The Lost Village was the first book I have read by Camilla Sten. I thought it was just an okay read for me. I am going to give it two and a half stars.

The Lost Village is a suspenseful thriller about amateur filmmaker Alice Lindstedt as she travels to investigate a "lost" town in Sweden where all of the residents--including her grandmother's family--mysteriously disappeared decades ago. No one since then has been able to uncover what happened to the residents or why there was one baby who was left in the village.

I have a lot of mixed feelings about this book. The atmosphere that the author developed was one of the strongest points, and it really made me feel as though the lore and mystery around this village was tangible and intimidating. I also enjoyed the author's decision to write the narrative with 'then' and 'now' chapter perspectives, which allowed us to follow Alice in the present as she attempted to uncover the strange happenings of the town, as well as allowed us to get a glimpse into what life was like in the town and what may have gone wrong that led to the disappearance.

Despite the positives, I was also disappointed in story arc overall in regard to plot developments and 'twists.' I also didn't really care for any of the characters and found myself not overly invested in any of their goals, personalities, or emotions while exploring the village. Alice, our protagonist, was a character filled with determination to not only discover what happened to her grandmother's family and the rest of the village members, but to prove herself as a documentary filmmaker and get her project funded on a fundraising website. I never doubted Alice's commitment to the project, and I think Sten did a good job of balancing Alice's personal motivations with the practical ones. However, I was frustrated by how Alice acted and planned out their trip to the town. I felt like it was repeatedly mentioned how Alice prepared extensively for this trip, but there were so many things that didn't feel properly planned for and seemed to be in need of some common sense. Maybe it was supposed to be this way in order to show Alice's newness to filmmaking and being a leader and embarking on a project such as this, but I found it disjointed and frustrating.

The rest of the characters added some needed excitement to the story, but at the same time I didn't find any of them overly compelling. The dynamics between all of them felt decidedly odd for such a trip, and although it is explained why there are some tensions between some characters, all of them seemed to interact in ways that just felt a bit off and made the dialogue and relationships feel forced. I appreciated some of the twists involving the characters that Sten included (which I can't mention of course due to spoilers!), but they weren't quite as impactful as they could have been had there been better development or had captured my interest. And in spite of the lack of individual development, I actually do think there was one relationship between Alice and an old friend that I felt evolved in a really interesting and well-written fashion.

Despite my issues, it was still one of those books that I kept looking forward to reading and turning the pages quickly. It's well-written and compelling, though not quite as exciting or well-developed as I might have hoped. I look forward to reading more from Camilla Sten!

SCARY... like actually really scary?

I felt like even though, in my opinion, this was more of a character driven book it definitely made me more scared because of the way the atmosphere was written. Like right off the bat, the way the deserted village is described when our main characters arrive. And the dual timelines where we have glimpses of the past, when people still inhabited the village. I WAS OBSESSED.

I could definitely see this playing out in the big screen. The only reason why I didn't give this 5 stars was because it fell just a biiiit short of my expectations.

But nonetheless, really really good and definitely will be recommending it to people. Especially around Halloween.

The premise of The Lost Village is one that I absolutely love - a small town with a huge mystery that still unsolved years later and a small group of people who go to research/discover said mystery. The fact that they described it as partly like The Blair Witch Project really sold me on it.

In the 1950s an entire village disappeared overnight except for the body of a woman who was apparently stoned to death and a newborn baby who was left in the nurse's office in the school. The story is told in alternating timelines and point of views - Elsa is the townswoman who is quickly unsettled with what the new pastor, Mattias, is doing to her town and its people, particularly how they are viewing Briggita; and Alice the granddaughter of Elsa's eldest daughter, who has arrived to the ghost town with a small film crew to get some preliminary shots and videos of the town for her forthcoming documentary titled "The Lost Village."

I absolutely loved the description of the village, it was creepy and atmospheric and I could just picture everything. There are quite a few scenes that spooked me. However, the ending didn't really sit well with me. I couldn't imagine how Aina, an elderly lady in her 70s, could have overpowered and killed so many people, even if they hadn't eaten in a day. Also, I thought it was a really dumb decision on Elsa's part to go back for Aina when she knows how her daughter feels. She should have tried to get to safety with Brigitta and the newborn and then come back with her family. I thought that was lazy writing to just get everything to a head. But if the whole town had captured them while they ran away, it would have been a stronger ending.

