Wow! This was my first thought upon finishing this book. What. A. Debut! This story is atmospheric, creepy, magical and really pulled me away from reality and into this small town. I love a good murder mystery, anyway, and throwing in urban legends and a powerful family of women really sealed the deal for me. I cannot recommend this book enough! I look forward to more books from this author. Thank you so very much for my ARC Netgalley and Penguin Teen.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Penguin Young readers group for this opportunity to read rage and review this arc which is available October 10,2023!

I am Appalachian and this book? This book captured the nuances of being Appalachian and our history, our belief in Magic’s and creatures. This was a literal treat to read.

It is about four sisters who serve up more than fried green tomatoes. They have gifts. Linden the main character can taste what others are feeling but naturally it soured her relationships especially with the vexingly handsome Coke Spencer one fateful night a year ago. A night when Linden vanished into the Dwpthsbof the forest and returned with no memories of what happened. Just a litany of questions and insidious nightmares.

Now it is the hottest summer on record and another girl has gone missing in Caball Hollow and the similarities to Linden are uncanny except the girl was found dead. Tempers boil over and Linden and her sister set out to find what hiding in the forest. It’s the freaking Mothman!! I hollered when I read that part.

Anyway this was a good old fashioned mystery with cryptids, small Appalachian town gossip and secrets. Freaking buy it! It is so worth it

A moody, atmosphereic paranormal fantasy. Really enjoyed the voice and pacing of this, the romantic subplot and the thriller aspects woven into this mystery with magical and paranormal elements!

Bittersweet in the Hollow thrives in its lyrical writing and in its description of the flora and fauna of the town. The lore of the book was down well and felt equal parts mystical and grounded in reality. While I di think it dragged in some parts, it makes up for the back stories of many individual characters. Plus Cole and Linden were so sweet to read about.

This book was atmospheric, spooky and lovely all at the same time. It was a delightful read and the combination of the mystery and paranormal aspect were well done.

This book partially deals with generational trauma as well as inter-family drama. One thing that I want to talk about in regards to this book is how much I adore the relationship between the siblings and their parents as well as their other family members. I loved how it was slowly teased out, how the siblings were the same, but also different. They were all unique in their own ways.

The plot was well formed, and had twists and turns to it, but the pacing of the book was slower. While there are a few action packed moments in the book, for the most part it is a slow unravelling of the truth.

In many ways, this book reads as southern gothic to me -- southern gothic/paranormal/historical, honestly, I really, really liked it.

Linden as the main character -- I loved her. I also loved her siblings as well. But Linden's struggle in the book was done well, how Pearsall cast her in this role, and had her working to figure out what happened both in the past and the present, and how it was connected.

The book was eerie as well. I don't know how else to phrase it, but it just it left a feeling after I finished it. Made me keep thinking about it. I was drawn into this world, and one of the aspects that I liked about it, is that it wasn't magic heavy (I love magic as much as the next person), but I felt the way the magic was woven into the world and the book was exquisitely done. It gave it a firm grounding in our world.

I HIGHLY recommend this book to anyone who likes gothic/horror southern books. As well as anyone who loves witches, a tad bit of magic and lots of atmosphere. What an amazing book and I look forward to reading the next book in the series!

I would probably purchase this book for my library because we are in Kentucky and fiction set in Appalachia is popular. However I thought it was heavily influenced by Practical Magic, so far as actually using a couple of lines from that book. There seems to be a trend of Appalachian/Southern women baking their feelings into food lately so I am getting a little tired of that plot. I did find some reveals of the mystery at the heart of the story to be surprising but others reveals have been overused in other works.

One year ago, Linden James entered the Appalachian Forest and was spat out a day later with no memory of where she was or what had happened. Armed with only a slew of nightmarish bits and pieces, Linden will do anything to remember that fateful night, especially when another girl goes missing and turns up dead. With suspicion of Linden and her family (and their unique abilities), the clock is racing for Linden and her sisters to find out what happened that night and why history is repeating itself one year later. Incorporating Appalachian culture and mythology, Bittersweet in the Hollow is a stunning debut that captures the dynamics of friendship and family after tragedy.

Bittersweet in the Hollow has been on my radar for quite some time. This book is delightfully atmospheric, the perfect book for a cool Fall day. The story was unique and captured my attention. I loved the cast of characters, especially the James sisters and the unique abilities they possess. The magic realism element took the story to a whole new level. The author did such a great job at weaving the outlandish concept of the plot into the normalcy of family and friendship. I never saw the ending coming, which is always fun for a mystery plot.

