Enter The Darkness features four characters entering a mysterious cave, each with their own reasons. I've always found caves to be pretty spooky and this particular one has secrets and ghost stories so it was interesting to read. The writing is concise and punchy. There were moments when characters felt disoriented and were in danger of losing their minds, which were the best parts for me. But then more characters are added and they don't get the chance to shine, only reduced to their secrets. Two characters have lost their sisters and it is hard to tell them apart because their names and the way they speak are similar. I was not a fan of the hanging ending which seems prime for a sequel. Overall, an intriguing concept but I wish I had enjoyed it more. Fans of survival horror (especially in caves!) will find this right up their alley.

You Want To Enter The Darkness.

Garth, a young man with a mysterious past, starts his dream job as a tour guide at the Chislehurst Caves in Kent. Cassie, a beautiful young girl, is visiting the caves in a desperate attempt to contact the spirit of her sister. When Cassie goes missing on Garth’s first tour, they both quickly realize that they were both dead wrong about the source of the caves and the evil that still lives there.

This was a fun read. I love the fact that the story is set in a real place in England, and Sarah uses the real history of the caves to add depth to her story. The characters are well drawn and I found myself empathizing with both of the main characters and rooting for good outcomes for both of them. The story is very well paced, and Sarah does a great job of creating a sense of dread, utilizing the darkness and claustrophobia of the caves, as well as the evil that resides there.

I really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading her other works.

I received an arc from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you Brigids Gate Press, LLC. | Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA), Members' Titles for allowing me to read and review Enter the Darkness on NetGalley.

Published: 11/07/22

Stars: 2 (exception)

I found this too be ridiculous with a cast of misfits. I wasn't able to visualise or appreciate the "horror." This was a tiresome read.

I suggest if the synopsis intrigues you and you read horror to give this a chance.

The writing in this is unfortunately very juvenile in tone. That could have been fine on its own, but an irritating and forced romantic subplot made this one a big miss for me. DNF.

A great fast paced read. However I was not blown away by the plot
I do wonder if my expectations were very high but I think I will reread in the future to see of my.opionion will change.

I had such a hard time getting through this. I ended up dnf’ing 30% through. There were many errors (grammatical and spelling), and even though, this is an uncorrected proof, it just felt like there were entirely too many.

During the Spring Solstice, four people enter the caves underneath London.

Garth: a shy young man, who seeks to save the girl of his dreams.

Cassie: a beautiful young woman, who seeks to use the dark magic of the caves for her own purposes.

Bill: an older man with a terrible secret, who seeks to find Garth and Cassie before it’s too late.

Sienna: a con artist with a dark past, who seeks to escape her fate as a chosen sacrifice.

Four people enter. Each of them must battle their personal demons before facing the White Lady, who rises each year during the Spring Solstice with a hunger for human flesh.

Only one of them will survive.

When I read the blurb for this one I was immediately drawn in and couldn’t wait to get started, unfortunately the book didn’t live up to the initial excitement I felt.

There were some interesting aspects to the book and I feel that Budd genuinely came up with a great concept and some scenes were quite creepy, but for me the whole book felt flat. I think this was because I never really connected with any of the characters and the multiple perspective narratives made the story hard to follow at times.

This wasn’t for me. I was bored and wanted to DNF it many times. I tried to push through but in the end I decided to skip it.

It was hard going into this book. Chapter one especially. It was hard to keep reading. This book is about pagan sacrifice under the streets of London.

Let me be clear – I love horror novels. In fact, I don’t often find horror novels that I’m not a big fan of. That being said… I wasn’t a big fan of this one.

For one thing, I felt absolutely no connection to any of the characters. I didn’t have the “Oh I hope that one doesn’t die” or “I hope that one isn’t one of the bad guys” feeling about any of them. They were there and that was that. I will give the author credit for at least giving some background for the main characters, but other than that, I just didn’t feel connected to any of them.

The writing wasn’t the best. I realize this was an “uncorrected proof” but the amount of mistakes – extra words, missing words, missing or incorrect punctuation, sentences that should have been one sentence instead of two or three – makes me think that an editor didn’t even see the book before it was put on NetGalley. That being said, I was able to make sense of the book.

The pacing was just horrible – I felt like I was just slogging through the book the entire time I was reading it. It was such a struggle for me to keep going, but I didn’t want to DNF the book for some reason. I kept hoping it would get better, but it just didn’t.

There were no appreciable plot twists and the few there were I had been easily able to predict. The ending wasn’t spectacular either. I can’t say that I’d read anything else by this author. Two stars because the story was somewhat readable, but I definitely wouldn’t go out of my way to read anything by her again.

Stars: 2 out of 5.

I don't understand all the glowing reviews for this book on Goodreads. I found it boring as fish. For a relatively short 200 page book it, it draaaaged and almost put me to sleep several times. I felt like just reaching the ending was an uphill battle.

