This is a DNF. This book was 18 hours and it feels like it. Maybe if I was reading this book instead of listening to it as an audiobook that might’ve made a difference. I got more than four hours into it, and I don’t care about anything that’s happening. Plus, there is slippage going back-and-forth. different characters brought in, it’s sometimes confusing. There is something out there in the mountains. Two experienced climbers go to hike this peak and only one comes back. And this hiker does not come back hole. They are missing half their face due to a fall. We start the story hearing from the significant other. We hear them talk about whether they should stay with the hiker or not. How people are praised for staying when things get rough instead of parting ways. But then you also have our hiker who’s like we “weren’t alone on the mountain there was something”. I’m at the point where the hiker is reminiscing about a hike with their grandmother. There are just so many limbs to this tree that the story is all over the place. There’s not a linear story and it is so big and so much more than it needs to that it made the book boring. As a reader I didn’t care about any of the characters. What I really cared about is the entity on the mountain but there’s been nothing. No hide nor hair, just there’s something on the mountain. This is almost like Midsummer. A great big buildup to fizzle out to nothing and has me thinking “Why does everybody love this?” That’s where I’m at in this book, which is why I am at 4 1/2 hours out of 18 and DNFing.

"Echo", a nature horror novel, is Thomas Olde Heuvelt’s second novel. I absolutely loved his previous novel "HEX", so I was very excited about this one.

The opening chapter in "Echo" is one of the creepiest ones I have ever read, so my expectations instantly went high.
The creepiness returns in multiple instances, and is satisfying when it does. However, there are also a lot of sections in between that, to me, felt like making the story too long. The novel is very character driven, and focuses alot on the relationship between Sam and Nick, the two main characters. A lot of readers may enjoy that, but I was hoping for a more compact, straight-up creepy horror.

The story sets off when Sam finds out about his boyfriend, Nick’s mountain climbing accident. Nick’s partner during the expedition that failed went missing, and Nick is severely injured and not remembering the events prior to the accident. Creepy things start happening around Nick, and Sam is set to discover what happened during Nick’s mountain expedition and what is happening with Nick.

I started this book last year when it came out, but it didn’t hold my attention then, and I put it down. This time around though, it captivated me a lot better. I had sections where my attention drifted off too, but overall, I felt much more invested in the story. I also noticed the chapter titles and quotes, which are all based on the author’s favorite novels and relate to the events of the specific chapter. I thought that was a really cool detail .

I listened to this book as an audiobook, and I really enjoyed the listening experience. Narrated by David Wayman, Greg Lockett, and Lauryn Allman, the audiobook was easy to be immersed in. Also, the transition between chapters and character voices was smooth.

Even though when I picked up “Echo” I was hoping it would be a lot more like “HEX”, I enjoyed “Echo” overall. Taking a break after the initial let down definitely helped, as I was able to enjoy the story for what it was, and not for how it compared to “HEX”. Having said that, it doesn't mean that if you liked HEX you won't like this one. However, if you were not a fan of HEX, I would definitely say give Thomas Olde Heuvelt another chance. 😉 Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for the audiobook arc.

⭐️⭐️⭐️. I was confused on the beginning but then it started coming around about a third of the way in. Definitely not as gripping as Hex for me but definitely a good read.

Echo is probably one of the strangest books I’ve read this year. By no means do I mean that to have a negative connotation because I genuinely liked my time listening to this audiobook, but wow did it have my head spinning! If I had to describe Echo I would call it mysterious, claustrophobic, and haunting. This is a story that feels like folklore meets modern day with a lot of callbacks to interesting traditions and beliefs. Add in an extremely secluded location and this book becomes the perfect setting for chills while reading.

Heuvelt does a fantastic job of building tension regarding what’s happening to Nick. Throughout the entire book I was committed to understanding what was happening and where things were going to end. One of my biggest struggles with the book was the pacing of the story. There’s a mixture of fast-paced sections with some very slow and repetitive sections mixed between. Despite the pacing concerns, I was in for the long-haul, which you’ll need to be, as this book is fairly chunky. The physical copy might not look like it, but the font inside is very small.

🎧: I loved the narrators for this book! They truly embodied the characters and brought the story to life in an incredibly convincing manner.

A huge thank you to Tor Nightfire for my gifted copy!

