to have a new beginning.

Except that it wasn't. They were moving to an ending.

If the cover doesn't betray the creepiness you will find in these pages, then Berube's writing certainly will. She is descriptive without spoon feeding and she weaves in elements that have the reader constantly questioning what is or isn't real.

To be fair, the reader will at some point have to acknowledge that both Skye and Deirdre are pretty awful humans that are seriously in need of therapy. I mean this beyond the scope of the general behavior of teens. Skye is manipulative and calculating and Deirdre withdraws further and further into her fantasies. It will make an adult shake their head as to why the parental response was a cross country move instead of intense treatment.

That aside this is a sufficiently creepy story that will grab the reader from the opening pages. Yes, you will question the narrator and from time to time I wondered if she was responsible for the events of the book. You will feel the dread coming from the woods and you will be actively trying to figure it all out.

What I enjoyed most was the wondering about Monsters. The ones in the woods or the ones that we conceal underneath pretty smiles. There are monsters within that are just as terrifying and the author does a good job of making that a key part of the story. For Deirdre it was withdrawal and playing with things that weren't ever meant to be games "By wood, stone, water, and bone."
For Skye, it was realizing what it meant to be the Queen of Swords. This was the truly creepy part to me. Especially the final conversation between Skye and her nemesis, Kevin.

A solid read!

The beginning grabs you and pulls you in, then it kind of stopped for me. Slowed down and then got a bit too creepy for my liking. I didn't finish it. Just not my kind of thing.

Unfortunately I had to DNF this book at 20%

I kept pushing through multiple attempts to try and get into the storyline but it felt far too slow moving for me.

One sister goes missing. The other believes faeries may have taken her. By 20% nothing had really progressed beyond this information and basic police search protocol.

Likes

Holy crap this book was a hell of a ride from start to finish. It reminded me of so many different books, tv shows and movies I've read/seen in the past and loved. Think Blair Witch (as advertised), but also Haunting of Hill House and Pet Semetary. It gave me the chills and it was just the right amount of 'weird' and 'off' to make me question what was real and what wasn't. Skye's character proved to be curious, inquisitive, but also just a normal teenager who was annoyed with her younger sister. But, when your younger sister goes missing, you're going to have a lot of questions and want to find out where in the heck she went off to. Especially if you have some creepy woods right behind your house. No way would I be venturing into those woods under any circumstances and you felt that fear while reading the book. Things get even creepier when you throw in some mysterious beings and there is a supernatural element to it. This book, in a word, was raw. I feel like that's the accurate way to describe it. It was all around a book that makes you want to sleep with the light on and keeps you hooked from the first page. I was trying to figure out what happened to Deirdre and what lengths Skye was going to go to in order to get her sister back safe and sound.

Dislikes

My dislikes for this book just herein lie with the fact that I didn't absolutely want to be buried with this book. I'm pretty hesitant to give a book a 4 star rating if I didn't really really like it, so this passed that test. I think it would be a perfect book for end of summer and early fall reading, gearing up for Halloween.

Recommendation

I would recommend this book to fans of the shows I mentioned above as well as anyone who is in the mood for an uber creepy read.

Thank you to Netgalley and Sourcebooks Fire for allowing me the opportunity to read and advanced digital copy of Here There are Monsters, by Amelinda Berube.

I enjoyed the story and the writing of this book. The characters were real, and I cared about what was happening to them. There came a point in the book, however, during which I had to stop reading. It became a bit too creepy, weird and impossible. The writing is vivid, though. And the plot was well-developed.

HERE THERE ARE MONSTERS is a bit of an odd duck. The book begins with Skye being awoken to learn her sister is missing. Deirdre is thirteen and lives almost entirely in her imagination. She has constructed whole worlds there and insists on wandering around in the woods around their house to live them out. As such, Skye did not think much when she noticed her sister was out when she got home. She must have fallen asleep and not noticed her sister had not returned. As the police conduct their search, Skye feels guilty and seeks answers of her own.