Because of these thoughts, I decided to sit with it for a bit before marking it as read and giving it a rating. And I'm glad I did because later that night, my baby woke me up and while I was trying to get back to sleep, I kept thinking about those spooky and creepy scenes from the book and I had a hard time getting back to sleep. The idea of someone watching and stalking people while they were vulnerable sends shivers down my back, as did the empty school scenes. And especially the part when Alice was inside the knocked-down van to try and find the generator and she heard the soft giggling down in the van's rubble - that part is what kept me awake in the middle of the night. Other than being scared, I also felt immense anger at the actions of the pastor and villagers. To the point where I thought maybe their disappearance was an act of God in the end.

Overall, this wasn't as much like The Blair Witch Project as I'd like but it still had me creeped out and wanting to keep reading.

I loved this book so much! It was the first book I have read by this author and I can't wait to read more! The characters and their story stick with you long after you finish the book.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

The Lost Village is a thriller/horror that evokes some elements of the found-footage archetype (genre?), a la The Blair Witch Project, to startling effect. It’s atmospheric, environmental, believable. It evokes every emotion of your standard thriller or horror story, including feeling simultaneously frustrated with and frightened for the characters as they make dumb choices, and being on the edge of your seat the entire time.

I also really liked the sense of history and scope to it. While horror and thriller aren’t often my go-tos, I like exploring why things ended up becoming as they are in the present, and the dips into the past for that purpose were satisfying.

However, one of the drawbacks is that I didn’t feel overly connected to the characters. This didn’t prevent me from feeling the stakes, but it’s definitely not a book where I felt having well-defined characters was paramount, and that’s fine, as it’s very much in line with genre expectations.

Either way, Camilla Sten is definitely a talented author, providing a fresh new voice for thriller/horror from Sweden with her English-language debut. I hope this isn’t the last we see of her, as she has a lot of promise, and I think more avid fans of the genre will love this.

“Documentary filmmaker Alice Lindstedt has been obsessed with the vanishing residents of the old mining town, dubbed “The Lost Village,” since she was a little girl. In 1959, her grandmother’s entire family disappeared in this mysterious tragedy, and ever since, the unanswered questions surrounding the only two people who were left—a woman stoned to death in the town center and an abandoned newborn—have plagued her. She’s gathered a small crew of friends in the remote village to make a film about what really happened.”

They are quick to learn that they aren’t alone.


There’s a lot of talk of this book being an awful lot like The Blair Witch Project and I can definitely see it’s influence throughout. The Midsommar comparison is a little shaky if I’m being honest. The Lost Village is, above all things, atmospheric. Camilla Sten is excellent at building a creepily immersive village through Silvertjärn. The character development is kind of secondary to this world building, but this doesn’t really detract so much from the story as it might in other novels. I did struggle a little in the beginning (though it’s hard to say sometimes if it’s me or the book. My brain likes to get all flighty, nearly always at inconvenient times.) but Village does pick up quickly and becomes nearly impossible to put down. I gave it 3.5-4ish stars.
It also feels important to note that I did a happy dance upon being approved for this eBook 😂

Thanks so much to Camilla Sten, St Martin’s Press, and NetGalley for the eARC in return for an honest review!

Despite a good premise and a likable protagonist, the execution was not so great, especially taking a dive during the novel’s conclusion. After taking a day to compile my thoughts, I unfortunately can’t rate this book more than two stars. The first 50% of The Lost Village is entertaining enough and I admit I did find myself reading quickly to see what would happen next. The creepy factor and sense of dread was also built up nicely and I highlighted several passages that are quite atmospheric.

The tone takes a strange turn not long after the halfway point, however, instead employing melodrama and cliche after cliche. Without getting into spoilers, this book has horrendous mental illness representation and several of the characters act quite young despite at least being in their late twenties. The dialogue between characters often felt stilted or cheesy with little in between, growing tiresome pretty quickly.

The twists are also extremely easy to figure out, which I wouldn’t mind if there was a great payoff in the end but I ended up disappointed in the anticlimactic (and lazy) ending. Trust me, if this sort of premise sounds familiar, I guarantee you that nothing will surprise you while reading the novel.

I usually don’t like to write such a negative review, but overall The Lost Village rubbed me the wrong way, personally. I might still suggest this title for readers new to the genre, but if you’ve been around the block a few times, I’d probably advise to skip this one.

Thanks so much to Minotaur Books and Netgalley for providing me with a digital ARC for reviewing purposes.