A dark excavation into the mind of a man who is losing it. This book combines horror, survival, travelogue, and psychiatric portrait into a text that will keep the heart pumping long through the night. The mountains are calling and I must go is the quote, but no one tells you the mountains may come back with you.

Love, love,love. I absolutely loved this book!! This author has become a must buy for me after loving this and their previous book, The Hex. Would absolutely recommend this to everyone I know!!

This was the creepiest book I’ve read in a while. Nik is a mountain climber who while climbing a Swiss mountain was severely injured and his climbing partner was killed. While hospitalized for his injury around 40 people at the hospital died do you mysterious circumstances. Sam Nik boyfriend starts noticing Nik acting strange living in the basement refusing to talk. Sam begins to believe that the mountain may have possessed Nik.

This book was very strange I liked it and it had very creepy vibes but there where parts where I was having a hard time following with the way this story was told. We get Sam and Nik perspectives the we also get Niks manuscript telling us about the climb. Then we start mixing some of Sams childhood in there as well. I really enjoyed the mythology of the villagers in the Swiss mountains but Sams story just kind of confused me where it all fit in. I would like to thank the publisher and Netgalley for a chance to read this book for an honest review.

*received for free from netgalley for honest review* This was a long and at times confusing read but it all came together really well in the end. Very creepy, would reread.

Review ** spoiler alert ** I don't know if I loved it or hated it. It was a great book, impregnated with a ridiculous amount of worthless pages. Yes, those pages built up the story and the characters but I also feel the same thing could have been done in a book half the size with just as much meaning and far less headache. I don't know. I'm conflicted, honestly. I loved it while also constantly saying "are we done yet?!"

The opening to this book captured me right away! It was incredibly spooky and chilling. I had to have more.

This book was creepy in the best of ways. Thomas Olde Heuvelt creates such a great mental image that I was jumping at my shadow! There was so much of this book I loved. However, I do wish it was shorter. At times it dragged with filler and my interest was harder to hold.

Overall, the book is good and I enjoyed the story.

Thank you Netgalley and Macmillan Audio for this advance listener copy in exchange for my honest review.

WOW!!! I could tell from the prologue that this was going to be a wild ride. The opening scene was one of the creepiest scenes in literary history. I've never gotten goosebumps from the written word until I started this book. This was more than a story. It was an experience. This book will sit with me for a while.

I'm not going to give anything away as I knew nothing about the story prior to listening to it and that's the way it should be with this book. I will say that I got House of Leaves, Stranger Things and the Exorcist vibes. It also reminds me of the true story of the Dyatlov pass incident in Russia in the 1950s. It was weird, beautiful and terrifying all at once. All I can say is EPIC. I've seen some reviews calling it "too long and drawn out", but I disagree completely.

The audio was fantastic! Told from the point of view of four different people and had three different narrators. Sam was my favorite, by far but the narrators for Nick and Julia and Emily we're also perfect. Four and a half stars. Perfect for fans of horror, sci-fi and physiological thrillers.

Though I have one of Heuvelt's earlier novels on my TBR, this actually marks my first experience with his writing. The premise of this creepy novel surrounds Mount Maudit in the Swiss Alps - a mountain where no one really ventures but one that Dutch climber, Nick, finds he cannot resist when he and his friend Augustin go on a trip. But only Nick returns from the mountain - gravely injured and perhaps not entirely himself. His boyfriend, Sam, at first is overwhelmed - and even a little spooked, but he soon finds himself fascinated while trying to discover more about the odd deaths that seem to follow Nick after his return from the horned mountain.

The audiobook is well-performed with multiple voice actors covering the different perspectives included. I'm not exactly sure why Nick has an English accent rather than Dutch, but I guess it was nice to have an added differentiation between his voice and Sam's. There's some creepy imagery here - and anyone who is unsettled by birds is sure to find this particularly alarming, I am sure! Although the bulk of the book doesn't technically take place during winter, all of the snow and freezing mountain air made this a good, creepy winter listen.

While the overall premise does strain credibility - it is within the horror genre, after all. The ending feels a bit chaotic and lacks some clarity that would make this a bit more satisfying. But it definitely captured my interest from start to finish, even if I didn't find myself really connecting with any of the characters very strongly. I was also quite surprised to discover that the mountain is actually a real one - and I enjoyed the setting quite a bit. I enjoyed listening to this one and am looking forward to digging out his earlier book from my TBR soon - and I am curious to see what Heuvelt will follow this one up with.