With past and present viewpoints, the first half of the book reads like a contemporary young adult novel. Skye and Deirdre had been so close, living out the worlds of Deirdre’s imagination, until they moved to this new town. Skye had made friends and become somewhat popular, leaving Deirdre to her own devices. Skye must balance these with her sister and family, a common problem facing teenagers.

The second half of the book reads as more of a horror, when Skye begins the search for her sister, and the creatures she encounters. The ride gets stranger and stranger as we creep towards the enigmatic and strange ending. Skye and Deirdre were somewhat hard to like- they both seemed rather self-absorbed and a little bit rude to others. However, some of that is due to their age maybe, and the efforts required when you are a little bit different. I was surprised at some of the reactions Skye had to Deirdre being missing, but maybe these align with the stages of grief.

My bigger problem I had with the book was all the labeled “slut shaming” that seemed otherwise unnecessary to the plot. I would have liked more acknowledgment or discouragement of this behavior, but it happens a few times. There are also excuses for sexist behavior by one of the teens that is brushed aside, despite being very offensive.

Overall, it was an interesting read, but not one that I would pick up again. It seemed part YA contemporary and part horror and part fantasy, and I had a bit of a hard time getting into the story and characters as such. Please note that I received an ARC from the publisher through netgalley. All opinions are my own.

Skye has grown up being the protector to her younger sister, Deirdre. Deirdre was always caught up in her games of queens, castles, and knights, and drug Skye in to them with her. She named Skye the Queen of Swords, the one that would protect her against everything, and that’s what she became. She also became an outcast because of it, the weird girl’s weird sister. When they moved to their new home, far away from their previous residence, Skye felt it was time for a new start. When they arrive, Deirdre is delighted that their new home is surrounded by woods and swamps to explore and create new kingdoms in. Skye, however, is done playing Deirdre’s games and makes a new circle of friends to call her own. Left to care for Deirdre while their parents are out one evening, Skye falls asleep and is awoken by her mother frantically looking for Deirdre. Deirdre is gone. Rescue crews continue searching to no avail, until Skye knows that she is the one who must go and find her. She must become her sister’s protector and play the games once again.

Let’s start with the cover of this book. How creepy and beautiful is that?! It’s very fitting with the tone and story, and I just love it. Now that I got that out of the way, on to the book itself. It started out a bit slow for me, so I was a bit anxious that I wasn’t going to like it and I was not happy about that, as I went in to this very hopeful (this is definitely my kind of read!). Fortunately, it did pick up after a bit and I got in to it. The story is told in alternating time periods, as it flashes back between earlier in the girls’ childhood and present day. I did enjoy that as it gives a clearer picture as to what may have led up to the present day situation. The characters, especially the main characters, were well developed. The two main characters, Deirdre and Skye, however, were not particularly likeable characters in my opinion. This is not necessarily a bad thing, as the main characters do not have to be likable for a book to read well. I do know that some readers are put off by this, so I wanted to throw it in in case this is a sticking point for you. There are some supernatural elements that come in to play as the book moves on, and this was a fun element. It is a very atmospheric book, which I believe may have been my favorite thing about the writing of this book. The author did a wonderful job of building the world/atmosphere and making it fit the story well. Where the beginning of the book suffered from a bit of a slow start, the end could have used a bit of a slow down. It felt a bit rushed to tie everything up, and left me feeling like a may have missed something. Overall, though, it was a solid read and if the author were to write something else in the same genre, I’d pick it up.

This review will post on my blog on 5/17.

I liked the intrigue and mystery it had pulled at my guts. That is the underlying reason it kept me turning pages abruptly, for the first portion of the book. But then it went sadly from interesting, eerie and ominous to tedious, unrealistic and downright lackluster kind of a book. If I'm being honest, I admit I struggled colosally when I got through the first half and that was when things started to become annoying. I've spent so much of my time just thinking about and considering to dnf the book. I hated that it had been eating away at me and my subconscious at the time, doleful that it felt like I owe this particular book my spare time, just because of the time, effort and sweat spent by the author just making this book published, and so I came to this decision that I'd try my very best to finish it rather than just leave it out there to rot. To my amazement upon myself and my self-imposed dedication, I did exactly that. I was proud. Satisfied even.

