“My uncle runs the Glory to God Museum of Natural Wonders, Curiosities, and Taxidermy.”
So begins The Hollow Places introducing Kara (Carrot) as she moves in with her uncle at the museum after her separation with her husband; Uncle Earl, who believes in Jesus, aliens, government conspiracies, faith healing, cryptozoology, and is actually a real nice old man who wasn’t in the book enough; as well as Simon, the barista at the coffee shop next door whose “left eye’s got some rare form of color blindness that only women get. So they think I’m probably a chimera and ate my twin in the womb and it’s actually her left eye.”
Carrot and Simon find a hole in the wall of the museum that leads to a hallway which can not actually be there. The hallway leads out to a new dimension which has entryways to other worlds. There are some inter-dimensional beings that stalk the living and they can hear your thinking.
The majority of the book is written in a lighthearted manner, making it difficult to shift to the creepy feeling when Carrot and Simon are in the dimension between worlds. Just when you start to get unnerved by everything it slips back to the aloofness you thought was left behind.
This was a great story and I know I am going to dwell on it for awhile but it didn’t portray the vibe I thought it deserved based on some of the horrors Carrot and Simon came across. It felt more like a YA book than a true horror/sci-fi , which isn’t bad, just not what I expected.
Thanks to NetGalley, Galley Books/Saga Press for a copy of this ebook in exchange for an honest review.

This book started out really good by chapter 4 I was laughing out loud and completely creeped out. The setting was super cool. I can't really explain without spoilers. So I'll just say this at some point it went from a really great read to an ok read. I enjoyed it but didn't love it as much as I wanted too. It is full of creepy elements some of them just didn't do it for me.

<I>Thanks to NetGalley for providing me with a copy in return for an honest review. </I>

This is a bit of a mixed review for me. On the one hand, as a horror novel, this really works. Parts of this book are incredibly creepy and Kingfisher does a knockout job of creating a deeply unsettling, believable alternate dimension. I whipped through this book and was even freaked out enough at points to have to get out of bed to turn on a light. As a quick Halloween read, I can't recommend it enough.

However, and this is what stops this from being a 4 star read, when Kingfisher isn't actively creeping you out, you might have trouble keeping your focus on the book given how dully repetitive the main character often is. For every creepy scene or interesting development there is an uninspired recap/discussion following it up. Further, while the alternate dimension is believable enough, a lot of the surrounding explanations - such as why they don't call the police in the beginning when finding a dead body or why they don't just LEAVE - are pretty contrived. Last, while the ending explanation is adequate, its not exactly mind-blowing.

In the end though, its a fast and overall enjoyable read with a atmosphere that is almost tangible in its creepiness.

This is a perfect read for October as it as creepy as it gets!

Super solid writing pulls you right into the story line. Kara (Carrot) is newly divorced and rather than live with her mother, she accepts her uncle's offer to go stay with him at his museum of oddities, The Wonder Museum. The museum is filled with odd objects and taxidermy animals, but Kara spent her childhood in the museum and so she loves it there. She then agrees to take over running the place while her uncle undergoes surgery and recovers at her mother's house.

Kara, along with Simon, the coffee extraordinaire from next door, investigate a hole found in the wall of the museum. Simon agrees to help patch the hole, but upon further examination, they discover an eerie and dangerous world just behind the drywall. They become trapped in a world where willows overtake everything, the evil of the place can hear your thoughts and track you by them, sand funnels appear out of nowhere, and the landscape contains numerous concrete bunkers, one of which contains the door they need to return to their own world.

They manage to escape and believe they have left the horrors behind them. But Kara soon discovers that the real evil was right in her beloved museum all along and the horrors have followed her home.

This book will make you consider the existence of multiple worlds, and whether the distance between worlds is really as vast as we might prefer. Overall this was a wonderfully eerie and bone-chilling novel that I thoroughly enjoyed.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for allowing me access to the e-Galley edition in exchange for my honest review.

