Together We Rot : a perfectly creepy, enthralling YA Horror Romance Debut🌲🌳🦋🕸️

Thank you so much @netgalley and @vikingbooks for the chance to read this book early!

This is a paranormal YA novel with the perfect dash of romance. I read this in my twilight walks and was both immediately intrigued and weary of the story weaving in a frigid little town in Michigan. We find Wil, who’s trying to solve the mystery of her mother, who’s been missing for over a year. She reluctantly teams up with her ex-best friend… who’s cult -leading family she suspects had something to do with her mother’s disappearance. Elwood has reasons to hide from too… seeing as he could be the next sacrifice on his 18th birthday.

My favorite thing about this novel?: the prose. Both lyrical and raw, it engaged me from beginning to end. Several plot twists I didn’t see coming and the ending did make me shed tears???? (Which I was NOT expecting.) Really liked the characters and their dynamic, especially the mix of emotions flowing between them.

Perfect for fans of paranormal horror or those wanting to dip their toes in. Also for fans of Hannah Whitten, Ava Reid, Isabel Agajanian.

Loved loved loved. 🥰

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#togetherwerot #bookreview #bookish #bookrecommendations

Wil is on the hunt for her missing mother. She teams up with her former best friend Elwood to help her. Both of them know his family had something so with it and are hiding quite the secret.

This story is deep. It touches on a lot, especially parental abuse. I mean Elwood's family is religious and part of the church, his dad being the pastor. And Elwood’s supposed to be the successor but he doesn’t want to be. And helping Wil sets them both on this dangerous path. Almost going against the sins of the father.

See I’m not a huge lover a books that have church settings because it just rubs under my skin, but Skyla’s plot takes a different turn and makes it so intricate and unique. Wil is this stubborn, tough girl while Elwood is shy and meek, such opposites that they make up for each other in ways. I loved how the story is eerily and impactful. It’s definitely a different story that I’ve read in a while, and for a debut I was utterly entranced by the authors writing and gut wrenched by the end of the whole book.

So creepy season is almost here, If you’re looking for something new and perfect to leave an impression under your skin.. look no further!

"Together We Rot" by Skyla Arndt is a riveting blend of Horror and YA Romance that immerses readers in a unique and captivating narrative. The book's innovative combination of genres creates an intriguing and gripping storyline that I found enthralling. Skyla Arndt's ability to balance horror elements with a romantic undertone adds depth to the characters and their journey. "Together We Rot" is a standout read that delivers chills and emotions in equal measure, making it a must-read for those seeking a spine-tingling and heartfelt literary experience.

Many thanks to Penguin Group for the arc of this book! The following is my review & my reflects my thoughts of this book.

Together We Rot is a gothic, horror, YA romance that strings together beautiful prose and heartache to bring you a beautiful debut novel.

Wil is a scorned girl who will at nothing to prove her mother’s disappearance has everything to do with foul play, and Elwood is a timid boy who desperately wants to find his place in a world dictated by his iron-fisted father.

Together We Rot gives off Midnight Mass meets Stranger Things. Wil is the perfect embodiment if rage and grief, a heroine who isn’t perfect and just wants to keep running from it all. Elwood is a precious, but lost boy who tells the tale of growth and acceptance in its most heartbreaking form.

This book was a pleasure to read. It’s fast-paced, funny at times, heartbreaking, and beautiful. I read it in one sitting and would absolutely pick another book up by this author.

Together We Rot was one of my most anticipated reads of 2023. I was drawn in by everything - the title, cover and summary, but the cover art is what first caught my eye. This is just the type of book my young-adult- reading heart yearns for. The writing style, character development and world building were all great. The story was unique and fleshed out well. I enjoyed the fierceness of the Wil, and the vulnerability of Elwood. It took a long time for the story to start, but when the speed of the plot picked up it was great. The pacing was mildly inconsistent here and there. I'm not a fan of alternating POV but it was necessary here. Overall, execution was a solid 4 stars. I'm impatiently waiting for more work from this author.

Thank you to NetGalley for offering this title in their catalogue. All the opinions expressed in this review are my own.