Interesting but not really my cup of tea. Well written I just personally couldn’t get into the story. My fault for not truly knowing that’s the book would fully be about. Predictable and honestly it was a struggle to keep my interest. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

This story started off super strong and had me immediately hooked with the terrifying story of what happened when two climbing partners went up a snowy mountain and only one came down, but he was forever changed by what happened. It was super creepy and horrifyingly descriptive and was super promising for the first 3rd of the story or so, but it was WAY too long and all of the unneeded information really bogged everything down for me. This was a struggle to listen to on audiobook as I would check my progress after hours of listening and still had like 10 hours left of the story. Overall though this may have been due to listening to it on audio, so I will definitely plan to pick this one up again via physical copy or e-book through my library!

I have been waiting so long for Echo. Heuvelt’s previous novel, Hex, remains one of the scariest and best horror novels I’ve ever read. It is genuinely terrifying. Little did I know, but Heuvelt mentions in the acknowledgements section of Echo that he suffered writer’s block after the success of Hex, which explains that gap between the two novels.

Echo is a cosmic, mountaineering horror novel. Nick returns from a climbing trip with severe injuries to his face, and a head full of memories of a strange and gruelling climb. But one thing he does not return with is his travelling companion, Augustin. Nick begins to exhibit incredibly strange, supernatural behaviour, while his partner, Sam, tries to figure out what the heck is going on. Did Nick bring the spirit of the mountain home with him? And what’s with all these weird birds?

Like in Hex, Heuvelt terrifies the reader right from the start, and things just get weirder and weirder. Minor spoilers, but about a quarter of the way through Echo, birds fly out of someone’s face. If that level of strangeness isn’t your thing, then you might want to give Echo a swerve.

One thing I love about Heuvelt is that his characters are very believable. They make jokes in the face of danger, they make pop culture references, and they seem genuinely baffled by bizarre situations.

My minor gripe with Echo is that it is very long. Towards the end I got quite impatient, and just wanted to get to the end. In the (very informative) acknowledgements, Heuvelt mentions he is a mountaineer, and this is evident in some of the lengthier descriptive passages on things like knots. I can appreciate that the slower pace of some chapters reflects the slow, painful ascent of a mountain, but I just like my horror to be a little punchier.

Don’t get me wrong; Echo is a good horror novel. It is clearly a very personal work for Heuvelt; he mentions in acknowledgments that this book is dedicated to his climbing buddy who sadly passed away in 2017. And Heuvelt was obviously fighting his own battle to get out of his writer’s block. I’m glad we finally got a new novel from Heuvelt, and I’m super excited for his next book, Oracle.

This story started off so great! It was heart-racing, spooky, and had me on the edge of my seat, but then it just hit a wall. It was so slow, and honestly needed to be shorter. There was way too much information that wasn't necessary, and it became a struggle to stay interested. I like the concept, I just got bogged down.

“We are born with the dead. See, they return and bring us with them.” - T.S Eliot, Little Gidding.

Echo tells the chilling tale of Sam, a well-traveled American, and Nick, his Dutch mountain-climber boyfriend who returns from a climbing trip permanently disfigured and sans his climbing partner, Augustin. Nick and Sam struggle to come to terms with what happened to Nick on the Maudit-the mountain that destroyed Nick's face-and with what's to come next. Because Nick's injuries extend beyond the natural, and the Maudit does not let go of those who climb it so easily.

Echo was originally published in Dutch in 2019 and the translated English version was just published in February 2022. The translator, Moshe Gilula, did a stellar job. The story maintains the ominous tone, the tense moments, and the impactful imagery that I can only imagine are all present in the original version. It is sometimes hard to tell what is actually happening to the characters and what is just playing out in a character's mind, which was a disorienting experience and suited the story very well. And the inner dialogue of our multilingual American main character, Sam, feels very natural.

The audiobook narrators also deserve praise. The book is read mainly by 2 readers-David Wayman and Greg Lockett-who voice the two main characters, Nick and Sam. Lauryn Allman adds her voice to a short section of the book as well. The narrators all acted their parts quite believably, with emotion and variety, although it was an unusual choice to give Nick an English accent since he is Dutch in the book.