After her marriage ends in divorce, Kara moves into her uncle's museum of oddities and antiquities. While struggling with her grief, Kara tackles the immense task of cataloging all the items in the museum - who can't relate to taking on a disaster when in such personal pain? She insists her uncle undergo knee surgery and assumes responsibility. While managing along, Kara forms a friendship with Simon, the barrister of the coffeeshop also housed in her uncle's building.
As Kara closes the museum, she stumbles upon a large whole in a wall. There appears to be yards of empty building - that can't exist. Kara and Simon enter the hole, walk around for short time and return home, freaked out. They agree to explore more the next night.
After packing bags with protein bars, whiskey laced coffee and their phones, they enter another dimension. It appears to be a gateway to many different worlds. Weeping Willows are everywhere - as well as Them. You can't think about Them - or they will find you. Of course Kara and Simon become lost, but thankfully not separated. Among the countless concrete bunkers, they find an area with military cots, lockers and MREs. Kara stumbles upon a Bible - with writing from a previous occupant, detailing their experience.
This book absolutely freaked me out - I love willows. Taking my dog out to pee in the dark - nightmarish. Great suspense. Realistic descriptions. A school bus immersed in sand. I mean really scary details.
I love the humor and friendship between Kara and Simon. Simon obviously supplies the humor needed - his dead twin's eye, stellar outfits. Use of alcohol. Loved him.
Kara is also a very relatable character. Stalking her ex's Facebook page; learning he is already in a relationship. He calls her, trying to get an emotional reaction. She doesn't have time - Kara is exploring different worlds.
What I didn't like - there were a lot of lulls as the author setup the next arc of the story. The cause of the holes appearing is mentioned throughout the story - overkill.
I enjoyed the story and characters but it was a struggle to finish.

This is a remarkably clever work of horror fiction with a marvelous sense of humor as well! I typically prefer my scary novels to be complex and intelligent, as I like the challenge of thinking through things more than straight up jump scares, and The Hollow Places has a great deal of smarty pants, thought provoking science fiction aspects mixed in with a good bit of gore. While I could have done with a little less dialogue clogging up the flow, I did whole-heartedly enjoy the way that the story unfolded, and the quirky characters were a delightful contrast to the oppressive atmosphere. If you're looking for an enjoyable, spooky read for October: look no further!

Holy crap. I just devoured this quirky, funny, horrifying little book in a few hours. I could not stop reading.

Kara was amazing and Simon was EVERYTHING and I just can’t even!

I got a little stuck at about 3/4 through when it got a little too campy, but it smoothed. A horrible, terrifying parallel-universe hub? Check. A mind-boggling enemy of trans dimensional evil? Check. A ton of laugh-out-loud moments? Check.

I will definitely be looking into T Kingfisher’s other works because I am HOOKED.

I received a free copy from Net Galley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I'm giving this 4.75 stars. This was a great read, perfect for a seasonal horror/supernatural thriller. I stayed up too late and got up too early so I could fit time into my day to read this as fast as I could. Every chapter was loaded with cliff hangers (I love books that are like that). This isn't the kind of spooky read that has insane murderess maniacs running through the book. This is a kind of read that has creepy unexplained and unseen terrors. This is a simple single point of view narrator, which makes it an easy and enjoyable read. I haven't read any of the authors other books before but I most certainly will now. I didn't give this 5 stars only because it was such a quick read, although a very enjoyable read.

Scary, creepy, snarky, un-put-downable, nightmarishly awesome. The Hollow Places is a terrifying read, but is also lots of fun thanks to the amazing main character and the unique setting.

4/5 stars!

Ooooh, this is the perfect read to kick off the beginning of spooky season. Mesmerizing and creepy, this is a story that sinks under your skin and takes hold like the roots of a willow tree.

This was my first book by T. Kingfisher (aka Ursula Vernon), and it did not disappoint. I was immediately drawn in by the humor and interesting premise - anything with secret doors and horror is an instant read for me. But as Kingfisher draws you in with likable characters and a charming setting in a small town, the roots of the story slowly take hold. It's a creeping and atmospheric horror, one where you don't realize something is truly wrong until its far too late - and by then, well...let's hope the way to escape is still open.

I think this book's greatest strengths lie in the characters and humor. I absolutely adored Kara (Carrot) as a character, and it was nice to have a main character in a horror story try to find some laughs in a world that is terrifying and impossible while also keeping the reader grounded. The relationship between Carrot and Simon was realistic, and they played off each other in a believable way. I also enjoyed the relationship Carrot had with her uncle Earl. It was so heartwarming, and I felt sympathetic to her - wanting to escape this world that shouldn't exist, but not wanting her uncle to stumble upon it.

Honestly, I think the scariest part of this book was the things that we DON'T see. There was plenty of haunting and gory imagery (I still find myself thinking about some of the descriptions days later), but something about the main monsters terrified me. I won't spoil it, but I found myself looking over my shoulder on the way to bed, as if that would help me at all.