My biggest issue was the multitude of grammatical and stylistic errors. I mean, English isn't my first language, but I'm pretty sure having verbs both in present and past tense in the same paragraph isn't grammatically sound. It's jarring to the eye when you read the book, that's for sure. It creates a cognitive confusion that took me out of the story completely a few times.

Add to that the head hopping that happened in a few places, when the chapter was clearly titles as being from the point of view of one character, but there would be paragraphs that described how another character felt or what they thought. As far as I know, none of the protagonists are omniscient, or telepathic, so how could they know that?

My second issue is that I didn't care for any of the characters. Yes, they had issues. Yes, the author tried hard to make us understand what moved them and make us empathize. Unfortunately, she failed, at least in my case. Being privy to their inner monologues didn't make me like them more, but made me annoyed with them at times. Especially Garth. The thoughts that went through his head were downright creepy and disturbing at times. He is certified stalker material. No wonder he had no friends or girlfriend.

Finally, as I mentioned, the story drags. The pacing is very uneven. The first 50-60% of the book is basically set up, then the events unfold at breakneck speed. Honestly, we didn't' need that much set up. We could have spent more time in the caves to advance the actual story instead of flashbacks into the pasts of our protagonists. A lot of that information wasn't necessary. What little we actually needed could have been woven organically into the narrative. As it was, I almost DNFed the book at about halfway point. 

I added one extra star for the description of the caves. You can see that the author did her research. That place is fascinating. Now I really want to visit.

I guess if you did "mesh" with the characters and didn't mind grammatical errors, this books could be a good read for you.

PS: I received a free copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Big thank you to Brigids Gate Press and Netgalley for access to the ARC of Enter the Darkness in exchange for my honest review!

I highly recommend Enter the Darkness by Sarah Budd to anyone who loved the movie As Above So Below!

Sarah Budd did a fantastic job curating a claustrophobic, heavy, and suspenseful atmosphere. I am quite claustrophobic myself, and found myself feeling panicked at times while reading.

I also enjoyed the four different characters POV, it gave the story great dimension.

I did feel like some of the storyline was repetitive but all in all I enjoyed the book!

Very creepy and gripping, good pacing! Enjoyable but just missing something slight for me - I think I just wanted a little more depth. But the plot and characters were well written and it’s a good read.

This story was so suspenseful and creepy. Anyone who reads it would have their neck hair standing on end with the terrifying terrors. A horror story that kept me up at night. All elements of the story provided great horror. the setting, the characters and the shocking moment in the storyline were amazing. Horror fans, must read this book.

4.5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Sarah Budd’s debut horror novella was freeaaakkyy. This book had me feeling claustrophobic as hell and sent shivers down my spine. The bulk of this book is set in caves that are said to have housed Druid rituals long, long ago. So, when someone goes missing in the caves from a group tour, the tour guide is panicked. But, we start to find out that perhaps not everyone is shocked to know that something ancient still lurks in the underground…

I thought the writing was brilliant and the story was great. I think the horror genre is so well-fitted to be written as novellas because they can really pack a (scary) punch in such a short amount of pages. I’m still not sure if I loved the ending, but I love a book that gives me a visceral reaction while reading + Enter the Darkness certainly did so

This book was okayish it didn’t really do anything to keep my interest in it. I found myself putting it down a lot. The story was just like the others I read before. There wasn’t exactly anything new in a horror story

This book was a nice little horror story. The gradual build up of anxiety created by the time stamps was an added bonus, and the somewhat open-ended way the book finished created terrifying possibilities.

Any book that takes place in a cave is automatically freaking scary in my humble opinion. The sense of the weight of hundreds of thousands of pounds of rock just waiting to tumble down on you, the idea you can get lost forever in the pitch black mazes is devastating, the idea you could get stuck, or something could grab you without you even seeing it, just a world of yuck and no. Throw in a terrifying witch/goddess/monster thing that collects skulls after it literally eats you alive? Of course I picked this book to read!

The characters were all flawed, all propelled by unnameable drives, and all were different and sincere. You found yourself rooting for them all, and knowing not all make it out from the get go really adds to the suspense.

What really got me hung up on this book was a few things. I would have loved for there to be more of the psychological horror drawn out. There was room to really play with the characters and what they brought into the caves, as well as what they hoped to emerge with (and without). I also felt there was room for more revision in the book. That being said, did this book do it's job and give me some good jump scares and freak me out? Oh yes.

Did absolutely nothing to keep my attention fully and just seemed like I had heard of it before. There were points that were promising but it all just fell flat for me.

A great read by this Sarah Budd. I definitely recommend checking this one out! Beautifully told, eerie and compelling. It kept me guessing right til the very end. Subject matter is a bit heavy in parts, so keep that in mind. Thank you NetGalley for providing a copy of this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Beautifully told, eerie and compelling. Author kept me guessing right til the very end. Loved this book!