Thank you, Camilla Sten, NetGalley, and Minotaur Books for the opportunity to read this book!

I usually prefer to read horror stories in the Fall but I had to make an exception for The Lost Village by Camilla Sten. This atmospheric tale jumps between two timelines: the present and 1959. Alice had heard stories of Silvertjarn from her grandmother. Her grandmother lost her entire family to this town. Without explanation, the entire town vanished in 1959 but a woman named Brigitta was found in the town square, tied to a pole…dead. But then there is the newborn baby that was found. There are theories but there is no hard evidence to solve this mystery. Alice intends to find answers for her documentary. She and her crew set up shop but it doesn’t take long for things to go wrong. One crew-member steps through some stairs, a car explodes, and everyone starts seeing something that they can’t explain. One thing is for sure, they aren’t alone.

WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!?! This book picks you up and draws you into this crumbling ghost town. The pace moves along so perfectly. Many horror novels take a long time to build up the suspense, not this one. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind a slow-burn but this book drops moments of uneasiness quite quickly. Readers should expect to jump and get the chills while reading this book.

It has the same feel as The Blair Witch Project but adds in a religious cult. A new pastor arrives and gets the entire town under his spell–including Alice’s great-Aunt, Aina. The characters all have depth. Alice has a history of depression. Tone has a direct connection with the case. Then there is Brigitta. Brigitta is described as being different. She lives alone but is taken care of by Alice’s great-grandmother. It seems to me that the author insinuates that Brigitta has some form of autism. Back in the 1950s, especially in very religious communities, someone like Brigitta would be singled out for being different. It is absolutely heartbreaking how Brigitta is treated.

Now, don’t get me wrong–the characters could be absolute idiots at certain times. You know when you watch a horror movie and you are screaming at the person being chased to stop looking back and just RUN. That is how I felt at some critical points in this book. Overall, I rate this book 4 out of 5 stars! If this sounds like your kind of book, it hits shelves on the 23rd of March.

WOW. I just finished this book and I know I should let it sit with me for a while before writing this review but just WOW. Camilla Sten is a master at the craft of horror, mystery, thriller and suspense.

The Lost Village follows Alice, a documentary filmmaker who wants to make a movie about a small Swedish mining town that mysteriously vanished, a ghost town if you will. For her, this project is personal, as her grandmother's mother, father, and sister all vanished with the town. Together with 4 others, she ventures to this town to find some material for her documentary, as well as attempt to uncover what really did happen to the residents of this town.

Y'ALL. WHEN I SAY I COULDN'T PUT THIS BOOK DOWN, I COULDN'T. The tagline for this novel of "Blair Witch meets Midsommer" is SO right. If you like either of those, if you like creepy suspense, cults, anything along those lines, please give this book a go. You really won't regret it.

I don't have much else to say. I really really loved this book and I am just stunned and in awe. It took a bit to get into (although I wasn't bored by the first 40% by any means) but by the second half, I really just COULDN'T put it down. If you're a fan of any of these genres, you need to give The Lost Village a shot.

Wow! This was such a frustrating experience for me because I started reading this book right as my life became crazy busy with a new job, putting my house up for sale, and preparing for a cross-country move. I would go days without being able to pick up my Kindle, and let me tell you-that was rough when you've got a novel as suspenseful as The Lost Village by Camilla Sten. I could not wait to pick this story up each day. It hooked me from the very beginning with the Netflix-style mystery documentary and I would have easily been able to read this in one setting had life allowed me to do so. The plot kept me on my toes and had an awesome creep-factor to it. I never saw the ending coming. It was unsettling in all the right ways. I highly recommend this novel and I can't wait to read what Camilla Sten puts out there next!

A big thank you to the author, St. Martin's Press, and Netgalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was a pretty good horror story. It is a slow burn. I get why it says it is like The Blair Witch. And that's because all the scary stuff are sounds. And nothing SUPER scary happens.

I think this is a good book for someone who doesn't read a lot of scary books or doesn't want something really scary. This book is also good for people who like slow burns.

It is very atmospheric kind of like a Gothic novel. I don't think it was ever scary but it was interesting and had me intrigued. 

I would definitely say read it if it's on your radar or you like these types of books.

Thank you Netgalley and Minotaur Books for this eARC. This book is out March 23rd 2021.