This book was so good. And it kept giving! I was torn between dying to know what happened and never wanting it to end. Now I need to go back and read Kingfisher's previous horror book, "The Twisted Ones". Thank you so much to Gallery/Saga Press and NetGalley for my review copy!

The writing style was so engaging that it made up for an otherwise meh story. I got invested in the characters so I was able to overlook a very weird story.

Horrifying, terrifying, and other types of -fying, this book gave me the heebie-jeebies. Kingfisher/Vernon has given us another great horror novel. We get lost in another world, learn just enough about that world to make us wish we had never been there, we get haunted by the creatures found there, and we get to see some really, truly strange taxidermy products. We also have a small town curio museum, home repairs (how would YOU fix the hole in the wall?), a strange Bible, a thoroughly annoying ex-husband, a most wonderful uncle, a bothersome mother, and a really great friend who supplies the morning coffee. And lest we forget, there is a heroic cat.

I got an ARC of this book from the author.

This might just be the best horror novel I have read in years.

I have the hardest time finding novels that scare me. So many of them are overwritten when it comes to the horror (cough Steven King cough) and others just never actually reach a level of horror that makes them interesting (My Best Friend’s Exorcism).

I was worried at first about this book. I was reading and I started laughing so hard I was having issues stopping at one line that was just so ridiculous. I will apologize now to my friends who will hear me talking about the gender of my pancreas for the rest of my life. It was exactly my sort of humor and seeing that in a book is always jarring, even more so in a horror novel. So I was skeptical that this book would actually reach scary territory. I did like that there were jokes and that the characters were characters that felt like they could be my group of people. I think that is part of what made the horror bigger to me. The random jokes, the over the top outfits (who wears fishnets and a top hat to adventure into a impossible bunker? About half of my friends would), this was something that would happen in my life if I was in this book. The ending also fit into the maybe over the top, but also completely satisfyingly me. It did make going to sleep a little harder last night.

The author writes children and middle grade books. This is something that I was so excited for when I actually looked into her. This is one of the best parts to me. So many adult horror novels are overwritten and edgy for edgy sake. YA and middle grade ones don’t go into extreme detail and that leaves them open for my mind to fill them in and make them scarier. Kingfisher managed to toe that line beautifully. There was enough detail that I felt my skin crawl in certain scenes (like the school bus), but also enough was left out that what I imaged Them to be may be drastically different than what another reader would think They are. It was perfect. The horror came and settled. There was not really any relenting, but it wasn’t overly done. There were jokes to break tension, there were slower scenes of learning that made things make sense and not just be horror for horror sake.

The characters were fantastic. I adored that the divorce actually seemed to matter to the plot and it wasn’t just a throw away thing to get the MC to the Wonder Museum. It was a reoccurring thing that changed and grew as the character experienced things. I am always super skeptical of books that have animals. I worry about the animal safety and I worry that they will be just thrown in poorly. This was probably the best example of an animal in a book I have seen. The cat was just yes. He had plots, he had a personality that was very much something I could see as being a real cat, there were some moments when the cat humanized the MC to me. The gay guy next door making gay jokes that were goofy was amusing to me. He was a bit over the top, but in the same way that my gay friends are (remember I dated a guy that was pretty much the MC from a TJ Klune novel). So having that character as a bit of comic relief, but also as a nuanced character was nice. He wasn’t just camp, he also had a backstory, he could use power tools, he got overwhelmed and tried. You could tell so much about him by his jokes and it was just well done. The jokes got more tired as he got more overwhelmed. He was the gay best friend I would want if I was transported to another dimension. I am a bit let down that there was no real mention of him in the ending.

There is a bit of body horror in this. I wouldn’t recommend it to someone who is not cool with organs being in a pool of water or some cuts on a thigh. The horror that got to me wasn’t about the blood and guts, it was the deeper stuff and also taxidermy based. Taxidermy is so creepy to me.

Overall, this was a fantastic horror novel with a bit of camp to it. It is not overwritten and I adored it for that. The camp did go a little far, but stayed enjoyable. I wish the GBF trope wasn’t as strong and that the GBF was allowed to play a larger role in the ending.

An unsettling read that I found almost impossible to put down. Excellent characters, an engaging story, and just enough humor to keep me from needing to turn on the lights!

