Tidepool by Nicole Willson

Thank you to NetGalley and The Parliament House for providing me with an advanced copy of "Tidepool."

This book was an exceptional read from start to finish. The blend of Lovecraftian horror with a gothic atmosphere was enthralling. I devoured it in one sitting and was left yearning for a sequel or prequel. The eerie setting and complex undertones added a rich layer of suspense that kept me hooked throughout. The characters were compelling, and the plot was satisfyingly twisted.

Though some elements were a bit predictable, the overall experience was gripping. I'm excited to see more from Nicole Willson and hope to revisit this world in future works.

This was such a good book, The plot, the characters, I read it all in one sitting and wished there was a sequel or even a prequel. The creepy/Lovecraftian undertones, the desperation of several characters, the subplot-I hope there are more books set in this world.

This book had atmosphere out the wazoo! The characters were fantastic, all of them, heroes, villains and in between. This was a fun, slow burn horror story that wasn’t too scary but satisfyingly creepy and twisted. I would definitely recommend!

Tidepool reminded me of a Lovecraftian horror story, which sparked my interest right away.

We, as readers, follow the story of Sorrow, a young woman who travels to a small town — Tidepool — to search for her brother, Henry Hamilton, who disappeared on a business trip. The whereabouts and fate of her brother are disclosed within the prologue, but the search for the truth from Sorrow's perspective still remains exciting. Personally, I liked the idea that, as a reader, I was already aware of what had happened to her brother. That knowledge made me root for Sorrow even more.

The author's writing further intensified the excitement while reading. The scenes and environment were rendered in rich detail, allowing me to picture the fast-paced scenes in detail, making it easy to further engage with the story. Especially the descriptions of smells have remained in my head, as this makes the book's atmosphere very oppressive and creepy. The creepiness that the writing evokes is perfectly executed for this kind of genre.

Although I was excited by the book's premise and the detailed writing, the depth of the characters sadly fell short for me. The characters are written very flatly and do not develop throughout the story. Sorrow is described as independent and strong, but unfortunately, we don't learn much more about her beyond that. This is similar for all of the secondary characters as well. Each of them remains the same throughout the story. Overall, the characters seem very flat, which is sad, as this character-driven story would have benefited from more dimensional characterizations.

Ultimately, Tidepool was a good read but sadly didn't fully live up to my expectations. Nonetheless, I would recommend this book to fans of short, gothic, and Lovecraftian fiction.

** Disclaimer **
I was lucky to receive an eARC of "Tidepool" thanks to The Parliament House and NetGalley. Nonetheless, I want to emphasize that this review reflects my honest opinion!

3.5 stars, rounded to 4 for the quick flow of the story.

**Thanks to NetGalley and The Parliament House for the free copy of this title in exchange for an honest review**

Tidepool follows a girl named Sorrow in her quest to find her brother Hal. Hal has disappeared in a town called Tidepool, and when Sorrow arrives the residents are almost comically unwilling to help her out. I found the characters to be very much caricatures of certain stereotypes to an extreme which made them hard to relate to.

I definitely enjoyed this as a quick Scifi/fantasy read and appreciated the Lovecraftian elements. I don’t want to spoil the main reveals of this story, but I will say that after a certain point it became a little predictable. The story describes everything in such detail, leaving little to the imagination.

While I liked the writing style and felt that the story flowed very well, I just couldn’t fully get behind the plot or the characters at any point. I would recommend this book for fans of scifi, sea monsters, and Lovecraft, or for a quick read to get out of a reading slump.

This was a DNF for me. It wasn’t my style of read which is okay, it wasn’t bad but just not what I love,

I really enjoyed this book, very atmospheric and gothic. It was written well. At times predictable but I still liked the story. Sorrow, the main character, was strong and enjoyed her character. I will definitely read kore of this authors work.

I’m looking forward to purchasing a physical copy to have on my shelf.

Thanks to NetGalley and The Parliament House Press for an advance reader copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All opinions expressed here are my own.

This was an interesting read.. I usually read fantasy novels that focus on action with/without a romantic subplot and rarely include horror aspects. Tidepool is different, it's a gothic horror reminiscent of Lovecraft, atmospheric and sinister enough to make your skin crawl.

The writing is fluid, easy to read, and evocative creating the creepy vibe specific to gothic horror. I liked that a lot.
Characterwise, I like Sorrow for the most part. She’s a strong female character who won’t submit to what society expects of her. There are some fun interactions with the folks of Tidepool about that. So I love that she has agency but throughout the story her behavior is inconsistent. And there were some aspects that seemed far-fetched.
Another thing that I found off-putting was the indecision of the characters. Do we leave? Do we stay? They’re never on the same page and the story drags a bit waiting for them to make up their mind.
All things considered, the storyline is engrossing even though a bit predictable, and the mystery is revealed too early. Nevertheless, it was a page-turner and I recommend Tidepool to fantasy/horror readers.