"The Blair Witch Project meets Midsommar", that was the sentence that kind of sold me for this book. I had seen both movies, and while I can't say I loved either of them - I did think they were both horrifying stories.

Let me start off by saying that I think this book would have been even better if it had been a mixed-media format. Not in the way the Illuminae Files were, but I would have loved to see newspaper articles and the files Alice had in her possession, and maybe even some photographs. Still, this book was great even without that addition.

The book was divided into two parts, the 'Now' section where Alice, Tone, Max, Emmy and Robert are in the village to see what it's like, and the 'Then' parts where we see the village in its 'prime time'. I have to say that while I liked both parts, the 'Then' section made the eventual reveal a bit predictable to me. Still, that didn't stop me from wholly enjoying this book and wanting to read more books like this (any recs?)

I can't say I really liked any of the characters, as they all had their flaws, but I think they were greatly written and I honestly felt bad for them.

In the end, I really enjoyed this book, and I think I will definitely recommend it to people who loved the above-mentioned movies, and even if you didn't love them (like me) but love stories about eerie abandoned places (Is that a thing? Books about abandoned places?). I actually think this book would make a great movie, or maybe even a (mini) series!

The Lost Village
Rating; 5 stars
Thank you to the publisher for the ARC given through NetGalley for review. All opinions are my own.

This was an amazing story! The storytelling kept me at the edge of my seat from start to finish. It was so scary good for me. I don't usually read this genre, but the synopsis of the story caught my attention. What happened to the people of this lost village?
It had me guessing about who or what had caused these people to go missing until the very end. I liked that the female lead, along with the secondary characters, were very well developed and the author gave us just enough to make us doubt their true intentions.
I highly recommend it and look forwards to reading from this author!

The Lost Village is a novel about a Swedish town that was completely abandoned by its citizens back in the late 1950's. Everyone knew that the town's only source of income was its mines and that the mines had been shut down and the workers sent home. The town, Silvertjarn, was a very remote village that relied heavily on its mining resources so once that resource became exhausted most of the villagers began thinking of moving elsewhere, unfortunately they never got that opportunity.

Alice is a modern day young filmmaker who hopes her big break is shedding light on the community of Silvertjarn. She is hoping to make a documentary film showcasing the abandoned village and hopefully trying to solve what may have happened to its inhabitants. Alice learned about the village from her grandmother, Margarita. Margarita grew up in the village, but moved away when she married. She still had family that lived in the village and was always heartbroken about their disappearance. Margarita never knew what happened to her entire family with the disapperance of Silvertjan. Alice deeply wants to solve this family mystery for her grandmother.

Alice gathers a team of five collegues along with filming equipment and camping supplies and heads for Silvertjarn. Their plan is to spend a total of six days exploring the abandoned homes and businesses and documenting their findings to come back at a later date to make a full blown documentary. The task seems simple, but the team soon finds out that the town isn't as abandoned as they thought.

This book kept me on the edge of my seat from beginning to end. It was a thrill ride! The thought of an abandoned village in the middle of nowhere is creepy in and of itself, but to know that its inhabitants vanished without a trace added to creepiness. I found myself looking over my shoulder while reading it, it was that creepy. I felt Camilla Sten's writing style to be completely immersive. She added just enough lulls in the story for your heart to stop racing before adding in another scare element.

Thanks to Netgalley and Minotaur books for an advanced copy for an honest review.

Camilla Sten gives us a story of 900 people disappearing from a small mining town in 1959.  Alice (the main character) heard about the town for years from her grandmother who lost family there. Alice finally realizes her dream and goes to the town to investigate and hopefully be able to film a documentary there in the near future. Ms Sten tells us the story going back and forth in time and does an excellent job of meshing the stories together. I want to thank NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an early copy to review.

The Lost Village - 4⭐

Quick synopsis: In the late 1950s, a small village in Sweden of about 900 people just disappear into thin air. Alice, an amateur filmmaker whose grandmother lost her entire family in the disappearance, gets together a crew to film a documentary entitled "The Lost Village" and secretly hopes she'll discover what really happened to all those villagers.

This was really engaging right from the beginning, which is what I love in a thriller. The story alternates from Alice in the present day, to Elsa (Alice's great grandmother) in the past. It maintains a fairly fast pace that continues to build and get creepier with each chapter. It would be so easy to binge this in a sitting or two, but I couldn't read it at night, between how eerie the setting was and the isolation of Alice and her documentary crew. There were a few twists along the way, some I guessed and others I didn't. While the end twist was pretty good, I did have some unanswered questions at the end and especially of the likelihood of the answers we did get.