After Kara’s marriage ends, she has no idea what to do next. A freelance graphic designer, she can barely make ends meet on her own, and is dreading the idea of moving back in with her combative mother. So when her Uncle Earl offers her a place to stay, she leaps at the idea, even if it means a somewhat unorthodox living situation.

Uncle Earl runs the Glory to God Museum of Natural Wonders, Curiosities and Taxidermy out of a storefront in Hog Chapel, North Carolina, a building Kara practically grew up in. The museum boasts an eccentric collection as weird and wonderful as its owner, and though Kara has had her fair share of arguments with Uncle Earl about things like evolution and Bigfoot, there’s no denying his belief in being kind, even when confronted with the gaps in his logic otherwise:

QUOTE
“But you’ve got a sign in the case with the prairie dogs that says the earth is four thousand years old.”

“It’s a quote from the Reverend James Smiley. It’s attributed down at the bottom. If it’s wrong, it’s on him. I’m not here to judge. The visitors can decide for themselves what they want to believe.”

“What if they decide wrong, though?”

“God forgives a lot,” said Uncle Earl. “He has to. We all do a lot that needs forgiving.”
END QUOTE

Claiming to need help with the museum due to his own failing health, Uncle Earl has cleared out a storage room and turned it into a little apartment for Kara, though he lives elsewhere himself. Kara plans to finally catalog all the exhibits as well as update their Internet presence while he mans the front desk, but a month after her arrival, his bad knees finally give out on him, necessitating surgery down in Charlotte. Kara assures him that she can run the place just fine while he recuperates, and at first everything goes smoothly enough… till she discovers a hole in the wall upstairs that leads to a corridor that can’t possibly exist.

Recruiting her neighbor and closest friend Simon to help her figure out the corridor, the duo unexpectedly stumbles upon a series of extremely creepy things that culminates in them exploring a bizarre world filled with horrors. But then they realize that they’ve lost track of the stick marking their way back to the corridor and, thus, the museum and the real world:

QUOTE
I tried to clamp that thought down before it could get much further. “Let’s think about this logically.”

“I’d like to panic for a minute, if it’s all the same to you!” snapped Simon. “There were things in that bus! Ghosts or--or something! I don’t know! And the stick’s gone and now we don’t know how to get back and we’re going to be stuck here with that bus full of whatever the hell it was!”

I waited. Honestly, I was rather glad he was panicking, because if he hadn’t, I was going to. Panic was definitely called for right now, but for some reason, if there’s two people, only one of you panics at a time.
END QUOTE

As Kara and Simon struggle to find their way home, they must also escape the notice of the terrifying creatures that inhabit the realm they’ve unwittingly stumbled into, creatures that could do much worse than merely eat them alive. But the greater question remains: even if they can find a way back, what can they do to make sure the monstrosities don’t follow them home?

The Hollow Places is a truly scary page-turner that had me quietly freaking out even as I devoured the tale as avidly as the nightmare creatures in its pages consume their prey. Based on the Algernon Blackwood story The Willows, it expands upon the premise of a mostly intrepid duo trapped in an inexplicable realm to tell a very modern, very funny and very psychologically acute tale of finding family, kindness and perspective in the unexpected. Character-wise, I found it very refreshing that Simon was an out-and-proud, high camp gay man, especially in contrast with the smothered sexuality of Mr Blackwood’s original protagonists. Kara and Earl are also wonderful creations, complex, caring and resourceful, and I was rooting for all three of them throughout.

Despite being based on a classic work, this was one of the most original and warm-hearted horror novels I’ve read in a long time. Touching just as easily on the metaphysical and quasi-scientific as it does on matters of the heart and lizard mind, this is another triumph for T. Kingfisher’s remarkably versatile writing career.

There's something enchantingly ominous about trees. I've always been fascinated with their twisted beauty and potential as portals to another world. Trees are what show us the growth cycles of the world, what it means to shed and be reborn and grow through any kind of adversity. They also have remarkable potential as elements for horror. They can keep you safe and cut you off all at the same time. T. Kingfisher's newest novel Hollow Places plays into that fear and builds something sinister around its edges.