This was an interesting book. It was gothic but it was different in that it was also a true horror story - this is a genre that I do not normally read but I felt that this book delivered in a unique but interesting way. The protagonist and the antagonist both were female, and the men were secondary characters in general.

There were small areas for improvement but overall this novel was an entertaining and enjoyable read - I definitely would read from this author again.

Tidepool is a gothic horror debut from author Nicole Willson. It's reminiscent of a Lovecraftian tale with very dark atmosphere in a creepy seaside town. Wilson's writing is smooth and coherent, with a lot of promise for future reads. She clearly has an excellent imagination and she has a talent for creating a nice, creepy feel.

While the atmosphere won me over, the protagonist (Sorrow) was a problem for me. At times she seemed to have a good head on her shoulders, but then she would make the stupidest decisions. Dumb characters who behave like slasher film victims are not my fave. This made the plot run a bit circular, dragged down the pacing, and made the story less believable. (I realize that believable is an odd thing to mention when dealing with a speculative fiction read, but that's what we're going with.)

The storyline was fun and creepy, but admittedly fairly predictable. While I enjoyed this quick, gothic read, I just wanted something a bit more solid and shocking. The writing, however, shows great promise and with Willson's clever imagination I expect that she may have some good spooky stories to share in the future.

* Disclaimer: I received a copy of this novel from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. *

Thank you, the publisher and NetGalley, for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I don't usually read Gothic horror stories, but this one turned out to be so good. This book is one of a kind!

"Tidepool looked like the kind of place where people went to die, not to live. "

Tidepool is a small village that some rich people wanted to turn into a resort. We follow Sorrow; a woman came to this town to find her brother, Henry, who vanished after a business trip to this town. While Sorrow was searching for Henry, she felt something weird. The locals kept assuring her that they had no idea what happened to her brother. Creepy! Even when she tried to leave town, she couldn't!

I loved the author's voice. The writing was beautiful. The book was easy to read, and the plot was engaging. A bit predictable but fun to read.

I loved Sorrow; she is a strong, independent woman who chose a different path than what her father drew for her. She didn't want to get married. Instead, she wanted to be a journalist. And I loved her for that!

I enjoyed the unexpected twist at the end, and it tied all the loose ends up very well.

Overall, I enjoyed reading this book, and I recommend it to everyone who likes horror stories.

An excellent story in which the author Nicole Willson manages to recreate the atmosphere of Lovecraft's stories.
I hope the author continues to provide us with more books with this same quality and style.

I tore through this atmospheric monster story about a young woman investigating the disappearance of her brother in a creepy and run-down fishing town. A feeling of dread seeps through the pages in Tidepool, where disturbing things wash up on the beach and everyone has something to hide. The characters were compelling, and I particularly enjoyed the focus on sibling relationships throughout the novel. My only critique is that I felt the ending was a bit of a let-down compared to all of the simmering buildup at the earlier points in the book. I was looking for a bit more action, or possibly some more complex revelations about what is going on in Tidepool. However, the book was still a fast-paced and entertaining read that captured the feeling of an ominous, stormy town on the sea in a delightful way!

I read very little horror. I don't really know why, because unlike from horror movies, I don't get weeks of nightmares, but it's just not a genre I have on my radar. And since my sample size is so small, I can't help but to compare Tidepool to All the Murmuring Bones, which I read earlier this year. Both center around the sea and [redacted], and it's just unfortunate that my only other experience with horror is apparently Dracula and its retelling Dowry of Blood (I was not aware that Dracula counts as horror to be fair, so I'm inclined to just not count it). I try to rate this without being influenced too much, but it was bad timing.

Tidepool is a small village in, I believe, Maine, US. It's 1913, and some rich dudes want to turn Tidepool into a resort town. Tidepool does decidedly not want this.
After her brother disappears from the face of earth, Sorrow (ngl I love her name) makes her way to the last place he's been seen alive. Yep, it's Tidepool. And well, Tidepool isn't happy to see her. Even less so when she starts asking uncomfortable questions and starts poking the wrong sleeping bears.

I had fun though. I mean, it was grisly and dark and everything felt very wet (you'll get it), but it was pretty well written and once I actually started it, I breezed through Tidepool. I did not need the Epilogue at all, it would've worked better for me personally if that had been missing, but otherwise, a solid novel(la? it's prettys short). And because it's so short, I won't talk about how some characters were a bit flat, just because you can't give every major character 50 pages of background if your story is only 200 pages long. I did like Quentin a whole lot though. He was probably my favourite, and it was really cool to read about his interaction with all the other characters.