Content warnings for graphic violence/murder - not a heavy focus but it was still moderately present.

Read if you enjoyed: The Sun Down Motel or The Forgotten Girls, or thrillers about conspiracy theories/cults or that take place in Sweden.

This book caught my attention right away and didn't let go until I turned the past page. The novel opens with a spooky--yet brief--prologue that describes those who found the abandoned town back in 1959. Right after that, there’s an invitation for the reader to become a backer for a documentary on this mysterious “lost village”. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to partially fund this project (like with Kickstarter) and earn supporter rewards in return. This epistolary style returns throughout the book, as we’re treated to letters that Alice’s great-aunt wrote to her grandmother in the months leading up to the mysterious disappearance of an entire town. 

This book is atmospheric and chilling. The author has a haunting prose that made even the most ordinary and normally simple things seem suspicious and eerie. When the blurb compared this book to the Blair Witch Project meets Midsommar, I was a little wary, but these comparators are entirely accurate. Even during the first of their five day stay in the town, there are creepy occurrences which might be supernatural in origin or signs that things aren’t as they appear with her crew.  Or, they might just be easily explained away as coincidence or Alice's overactive imagination.

The crew is small and full of relatable, interesting characters. Alice had to hire her former best friend, Emmy, as director, but they had a falling out back when they were still in college. Tensions are high between those two and everyone else, especially as things start to go south.

In addition to the letters, there are two timelines in the novel. “Now” features the film crew that’s shown up at Silvertjarn to get preliminary footage to show to backers to hopefully get the support they need for this documentary. 

There’s also a “Then” timeline, which follows Alice’s great-grandmother, Elsa, in the months leading up to the mass disappearance. Unfortunately, this is where the book fell a little flat to me. While the present day events are rife with foreboding, this tension didn’t quite carry through in the past timeline. Quite a few of the excerpts felt like filler. They were quite short, and they didn’t serve much more than to provide a little backstory about the town and to set the stage for what might happen. It felt like the author didn't need both the "Then" timeline and the letters, and it might have worked better if she had chosen one and gone a little deeper with it. I also can't help but wonder if the "Then" chapters were longer, maybe I would have become more invested in what was to come for Elsa, and maybe there could have been more characters as red herrings to make the story less linear and the twist about what happened to the town a little more surprising.

That said, the present day twists prior to the final twist were quite good. I was shocked a few times by the events that took place. Unfortunately (I’ve said that word a couple of times in this review, unf--sadly), the final twist required a little too much suspension of disbelief. I had so many questions, many of which were somewhat answered, but not well enough for my liking.

I'm giving this book 4 stars, because while I had some issues with the past timeline and the final twist, it was extremely well written, the characters were relatable, and the story itself was quite clever.
*This review will be posted to https://powerlibrarian.wordpress.com/ and other platforms on March 23, 2021*

I recommend this book to those who love a fast-paced, spooky thriller that has a compelling and clever plot.

This chilling thriller will have you staying up late with the lights!!! 3.5 stars

I received a copy of this book in exchange for fair and honest review.

Thank you to Netgalley, Camilla Sten and Minotaur for the gifted e-ARC in exchange for an honest review!

The Lost Village is set in the ghost town of a mining village in Sweden. In the summer of 1959, the entire village of Silvertarn vanished without a trace. The only two people left behind were the body of a woman who had been stoned to death and a newborn hidden away in the school.

In present day, aspiring documentary filmmaker Alice has pulled together a small crew to scout out Silvertarn for a new documentary. The village captivates Alice since her beloved Grandmother’s parents and sister are among those who vanished. Armed with her own research and the letters from her grandmother’s sister, Alice thinks they have a chance at discovering what really happened.

This book has been marketed as The Blair Witch Project meets Midsommar but I haven’t actually seen either of those movies so I can’t say whether I would agree with that or not. The book is extremely creepy from the beginning. The writing is atmospheric and chilling. You just know something bad is going to happen on any page now.

My biggest issue with the book is the use of people’s misunderstanding of mental illness as a plot device. I don’t want to go more into it and give away any spoilers but there were several statements that just didn’t sit well for me.

I would recommend this book to people who enjoy horror or ghost stories and aren’t squeamish.

The Lost Village is out March 23rd!

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