Together We Rot is such a beautiful book. Arndt did such a wonderful job of crafting a beautifully chilling gothic atmosphere that i could not get enough of. I fell in love with the characters within this book and could not get enough of them and their journey. There was a perfect blend of sweet and tender moments to combat the creepy crawly parts of the story, as well. This was a beautifully horrific read and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Initially, it took me a while to actually get into the book but once I got through a couple chapters, it definitely started flowing. Together We Rot was such an interesting concept and it was different to your typical YA plot. I wished the book was longer and the plot more in depth because it certainly has a lot of promise. I also wished we got more of Elwood and more of an explanation at the end. Overall, I enjoyed the horror element and found it was a bittersweet story
Rated: 3.6/5

Thank you so much NetGalley and Penguin Teen for gifting me an E-ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review!

Together We Rot is a unique and beautifully creepy novel. It was definitely one of the most interesting books I’ve read all year.

I was super excited when I received an arc of this book since it was one of my most anticipated and it definitely didn’t disappoint! (I am a little torn between a 4 and 4.5 so I may change it in the future.)

For the starters, this book was written so beautifully. I highlighted so many quotes because I just loved the writing so much. While it’s lovely throughout the whole book, it truly stuck out to me in Elwood’s povs. The way his thoughts, emotions, and personality was written was just so poetic and beautiful. It really made me fall in love with his character.

In books, I’m always used to a strong or tough MMC. However, Elwood was the complete opposite. While he wasn’t afraid to stand up for what he loved and fight back, he also didn’t mind showing his emotions. He was so soft and loving, I really enjoyed reading his and Wil’s story. Which was so beautiful and sometimes heartbreaking to see. They too, are complete opposites but complimented each other so well. The entire cast of characters was interesting and unique. Other than the meant to be villains, I didn’t hate any of the characters.

The plot was definitely a unique one. As was the world. I enjoyed the author taking modern day life and putting a creepy twist on it. Despite the beautiful writing, I sometimes got a little confused when it came to the world building or plot building. I don’t know if this was just a fault in the writing or if it was because I was reading an advanced copy but it was something I noticed a little bit.

I’ve been getting more into horror books lately (but yk not terrifying ones 😅) and this definitely didn’t disappoint! It was so gothic, creepy, and disgusting. I really enjoyed reading it. The author did an amazing job with description. I truly felt like I was there and some scenes even made me feel queasy since I hate bugs.🤣

If I could relate the book to any other book I’ve read, I would say it reminds me of Wilder Girls by Rory Powers. When it comes to the nature horror aspect they are similar in those ways but with completely different plots. However, if you enjoyed Wilder Girls, I definitely think you would enjoy Together We Rot.

Overall, I really loved this book!! Definitely some of my new favorite characters and one of the favorite standalones. I’m super excited to read more by this author in the future and definitely recommend this book!

🍂Together We Rot Tropes:

~ Romance Side-Plot
~ Best Friends to Enemies to Lovers
~ Creepy Religions/Cults
~ Found Family (a little bit)
~ Nature Horror
~ Gothic and Creepy
~ Lots of Bugs
~ Grumpy x Sunshine
~ Soft MMC

Can I just say if this is their first book signed me up to be on the journey to their 10th because OMG… This book had it all! Will knows the Clark family had something to do with her mother going missing mr. Clark is the leader of the garden of Adam church/cult and Will knows her mom was investigating them. When she finds out the local police or closing the case she is angry with the side she will keep looking in this includes sitting outside of his house in the bushes in man killing weather. This is where she is when she sees her ex-best friend and goody two shoes Elwood Clark sneak out of his home. Her and Elwood used to be the best of friends and maybe just a tad bit more but when her mom went missing he was told under no uncertain terms to stay away from Wilhelmina she knows El is going to Luke’s party and quickly called her best friend Veronica a.k.a. Ronnie to go with her Will has made an enemy of everyone in town except for Ronnie and Although she wants her to go for her company she also needs her to go because she wouldn’t get in without her she is Luke’s ex-girlfriend and he definitely and desperately wants to get back with her so Will knows Ronnie is a sure fire weight to get into the party to watch Elwood but when they arrive he is doing and all he can drink headstand and Willis hopeful with the non-drinking Elwood drunk he will tell her something about her mom‘s disappearance and why his parents so desperately want to buy their rundown motel. Instead of approaching the situation steltily and cleverly will gets in an all out argument with the drunk Elwood and it seems she has ruined her chance to find out what happened to her mom but after she goes home and decides to break into the Clark’s house during a severe snowstorm might I add she will run into Elwood who is trying to flea his own living nightmare and they will team up for one of the strangest nights in their history I haven’t even talked about the changes Elwood is going through or almost goes through and the fact that they will eventually be told he is dangerous Elwood has always had an interest in leoparDasary… Is there a reason Elwood has always been attracted to moths and butterflies? If you love teen thrillers with a dab of creepy then you’ll definitely want to read Together We Rott by sky Arnt I always seem to write the worst reviews when the books are super great because this one is super great but the review totally is terrible but either way you definitely need to read this fuck if you got this far thanks for reading my messed up review. I want to thank Viking Young readers Ann Net Galley for my free Ark copy please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictate my review.