On the downside, I definitely found this book to be slowly paced. The book felt like it was very surface level at first, like we weren’t diving into the story and the characters and fully engaging with them. By the middle, the book definitely picked up, but I still felt like the book didn’t dive as deep as it could have. I found Cole and Linden’s relationship kind of unnecessary, as it didn’t add very much to the overall story.

I really enjoyed this book. I’m glad to have read it. Thanks to Penguin Teen and the author for the ARC.

Bittersweet in the Hollow follows Linden, the second youngest of four daughters raised in a small town in the Appalachian Mountains of West Virginia. The women in her family all have magical abilities such as being able to taste emotions, being able to see and commune with spirits, being able to sense lies, etc. The summer before the story takes place, Linden went missing and doesn't remember anything that happened before being found bloody and broken in the forest. When another girl is found drowned in the river in the same spot Linden was found, all sorts of town secrets come to light and Linden (with some help from her sisters) try to solve the mystery behind the murders and her own disappearance.

The book is fairly slow paced and it works well. It gives you a look at what life is like for Linden and really gives a chance to build up the mystery. There are just enough supernatural elements in the book to have you questioning whether or not the murders have something to do with the "Moth-Winged Man" of town legend or are really just the evils of humanity. And then about 85% through it just flips and we're told that the supernatural elements are to play and basically given a roadmap as to why all the stuff happened. It was such a drastic shift that it felt incredibly jarring. Despite that, it's still a great story and I truly enjoyed it, I just wish that Linden finding out the secrets came about in a much more organic way that would leave you questioning what was really at play.

Thank you to net galley for providing me an arc in exchange for an honest review

First of all I just want to acknowledge how strong of a debut this book is. I didn’t realize till the acknowledgments that this was Kate Pearsall’s first novel but it is definitely something to be proud of.

When I first picked it up, the book was a little hard to fully get into and connect with the cast of characters, but I believe that is just a personal issue of my taste starting to lean away from YA books. However, once the plot picked up and I got invested I couldn’t put the book down. I finished the last 50% all in one night. I just had to know what actually happened the summer night Linden went missing, and the past that came before her.

Although I did predict the mystery pretty early on, I still didn’t have all the details and the twists and turns in this story were so well done. It had me second guessing everything. I loved the way everything was connected in some way.

I don’t really have many strong feelings on our main character Linden or her love interest Cole. I didn’t really connect with them deeply but I was still rooting for them throughout the book. What i did connect with though were the themes of familial ties and bonds that span generations. I thought it was beautifully done and it made me feel like I was apart of the James family. Rowan was absolutely my favorite sister. She was so fun and snarky and her one liners were hilarious.

I really enjoyed the magic system as well. I loved how the powers of the James women manifested differently in each one. It was all done so creatively and in a unique way that was a breath of fresh air from the way recent books can rely only on basic tropes and magic systems. Lindens power of being able to taste the emotions of other people was such a cool thing to read about and same goes for the parts we see with her other sisters powers too.

I think my absolute favorite thing about this book was that for every passing month we got to see an excerpt from The James Family Book Of Mountain Wisdom. It gave us information about different types of moons in the lunar calendar, what is in season to harvest and forage, and what magical spells and charms are best to be crafted. I absolutely loved this and thought it was so creative and fun to include and gave us a deeper understanding into the magic of the James women.

I thought the ending was really well done and nothing was rushed. The pace was pretty consistent throughout the entire book and you learn each new bit of information in a timing that felt right.

Overall this was such a strong debut novel. I saw there will be a book 2 which I am wondering if we are going to be following a different James sister since Lindens story wrapped up pretty nicely. I would definitely be interested in picking up more of Kate Pearsall’s work.