(Also, did you see that incredibly cool cover???? It's great. I love it. I am not above admitting that I requested this purely because of the cover. But it was also fun and short to read, so it was a win-win for me!)



@NetGalley and The Parliament House: Thank you guys for this ARC!

This is a Gothic horror story featuring Miss Sorrow Hamilton who goes to a Northeast coastal town, Tidepool, to search for her missing brother.

Tidepool is a “Lovecraftian Gothic novel,” but the Lovecraftian creatures don’t take center stage. It’s the town’s claustrophobic feel, the grim countenances of the residents, and their dislike of outsiders that give Sorrow so much trouble. SOMETHING is wrong, the reader can tell, but we’re not quite sure what it is. Are the townfolk hiding a serial killer? Are the waters infested with sharks?

I thought the way Willson revealed the town's secret in a roundabout way, hinting here and giving a glimpse there, was brilliant. I couldn’t stop turning pages the deeper I got into the book.

I am surprised at how much action Willson manages to put into a slow burn Gothic story. (There really is something for every reader in this book.)

The only thing I question about this story is the ending. Willson not only creates a tidy ending for the major plot/characters, but also she goes on to neatly tie up everything else. I would have been okay with a little ambiguity at the end, but perhaps other readers wouldn’t. There’s nothing in the ending that actually spoiled the book for me, so no stars off.

Willson has written a fabulous Gothic horror novel, five stars! I’m thankful to NetGalley for a chance to read and review an advanced copy of this book.

Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone book that I got through NetGalley to review.

Thoughts: This was a well done historical thriller/mystery with heavy Lovecraft influence. It was an easy enough read and kept me engaged the whole time. I did think that it went on just a bit too long at the end, but it did tie all the loose ends up well.

The story focuses on Sorrow Hamilton who goes to the town of Tidepool searching for her missing brother. What she finds there stretches the bounds of sanity and what she knows of the world.

The story itself ends up being fairly predictable if you have read Lovecraft types of horror before. It's all about what dwells in the deep and the effect on sanity it has on the humans around it. I did enjoy the idea of a priesthood that protects humanity and loved that this priesthood had to constantly commit evil deeds for a greater good (it made for an ironic moral balance).

This was well written and easy to read. I never had any issue with staying engaged in the story. I do feel like it could have taken things a bit deeper and further and that would have made it more intriguing and less predictable.

My Summary (4/5): Overall I enjoyed this and would recommend it if you enjoy these dark types of “eldritch horrors of the deep” types of stories. This was well written and engaging. I do think it was a bit predictable and that the ending went on for too long. However, I really enjoyed some of the ideas presented in this story as well. I definitely plan on checking out Willson’s future books.

the writing style of this book added an even eerier feeling to the town and story of tidepool. i really enjoyed it, although it could have been shorter.

Ms. Ada Wilson and her brother were my favorite characters by far. I would read again just for them.

The nitty-gritty: Dripping with atmosphere and creepy characters, Tidepool is a treat for lovers of cosmic horror.

Tidepool is Nicole Willson’s debut novel, and wow I had so much fun with this! This is a horror tale that takes place in 1913 Maryland and almost feels like a cozy mystery in the beginning. But watch out, because this story has teeth—or tentacles, maybe I should say—and it doesn’t take long before blood is spilled and bodies are torn apart. But I’m getting ahead of myself!

The story centers around Sorrow Hamilton, a young woman whose brother Henry has gone missing after he visited the seaside town of Tidepool. Henry and his father want to turn Tidepool into a tourist attraction, but the reclusive locals have no interest at all in opening their town up to a bunch of strangers. When Henry doesn’t return after a couple of weeks, Sorrow decides to take matters into her own hands and sets out for Tidepool, even though her father forbids her to go.

But when she arrives, she finds a dank, shabby town full of unfriendly locals who insist that they don’t know what happened to Henry. And when Sorrow sees a dead body wash up on the shore, she knows something isn’t quite right in Tidepool. Who is the mysterious Mrs. Ada Oliver and why does she keep her daughter Lucy in the basement? What really happened to Henry? And what does the ominous message in the cemetery-—“If ye give not willingly, the Lords will rise”—mean? No matter how hard Sorrow tries to leave Tidepool, she's thwarted by one thing or another. If she doesn’t get out soon, it might be too late…

This is one of those stories that creeps up on you, and I do mean “creeps”. The first chapter is told from Henry’s point of view, as he arrives in Tidepool and tries to make friends with the locals, telling them his grand development ideas and how they will benefit the town financially. But by the end of the chapter, the reader has an idea of Henry’s fate, although the details are a little vague. When Sorrow decides to go after him, we switch to her perspective. Sorrow doesn’t know what the reader knows, so it was fun to see her try to piece together all the clues. At the same time, there was always a question in the back of my mind about what really happened to Henry, so reading that chapter didn’t spoil anything, it only added to the suspense and creepiness of the tale.