*ARC provided by publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*
"You can't just walk away when someone needs a hero."
This is Amelinda's second novel and I have to say that she completely wowed me to no end. I just finished this book less than 20 minutes ago and I'm still reeling from the relentless attacks to my heart so this may be all over the place.
This book follows Skye right as her little sister, Deirdre, goes missing. We get to see how her family is changed completely and how she handles it from there. This book is told in three parts and it weaves through her past with her sister and the present, without her. I really loved seeing how her relationship with her sister developed and finding out what caused it to change so much. It was super easy to see the change in Skye between the past and present and I liked that a lot.
I do have to say that Deirdre overshadowed Skye in most of this novel. I was completely hooked on her character and wanted to dissect her every action completely. I wanted to get in her head and know what made her act the way she did. I can't even put into words just how intriguing she was, I didn't dare blink whenever there was a scene with her in fear of missing any little detail that gave away her motivation away.
I don't have much to say about the first half of this novel except that I had a strong dislike for Skye and how she treated her little sister. It seemed so cruel that it was borderline unrealistic to me. I don't know if it's because I adore my siblings and would never EVER complain about them and treat them the way Skye treated hers but I can't see someone being that cruel in real life. Maybe I don't understand other sibling relationships? I don't know. I can't forgive her cause of her age either since I didn't act like this when I was a teenager. Anyway, I really disliked her but the story itself was super slow in pace and it didn't really pick up until the second half.
Skye eventually grew on me but that doesn't mean I liked her any more than I did in the first half. I respected her as a character but I was not okay with the things she did along the way. That's not a bad thing at all though, it's a huge reason why I have so much respect for her. She does what I could never do if I were ever faced with her situation. (Or maybe I would, I don't know and I never will unless I experience it myself. It's what I loved most about this book. It made me exhaust every possibility in my head of how the story would unfold while still keeping me on my toes.) She was definitely more intriguing in the last half and I massively enjoyed following her journey.
Also, I have a favorite character and I'm not going to mention their gender or their name so it doesn't spoil anything. Let's just say they are not Sky or Deirdre. They were my absolute favorite character in this book and it broke my heart to see the way they were treated. I cried so hard for them, every sliver of pain, no matter how small, that befell them tore me to pieces. I am in love with their character and I wish we could get a book solely following them after the events in this novel. I want to see more of them and their beautiful, kind soul that has now stolen my heart forever. I can't stop wishing I had the power to hold them and wash their pain away.
I also fell in love with the atmosphere in this novel. I wanted to desperately get sucked into it whenever it was described to me. I really love the way Amelinda's descriptions bring the world around her characters to life. I am now holding on to hope for fanart of this book. I feel like some scenes would be beyond perfect if they were illustrated. This book is also being compared to Blair Witch Project and now I really want to watch it to tide me over this slump I see coming due to this book. It ripped my heart to pieces and it's going to take me a while to bounce back from all I just went through.
I honestly can't wait to see what else Amelinda's mind has in store for us!

I chose to read this for the cover and blurb. The first part of the book was good and I felt like it was going to be a really good creepy story. As it went on I found myself not really liking Skye. I get how she was feeling smothered and held back by her sister but I didn't see anything in her that drew me to her. Midway through the book it got really confusing. It took too much effort to figure out what was going on and I'm still confused even though I finished the book. Also so much was left unanswered at the end that the story just didn't work for me.

I really enjoyed this slow-burning YA horror/fantasy novel which genuinely nailed the psyche of a sixteen year old girl who is trying to deal with the sudden disappearance of her little sister aged thirteen. Deirdre has issues, which are revealed slowly as the plot moves backwards and forwards through narratives before and after the disappearance. The supernatural is slowly filtered into the book, genuine teen readers may find this all a bit slow, but the compelling friendship dynamics Skye has with her new school friends more than makes up for it. As the disappearance lengths, the mystery deepens and I found this to be an excellent and atmospheric read for kids aged 13+