There are some books that seem to effortlessly evoke the atmosphere of a place, and Bittersweet in the Hollow is one of those. Without needing purple prose and without feeling overdone, Kate Pearsall made me feel like I was actually in the southern countryside during summertime.
This book felt like reading the lovechild of Alice Hoffman and Fannie Flagg, and I mean that in the best way possible. It follows a family of women with magical abilities, each one a little different from the other, and the depth of love between the sisters was so beautifully shown. The family also runs a diner in town, and I've never been more upset to live in Utah than I was reading the descriptions of some of the food they made. (I've also never Google'd so many southern dishes before: ramps. dilly beans, chow chow, <i>sweet tea pie</i> are a few that are at the top of my head.) The story is intended for YA readers, but I'm 34 and still found it engaging, and the mystery and paranormal aspects blended together well. I especially liked that the main character steered clear from so many of the stereotypical pitfalls in many YA thriller books.
Overall this book was fresh and atmospheric, and I am definitely looking forward to more from Pearsall. The ending left it open enough for a series if she wants, but either way she is definitely an author I'll keep reading.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Unfortunately, this story really fell flat for me. I've tried giving it several chances because it was compared to House of Hollow (which is a favorite of mine) but the story itself just didn't reel me in like House of Hollow did.

Due to the fact that it was extremely slow paced, I had to DNF this novel.

Note to the author: don't be discouraged by negative reviews. Set yourself apart from other authors/books and write a story true to you.

I absolutely fell in love with the premise for this book. Combined with the cover, I knew that I needed to read this one! The writing took me a bit to get used to, but once I did I really fell in love with the atmosphere. The author painted a picture of the world very well, and I could feel the humidity on my neck and the mosquitos biting at my ankles. I really wanted to love the characters, and a couple I did end up falling for. Unfortunately, the side characters were a touch lacking in development, so this wasn't completely well rounded for my liking. In the end, I wasn't disappointed, but I really wanted more from this universe that the author created. I look forward to reading more from her in the future!

3.5 stars, rounded up

Bittersweet in the Hollow crafts an engaging narrative with a backdrop that's beautifully eerie. The plot revolves around the James sisters, living in the atmospheric Caball Hollow, each equipped with peculiar supernatural (witchy) abilities. Linden, the protagonist, has an especially unique talent — she can taste others' emotions, which adds an intriguing layer to the story.

I really enjoyed the relationship between Linden and her three sisters. Their dynamic was believable and compelling, although I wish that Pearsall had dug deeper into these relationships and the exploration of each of the sisters' unique abilities.

The atmospheric descriptions truly shine in this novel, creating a vivid picture that immerses you right into the heart of the forest town. Readers are immersed in the intricacies of Caball Hollow and the surrounding National Forest, which often felt like characters in their own right.

The pacing and plot execution, however, stumble a bit. There are points where the narrative slows, hampering the overall momentum of the story. The central mystery doesn't offer the level of unpredictability I hoped for, and the ending felt somewhat underwhelming.

Overall, Bittersweet in the Hollow provides an enjoyable reading experience with its haunting setting and distinctive characters and is certainly a worthwhile read for fans of dark, atmospheric YA with a dash of mystery and supernatural abilities.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for giving me an ARC copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

The atmosphere in this book was very cool! There was lots of descriptive words and imagery. I could picture the smells and the scenery. There was a mystery in the air and a slight creepiness. The rest of it fell flat to me unfortunately. If you just want spooky vibes, this is a book for you. If you want actual plot, I would look elsewhere.

If you are expecting this book to be like “House of Hollow”, the closest you will get to that is the cover. I loved “House of Hollow”, so I think I was thrown off when this book really wasn’t anything like it after being compared to it.

It had a very slow start. I was 100 pages in and still nothing really happened of note. The plot seemed all over the place. It was supposed to be a murder mystery, but Linden didn’t even investigate half the time it felt like. Clues kind of fell into her lap, but it felt like she was just going through the motions in her every day life until something would come to her. It seemed like all vibes and no storyline. It felt like nothing really happened throughout the entire book. We would learn things as we went along, but nothing interesting or compelling for me to want to keep reading.

I liked Cole even if there wasn’t much to his character. I could have done with more of their relationship. We got it in small spurts, but honestly there should have either been no romance at all or there should have been more scenes of them together. I wanted to like them together because we were told they had history and that Linden still was hung up on him, but there wasn’t anything of substance to latch onto really liking them together.

The way Linden was acting was that their falling out was dramatic, but he was nothing but nice and flirty to her for the most part after the fact, so I am kind of confused why Linden thinks Cole stopped liking her, even if they stopped talking as much. We barely see them interact throughout the book except for a few scenes here and there, and then by the end they are madly in love. I know they dated before so those feelings are still there, I just wish I saw more of that to make it more believable.

I actually really loved Hadrian as a character! It was so funny every time Rowan gave him a hard time and he just took it. She obviously had feelings for him, and it was cute to read even when she didn’t trust him. Ethan was a fun character as well, even if he wasn’t in it a lot.