Willson drops hints about the weirdness of Tidepool as the story goes along—the suspicious behavior of the townspeople, the odd man on the beach who is gathering sea water into jars, the local police who don’t seem concerned about a dead body on the beach—and that weirdness grows as the reader comes to realize that something sinister is lurking just below the surface. Sorrow senses this right away and tries to leave town over and over, but something is keeping her in Tidepool. 

The story is full of fascinating characters, and my favorites by far were Sorrow and Ada, two very strong women who are complete opposites but actually have a lot in common. Sorrow is a woman way ahead of her time. Her father wants her to act like a proper lady and get married, but Sorrow is a writer and her dream is to become a journalist someday. She has an annoying suitor named Charlie Sherman, who is sent to Tidepool by her father to find her and bring her home. Charlie tries to push her around, but I was happy to see that Sorrow wasn’t going to have any of that nonsense. She was a delightfully independent woman in a time when women weren’t allowed to do much on their own. 

Ada’s character surprised me, because in the beginning I didn’t like her much. She’s portrayed as the villain, and there are oh so many secrets swirling around her. She’s rich, for one thing, and she always dresses in outdated dreary black dresses. She lives in a creepy mansion on the hill with her daughter Lucy and her brother Quentin, and the townsfolk seem to respect her and her odd family, for some reason. It isn’t until Ada gets her own chapter that we learn about her past and how she came to live in Tidepool. This is the point where the story really took off for me, since another layer of the mystery is pulled back and the reader finally learns about what’s really going on in Tidepool. Ada is driven by her duty to protect the town, and in fact she reminded me a little of Buffy!

I also loved Quentin, Ada’s weird brother. Quentin and Sorrow develop a nice friendship during her stay in Tidepool, and he turned out to be a really interesting character with plenty of his own surprises. As for Charlie, well I couldn’t stand him, but I don’t think you’re supposed to like him. Charlie has only one thing on his mind—getting Sorrow to follow him around and do whatever he says. Luckily, Sorrow isn’t that kind of girl!

As for the story itself, it did not go at all where I was expecting it to go. The big, bloody finale happens well before the end of the book, which surprised me because I couldn’t figure out how the author was going to wrap things up. But then, we get to follow Ada, Quentin and Sorrow after those events to see what happens next, and I really loved the fact that Willson includes these “bonus” chapters in her story.

If you’re a fan of slow burn, creeping terror of the Lovecraftian variety, you’ll probably love Tidepool. I’m hooked, and I can’t wait to see what Nicole Willson does next!

Big thanks to the publisher and the author for providing a review copy.

First, I was given a free copy of this book by Netgalley for an honest review. Second, this is more of a 3.5 rating versus just three stars.

Anyway, this was a fun, quick read. Normally, horror novels usually don't scare me, so it's not a surprise to say that this book falls into that category. Having said that, I still enjoyed the mystery and the horror in this book. The main character, Sorrow Hamilton, goes to Tideland against her father's wishes in search of her missing brother. There, she discovers more than what she expected and finds that no matter how hard she tries, she just can't leave Tideland.

What I found fascinating about reading this book was how inquisitive and independent Sorrow is in comparison to the majority of the male characters. The men are constantly trying to force her into the damsel in distress role, and she's just not having it. It's both amusing and annoying to read because the repressive culture of the early 20th century is still there, still looming even as the main character takes ownership of her own agency.

The setting itself is oppressive, and dark. The author succeeds and just conveying the unearthliness of Tideland. The strangeness. The evil just lurking beyond sight. By the end of the novel, I wanted more. And because of the way the novel ended, there were some things that just didn't make sense or needed a bit more of an explanation.

Either way, this was a fun read, and if you are a fan of horror, then this won't disappoint.

Oh wow, this book. First of all, I loved, loved the writing. It was so atmospheric and gothic and I loved the vibes it gave me...like Haunting of Bly Manor kinda type of narration. The whole story was creepy and horrific — I think the character that intrigued me the most was Ada. You can say that she's one of the villains here, and she definitely does not show much remorse at all, but her back story will definitely make you sympathize with her. On the other hand, while I did like Sorrow, it did feel like there were some inconsistencies with her character, she just seemed so casual sometimes, despite everything that was going down. The other characters sometimes felt like caricatures, but I did like Quentin though. Charles was kinda annoying. My other note was that there were like, five chapters of epilogue. I think it would have been better if there were maybe just two, or even one. Although I do like a good, detailed epilogue, it did feel rather unnecessary. The last chapter especially I didn't see what the point was, since I think the point it was trying to make was already well established.