This book vacillates between the creepy, the strange, the darkly mysterious, and the more relatable struggles of two men dealing with traumatic experiences. We hear a little bit about Sam's early life and a life-altering event he still struggles to overcome even though it happened so many years ago. And of course, Nick grapples with low self esteem and the unfamiliar feeling of being undesirable now that his face is disfigured and his life forever changed.

The main critique I have of this book is that it is rather long-winded for a story of suspense. Many scenes could have been cut quite a bit shorter so that the strangeness of the events could shine through. There is a substantial amount of repetition that eventually ceases to be ominous and borders on annoying as we get further into the book. We also get quite a few explanations early on in the book that could have waited until later, so as to build suspense. Overall, I think a tighter and a more concise story would have had more impact.

I do like the mixing of pronouns used by our main protagonist, Sam. Throughout the book he uses “I,” “You,” and “We” almost interchangeably to refer to himself. I thought it added to the overall strangeness and unreality of the book.

I went into Echo hoping for Hex. That is my bad. I shouldn’t have done so and I imagine that is the bane of so many author’s when they write each book. People wanting more of the same. In my defense, the description sounded like I was getting another thriller. The opening was one of the creepiest I have read in a long time. So intense and scary! I was actually glad to be reading it in a well-lit and crowded place.

Then it slowed way down. I mean waaaaayyyyy down. There was a lot of poetic descriptions of mountain climbing. I don’t get mountain climbing. I love mountains. I live in a forest on a mountain. I love hiking. I don’t get thinking you have somehow conquered something by reaching the top of it, nor do I see why you would want to think your had conquered a mountain. I guess this story is the answer to those who think they have. You have not.

What most of this story was really about was the changes in a relationship after a disfiguring accident. In that regard it was moving. One of the main characters was so shallow that even his own admission of it could not make him likable. He was dealing with a lot, but he really seemed focus on the physical far too much. It was creepy in a completely different way at this point because you never seemed to know what was real and what wasn’t. There were a lot of these instances. Too many. They didn’t really build. They just happened. The whole thing took far too long and was repetitive to the point of monotony at times. I found myself listening on a much higher speed in order to get through some of the chapters.

Echo tried to be many things and it was only partially successful in each.

I’m an avid hiker, so I was incredibly excited to read a horror novel set on a climbing trip in the Swiss Alps. I’ve traveled to a handful of places mentioned by Nick in his travels–I’ve climbed Mt. Taranaki, which is mentioned in passing, and my friends and I got lost in fog near the summit. That’s what I was picturing while I listened to the scenes of Nick and Augustin lost on the Maudit.

Obviously, my favorite scenes were the ones on the mountain! I also enjoyed the creepy Swiss mountain town, which seemed nothing like the picture-perfect ones I’ve visited.

Echo grew on me more and more as I listened. At first I was a little lost, and it definitely helped to have a physical copy to read back through to figure out what had confused me. Without a physical copy, I would have had to restart the audiobook a few times for clarity. At the beginning, I thought I might not be smart enough to follow the author’s train of thought. Once I got a hang of the story, though, I began to really like it.

Relationships aren’t usually the focal point of horror novels, but I really liked Nick and Sam’s. I also liked Sam’s relationship with his little sister. The scene where she brought him his childhood teddy bear to give him courage was so sweet!

I definitely think horror fans will enjoy this creepy, atmospheric story.

The audiobook was narrated by David Wayman, Greg Lockett, and Lauryn Allman. I love to listen to horror novels, because I think it really enhances the experience. The terror in the character’s voices doesn’t always come across as well when you’re just reading, and these voice actors did an amazing job of increasing the suspense.

This Audiobook was amazing! I went back and forth between physically reading and listening but I was continually pulled to listening because it genuinely creeped me out!
This book gets the award for most terrifying start of a novel. This book had such creepy imagery throughout the whole thing. Still thinking about certain parts of this book made the hair on the back of my neck stand up! My only complaint is I thought it was a tad long and there were a few parts I just skimmed but there were plenty of parts that made up for that! I also think that there was a great disservice done by not advertising that this is gay horror. I think to many people that is a selling point on it's own because there isn't a ton of LGBTQ horror. Overall this.is gonna be added to my All Time Favorite Horror list.