I wish there was more of a sibling dynamic. I felt like they really built up the sisters and their dynamics with each other in the beginning, but after the murder happened, the sister’s were in it, but it didn’t really feel like they were a priority anymore. I liked Linden’s relationship with her parents, Gran, and aunt though.

Most of the time the characters felt superficial sadly, which makes it hard for me to enjoy a book.

There were some things that happened that I wasn’t expecting and thought was a unique twist. I was able to guess who done it; it was the motivation I wasn’t expecting.

The ending was kind of quick. There was no build up. It was just, boom, here we are going to reveal everything in the last 50-100 pages. Despite this being a long book, I needed more to it. It felt all over the place and I didn’t really care about any of it. Which is unfortunate because I really wanted to like it! I hope people can enjoy it more than I did.

What worked: Spooky fantasy filled with mysteries, disappearances, and an urban legend set in the Appalachian mountains. Think YA meets Practical Magic in a rural small town that holds secrets that might be best left hidden.

I love a good witchy tale and what makes this one unique is the setting in the Appalachian mountains that have a legend of a woman who walked into the rural town Caball Hollow and the secrets she passed down throughout the generations. Linden James has the ability to smell the emotions of people. Seems all the James women are born with unique abilities. Some in town call them witches. But all agree that their enchantments work. I never heard of the Moth Winged Man legend. In this legend, it states someone calls his name three times and he appears. But like Linden's grandmother tells her, "All legends have some truth." And this one is chilling and frightening.

A local mystery resurfaces after Linden's best friend goes missing. Linden also went missing a year previous but has no memory of that date. She's determined to find out not only what happened but how these events might all be linked. There's a slow build-up on what happened which involves her own family's secrets. The tension builds when Linden and her sisters call on their paranormal abilities to find out the truth. I loved how emotions are shown through the foods that the James women cook at their small family-run restaurant.

There's almost a fae atmosphere feel with the Moth Winged Man legend throughout this story as well. That adds to the creepy factor of this novel. Linden and her sisters reminded me of the Charmed sisters, especially when they come together to try to figure out the mystery behind a local death and a decades-long missing child case.

The relationship between Linden and Cole Spencer moves slowly and is on the back burner while other secrets surface. It's more a story of sisters and the paranormal abilities they share and how they work together to solve a decades-long mystery in Caball Hollow. The final reveal did surprise me and I'm curious how this will be woven in the second book in this series.

Beautifully written dark fantasy where some secrets once revealed have the power to change not only those in the town but lives as well.

the amount of books whose plot progress solely because the mc wants to figure everything out is so fun to me like yess be curious even if it becomes a danger to you and those you love!

bittersweet in the hollow features mysterious disappearances, a small town full of gossip, and most importantly a family of magical women with mundane magical abilities. it's been a year since linden went missing for a day, back with no memories of what happened that day and when another girl goes missing, on the same day a year later, linden is determined to find out what's going on in her town. but with a lot of secrets and little information, there's no telling what linden will find. this novel tells the story of when four sisters, the mysterious disappearances, and their town's history all connect to one big plot, and what happens after they uncover the secrets it holds...

this book was a decent read! i enjoyed linden as a character but i was disappointed about her sisters' involvement. while they are plenty involved in linden's journey to uncover the secrets, the description makes it seem like they play a much bigger role than they actually do. . i would have actually preferred the ending to center around the sisters since that was my main draw to this book, instead of how it was done. and while the mystery was interesting at first, the reveals we get regarding mysterious characters and situations felt anticlimactic to me. they were just very quick in ur face this is who it is now! with very little immediate buildup to the actual like. happenings of the reveal. two characters would be talking and soon a reveal would happen, which wasn't that satisfying for me. they're still pretty smart (meaning they made sense and left me going ahhhh okay) plot twists/reveals but idk.

the side romance was cute but should have been fleshed out more as for most of the book it looks like linden is pining unrequitedly and it's just distracting since a little bit after they get together the climax of the novel happens and it's something to forget until they show us again.

this sounds like a very very negative review but this had some very fun scenes any time linden was in the diner i knew i was going to enjoy it idk smth abt that diner was my favorite setting <3 also descriptions were a INCREDIBLY strong part of this book every time linden described how a certain emotion tasted like it was incredible and i was able to taste it too! and i LOOVE family secrets which this book had an ample amount of! the lore of this town was interesting and i definitely felt inside the story and once again i love a came back wrong and some mundane magic which this book definitely had so! enjoyed this novel will probably read the next book that seems to be coming after this one <3

Okay, this had a bit of a slow start for me. There was some YA world building to do and a lot of characters to introduce and to do that correctly takes a chunk of time. I think the premise is interesting, and I wish we had learned more about the powers and seen a little more “witchy” type stuff. But holy cow! That last quarter of this book had me gripping my seat. I honestly did not see the needing coming and I loved it! Some great characters.

