This is such a fun concept! It starts off intense right away, and between the bloody cover and the great first page, I think a lot of teens will like this. It's a great Halloween read, and also has fun mystery/thriller elements that will appeal to teens who like that kind of thing.

It was easy to fall into the story and the real mystery is who Wyatt can trust and what really happened to her mom. There are pieces of Wyatt's memory missing and the police have no real leads. Could someone Wyatt knows have committed the murder?

This was such a gripping and twisty murder mystery! Seriously, I can't remember the last time I read a YA thriller that was so deliciously dark and engrossing. Sara Walters has definitely become an auto-buy author for me!

This will definitely be rated higher if you're more in that YA range. I hate sometimes reviewing YA because I want to be honest on how I feel but you have to keep in mind it's not written for me as I'm in my late 20s. So with that in mind, there was a lot to love about this book and I really am a sucker for YA books like this. The begining was written well with tension and food slow building but then it faltered and became rushed. It's more on the line, as you read, of teen angst and poor choices. But there are so heavy issues and things brought up.

I have received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

""After Wyatt's mother was murdered last Fall, she's convinced that the November sickness plaguing Wolf Ridge isn't just a rumor but an evident force infecting her town. As Wyatt's best friend Cash turns on her, and her friend is almost killed in a tragic accident, Wyatt fears no one around her is safe. As the evidence behind her mother's death starts to disappear, Wyatt wonders, is she just imagining everything, or is the sickness probing people into doing bad things?! She is going to prove the ailment exists while finding her mother's murderer in the process.""

I really couldn't wait for the book to come out, but I really enjoyed it. This one dark and disturbing book. Be prepared if violence, murder, or suicide are triggers for you. I was horrified when the author revealed the true nature of the sickness.

This is a book you have to read and not in the dark!!

A good spooky read I was able to figure out the ending no surprise plot twist for me.
Definitely some trigger warnings here on sexual assault, death if family member, and suicide.
An over all good spooky YA thriller that's a quick read and easy to follow.

This is a very good mystery/thriller that is hard to put down. The Violent Season by Sara Walters is a quick read, fast-paced and has an absolutely shocking twist at the end! I enjoyed every second of this thrill ride even if I was constantly trying to connect the dots attempting to see the whole picture. There is so much I loved about this book! It kept me on my toes and I really could not ever figure out what was really going on. It's a wild ride and I definitely recommend it.

In Wolf Ridge, November descends on the town with a thirst for violence. Wyatt's mother was murdered last year, giving a first-hand look at how the November sickness grips the people of her town. She wants to prove that the violence in her town is more than legend and solve her mothers murder while she's at it. When her best friend turns on her her mission becomes all the more urgent. Will she and her friends survive this Violent Season?

This was definitely a really cool premise for a creepy tense autumn read, I think the story was a little rushed which lessened the amount of tension and anticipation in the atmospheric moods. I personally couldn't get onboard with crushing on Cash and I thought Wyatt deserved better than the way he treated her, even if his coldness had reasoning. However Porter did keep my interest. Overall, the story just underwhelmed me compared to other YA thrillers I have encountered, The twist lacked build up and became repetitive within the second half. I wanted more. It was not a bad book my any means and did have some important discussions!

I would still recommend giving this one a chance, I just wasn't into the chemistry or the attempted love triangle when the creepy town was much more interesting to me.

I definitely enjoyed this read, especially once I reached the point where I knew a big twist was coming! Wyatt and all of her counterparts were great, which is super important to me as a reader. My only gripe was that the book felt a little unbalanced. The first part was so wonderfully tense and slow building, and then the ending just rushed in and the book was over. I'm all for a big reveal, and I felt like that was done right! I think I just maybe wanted a little more closure. Still, wonderful story! Would recommend!

An interesting premise. I was gripped from the start.
It turned out to be a different kind of novel to the one I was expecting, a more substantial interesting story.

Trigger warnings: Sexual and physical assault, attempted rape, attempted mass murder.

This was a good YA thriller about a small town where a disproportionate number of strange and terrible things happen, often in November. One of those things was the murder of Wyatt’s mom, and she’s on a mission to find out why theses things are happening in her town.

This was not really the book I expected, and maybe that’s on me - but the blurb hints at a supernatural aspect to the story which was part of what really appealed to me, and that never really materialized in the book. While I did miss that, it was still a fairly quick and engaging read and I’m looking forward to reading more from the author.

I’m grateful to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Fire for the opportunity to read and review The Violent Season.