It takes a special talent to plant horror in an unusual yet endearing space, and Kingfisher does it with ease. A taxidermy-filled museum is the heartwarming gateway to this insidious tale of other worlds and willows with more in mind than weeping. When Kara (aka Carrot) returns to her uncle's Wonder Museum to help him run it after a divorce that leaves her reeling she finds more in the shop than her favorite old elk head. When a mysterious and decidedly creepy new artifact shows up at the museum's doorstep, it is nothing new, but as for the hole in the museum's wall that seems to lead to another world…

Kingfisher is adept at creating endearingly messy characters; people with complex and imperfect lives who must face unfathomable circumstances to return to their sense of normalcy, forever marked by the knowledge of mysteriously magic possibilities amid an otherwise mundane world. She is also unnervingly skilled at ramping up the horror of her worlds. For much of the first quarter or so of the novel I felt compelled to continue simply to hang out more with Carrot and Simon, the gay barista of the coffeeshop next door to the Wonder Museum and Carrot's depth-perception-challenged yet unfailing companion into the other world. But then, things escalate quite quickly when they reach the "Wood between Worlds" and find an otherworldly trap set for them, and see the gruesome results of what happens when you can't escape.

Hollow Places paints vivid pictures of unnatural torture and things more than human exercising their power over humanity, of madness and nature gone wild, and of what it could look like if the skin between worlds gets punctured and the worlds bleed into each other. I'm not sure which image will stick with me longer, the seemingly abandoned school bus in the trees or the bunkers with "Pray They are Hungry" carved onto their walls…How do you fight something that knows where you are by following when you think about them? How do you avoid thinking of something capable of inflicting unimaginable torture at any moment?

I've always had a healthy love and respect for trees, but Hollow Places might just make me linger a little longer on the willows from now on…just to make sure they aren't moving…

I would like to thank NetGalley and Gallery Books for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book was very atmospheric. I could feel the damp desolate alien land. I was chilled to my bones.
I did find the characters very likable and I rooted for them the entire time..
The pacing was spot on.

T. Kingfisher is an instant read and this book confirmed my trust in her.

Kara, newly divorced, goes to the place that kept her safe during her youth: her uncle's museum of weird objects. After finding a hole in the wall, it leads her to world that has portals to other realities. However, something lives in this world that, if you're lucky, will eat you.

I started reading this thinking that this was a sequel to The Twisted Ones. It's very much a spiritual sequel but I found this one more haunting. The things the creatures do with the human body when they're not hungry is nightmarish. When Kara ends up home, she starts sleepwalking and that helplessness of not being able to stop herself plays up the horror of not having a safe place.

Seriously, read T. Kingfisher's books. Her characters are smart and funny.

This review is based on an advanced copy provided through Netgalley.

Just imagine for a sec that you recently went through a divorce, are living with your uncle running his taxidermy little museum business while trying to get your footing and then BOOM💥 you find a door to an alternate dimension hidden behind a wall.

Yeah...that would be weird and kinda cool if it wasn’t for the creepy creatures that live beyond the portal. Hollow places is a cross between horror, sci-fi, and fantasy with some Narnia vibes...but minus the Turkish Delight and add in more scary stuff. The writing in this book was so witty and I found the story to be really entertaining.

Besides the fun scary elements, the characters were what really made this story for me. Their dialogue and thoughts were perfection. There was so much strangeness going on and I loved it! I hung on every word. This author really knows how to craft an amusing and unsettling story.

If you’re looking for a spooky little fantastical treat to read in October, this is it! Thank you @netgalley for providing me this eARC for review! Make sure to get this when it’s published soon on October 6th!

The Hollow Places was awesome. Even though I read a lot of horror, this book creeped me out for a couple of days when I read it and had me looking at all my walls to make sure there weren’t any holes.

I loved how the book was so ordinary and yet so completely out of this world. We followed Kara as she settled into her uncle’s museum after her divorce and got to know her. She was a likable character and she made friends with the barista at the coffee shop, Simon, who was equally likable. It seemed like an ordinary book, until she discovered a hole in her wall and suddenly explored her way into a creepy world.

I am very thankful there are no willow trees where I live. When I see palm tree leaves swaying in the wind, it makes me shiver a little bit. Thinking about Sturdivant creeps me out. It was such a crazy world. I loved that she took the book with her and got to read an account of some of the militaristic survivors in the bunker. I didn’t know if they would make it back home, if once home, the beings would slip through into the real world, or if it was over. Was it over?

This was such a great horror story full of weirdness and I highly recommend it. I was hooked from the very first page and couldn’t stop reading it even when it unnerved me. I had to know what would happen next and how, if they could, they would close the hole and recover from the terror.