Vibes like Kingdom of the Wicked. Can’t wait to recommend this!

Linden has grown up in Caball Hollow, a small town with whispers of its paranormal history. Some of those whispers have a smidge of truth mixed in with the rumors, and she would know this better than anyone since she was born into the latest generation of James women and their distinct abilities. When a girl from town goes missing and is found dead, the town’s whispers about the James women grow louder and louder. This disappearance is eerily similar to Linden’s own disappearance the previous summer, and she can’t seem to remember anything about that night. As many in town begin to grow meaner, louder, and bolder, Linden and her sisters lean into their abilities to find out who is behind the murder… or murders.

When I picked up this book, I was not expecting it to be as much of a mystery and thriller that it actually is, and that’s a good thing! I was sucked into the story so fast. We follow Linden, a teenager whose life was turned upside down after she went missing a year before where the story starts. It all began with a silly game of Moth-Winged Man, which is played like a game of Bloody Mary but in the National Forest and without a mirror. The only problem is that Linden can’t remember much about that night, and it’s caused a divide between her and all her friends. She’s just been waiting for the whole thing to finally blow over when a friend of hers, Dahlia, goes missing around the National Forest.

Of course, things only get worse when Linden discovers Dahlia’s body, only she was pulled to it like a magnet. She and her old friend, Cole, keep dancing around each other as she and her sisters try to figure out what happened. Linden doesn’t want to accept Cole’s help given how their friendship broke apart, but it seems that he’s not as weirded out by her as she thought. I think the differences between Linden and Cole investigating and Linden and her sisters investigating were really fun. We see Linden and her sisters using their abilities, such as contacting the spirits, to see what they turn up. However, when she’s working with Cole, we see just two regular teenagers trying to connect the dots. It was really interesting, especially because we get to see how each method of poking around uncovers new information that helps them all move forward. I especially loved seeing Linden and her sisters bond, bicker, and support each other every step of the way.

The mystery itself was excellent. It went so far back and was connected to everyone in so many different ways. It was really interesting to see how the decisions of some of the characters we get to know impacted how the events played out. I also really liked that the central plot leads Linden on a path of discovery about her family and how her ancestors really ended up in town. There are so many twists and turns throughout the story that it’s easy to tell how much planning went into this. It was truly an excellent read. I wasn’t happy about the final chapter, but that was because it went from high stakes to instant closure when I was hoping we’d get more information about the aftermath of the previous chapters. However, since this is the first in a series, I think it’s very likely that we’ll see the aftermath of those events play out in the next novel.

Bittersweet in the Hollow is a great YA book about a girl named Linden that has the unusual talent of being able to taste what people are feeling. Sounds weird right? Her whole family has talents and the town pretty much considers them witches. The other main part is the forest where some people either vanish or turn up dead. Linden survives going into the forest but has gaps in her memory and suffers from PTSD from her ordeal. So put this all together and add her close friend showing up dead in the forest and a Moth-Man legend that comes to life. It makes for an interesting story and the author is able to weave all this together very well. The atmosphere is so cool, the forest seems larger than life and creepy as heck. I loved Linden's family and the whole deal with the family book and the powers and history. The Moth-Man part is also really cool and probably the best part of the story. for me. What would you be willing to give up to save someone? That is a question that comes up at times and something to ponder. Anyway, this is a great story and really has it all, a great creepy setting, a mysterious Moth-Man, witches, a solid mystery as to some characters' identities, and more.

Kate Pearsall’s “Bittersweet in the Hollow” is a haunting mystery that grips you to the very last page. In the same vein as “Small Favors,” “House of Salt and Sorrows,” and “House of Hollow,” the book blends paranormal intrigue with otherworldly elements, resulting in a deliciously tense literary atmosphere where nothing is as it appears.

I couldn’t recommend it more.

*Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC.*