Thank you to Sourcebooks Fire and NetGalley for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Wyatt and Cash are teens living in a small town that seems to have more than it's share of death, all of which occurs every November.
The two teens have lost their mothers, one to suicide and one to murder, and have now bonded together in their grief. Wyatt believes that the local urban legend of violence affecting the townspeople is the reason for her mother's death.
This is a well written book that does a very good job of bringing to life Wyatt's emotional breakdown and confusion in her life.
I went into this book expecting something similar to Stephen King or Bentley Little books where an evil presence
takes control of the townspeople forcing them to commit acts of violence. This storyline is more of one of teenage angst and poor choices.
Great story for readers of all ages.

A character study of a toxic relationship and all mayhem and chaos that can spiral from that. The Violent Season is an edge of your seat thriller that will keep you enthralled.

While this book was a quick fever dream of a read, you'll have to suspend your disbelief a bit and just go along for the ride.

Content warnings: domestic abuse, murder, suicide, drug abuse, sexual assault

Thank you NetGalley and Sourcebooks Fire for this ARC. All opinions are my own.

This is the kind of book you have to sit with. I wasn’t sure how I felt overall until about the last 50 pages. But yeah. This story was stellar. A wild ride for sure. The fact that Wyatt grew so much was impressive. I also love a story where characters are more than their stereotypes. I didn’t care for the sickness premise, but the whole concept of death, murder, suicide and general violence cropping up at the same time every year is fishy. So I believe the sickness sounded the most plausible. I can’t truly explain why I like this book. Was it the story line? The atmosphere? The character development? I’m honestly not sure. But elements of each were perfection.

Think Fear Street with more doubt, uncertainty and following the tragedy of one girl's pain.

TW: abusive relationship, attempted SA, suicide, mental health, violence, PTSD, drug abuse and murder.

Reading this book, you almost feel like you are involved in a light fever dream as you follow and wonder with the MC if this town is genuinely cursed or if it holds more evil people than usual. The city suffers more heartache and pain than most, but what indeed is frightening is the fact that it all seems to occur in November. We see the spiralling of MC as she tries to break away from a toxic and abusive relationship/friendship and find a cause for why her mother was murdered a year ago.

This book did a great job of showing how you don't know you are in a toxic situation until you see it from the outside or a BIG red flag occurs and even then how hard it is to break away from. While I am happy she broke away quickly after it, I know this isn't always the case.

Thank you, NetGalley, for an e-ARC of The Violent Season by Sara Walters.
The Violent Season pulled me in from the beginning. Sara Walters does an excellent job creating characters and plot. However, there were loose ends left over, and the resolution seemed rushed. I loved the Gatsby theme that was woven through the story, but I wish that theme would have been carried through to the end.

I was hopeful about this title but it unfortunately landed in my "basic ya mystery/thriller" camp. It's not a bad book, but it didn't hold my attention and I just didn't care. It didn't do anything special and it was essentially a cookie-cutter ya thriller. I wasn't shocked by the reveal and it didn't have any mystery around it. It was more contemporary with a slightly darker tinge.

Also, "breath I didn't know I was holding" was used more than once which I'm sorry but I had to knock a star off for that.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC.
I wasn't too sure what to expect from this book. Based on the blurb, I was super excited for it.

So we have Wyatt Green, a young lady whose mom was brutally murdered during her towns "Violent Season" which she believes happens every November and now Wyatt is trying to get answers.

There are many characters in here that come to play. I was suprised at some of the topics disussed in here such as toxic/abusive relationships and addictions. Just a trigger warning for anyone out there.

The whole premise of a town cursed one month a year where its citizens are filled with violent urges was original and interesting to read about. However, I really didn't think the love story between Wyatt, Cash and Porter as needed as there was so much going on. that was way more interesting.

Thank you again for the arc!

LOVED loved loved this book.

The writing had me captivated from the start to finish, and I found myself reading it almost straight through one sitting. I look forward to reading more by this author.

I have one word for this book and that is WOW.
I thought this was going to be another enjoyable and fast paced YA thriller, and it was, but it was also so much more than that. It shows how we deal with grief, abuse and trauma. This had many heavy themes in it and I recommend checking trigger warnings before reading.
November seems to bring nothing but violence and bad luck for everyone in Wolf Ridge, Vermont. No one knows that better than Wyatt who found her mother murdered last year, whose classmates and friends and neighbors have all had tragedy befall them. She’s aLeo been in love with Cash Peters as long as she can remember. She’ll do anything to make him happy including drink, smoke, and isolate herself from those around her. When she becomes close with Porter Dawes, the one boy Cash hates the most, Porter helps Wyatt see that maybe Cash isn’t as good for her as she thought. But everyone of them has been keeping secrets. And as November rolls around again with tragedy in its wake, can Wyatt finally get the answers she’s been looking for?
Not only did the suspense of this story drive me to finish this in one sitting, but so did Wyatt’s growth. She learned to trust herself to see people for who they really are. I loved watching how everything unfolded and how strong she stayed through it all. This is one that will stay with me for weeks.