what a harrowing tale.
the cover is what made me pick this book up, but the story made me stay.
this was so beautiful, and the underlying themes of religion worked so well. this stands out among the heavily saturated genre of YA.
The characters are fleshed out and real. Wil Greene is a little fireball, and she quickly became one of my favorite fmcs.
I loved the romance in this story, and the darkness that was rooted in it.
Must read!

I don’t know how I feel about this book to be honest. It was not at all what I was expecting. I liked wil. She’s spunky and determined. I did not love Elwood or the religious heavy elements of the plot. I also think the monster idea wasn’t fully flushed out as much as it could have been

I wasn't really sure what to expect with this book, but the cover (and the author's description alluding to Mothman) captured my attention and pulled me in. Overall I liked the themes of grief, religious abuse, metamorphosis, and love, and thought it was really creative how Arndt pulled it all together. I enjoyed getting both Wil and Elwood's perspectives as they are thrown back together, and how she explored the broken friendship and the ways that they pushed each other away, only to start to reconnect under dire and potentially tragic circumstances. I also enjoyed how creepy the cult itself was, and how venomous the community could be under it's influence. That said, I think that I was a little too caught up in the promise of Mothman, as while I can see how one could describe it that way, it's not exactly Mothman in the sense that many enthusiasts have come to expect and know him. But that is almost assuredly a personal preference, as Mothman as been a special interest of mine for a very, very long time.

TOGETHER WE ROT is an eerie and poignant dark fantasy. With the upcoming Halloween season it may be a good one to add to the seasonal reading pile.

Together We Rot is a YA novel about Wil Greene, a grumpy spitfire who is investigating the disappearance of her mother and Elwood Clarke, the gentle and bug obsessed son of a religious cult leader who is pulled farther into the cult. Former best friends, Wil and Elwood haven't spoken since Wil accused the cult of killing her mother. As a ritual grows nearer, Elwood starts to suspect that he may be the cult's upcoming sacrifice. He, Wil, and their former friends team up to stop the cult and figure out what happened to Wil's mother.

I thought the premise of this sounded interesting and I was drawn in by the incredible cover art! Now after reading it, those are still my two favorite things about the book. For good reason! The premise is really cool. I loved the idea of mixing a mysterious cult with fantasy elements. The book is set in Michigan's Upper Peninsula during the winter, which also adds an interesting layer as you don't see a lot of books set in the UP. The cover art SO AWESOME and would have absolutely drawn me in if I were still a moody teenager. It certainly drew me in as a semi-less moody adult!

The execution of this book left some things to be desired for me. I wish that it had been fleshed out a little more. This book is fairly short, which I thought was okay, but I do think that it suffered from relying on character tropes instead of actually fleshing them out. The main characters are a grumpy/sunshine combination, but to such an extreme on one side and to a lesser extent on the other. Wil is SO abrasive and rude to everyone that I really can't imagine how gentle Elwood ever dealt with her. And Elwood falls over like every other page. Since he's being abused and maybe turning into a sacrifice, I can't really blame him, but the positive parts of his personality are really only described in the past tense. I think this may have worked with single POV but with dual, his parts are just him in distress the whole time. Which doesn't make for the most fun or compelling read.

Overall, I thought this book was fine. It had a great premise, but the execution didn't bring it from fine to great like I had hoped. 3 stars. Thank you to PENGUIN GROUP Penguin Young Readers Group and NetGalley for the electronic advanced reader's copy of this book, my thoughts are my own!

Together We Rot by @arndtskyla is a novella with exquisite creepy imagery. The story quickly became much more than I expected, with an Old Testament-based cult, teenage trauma and a brave love story. Go read it 💙

When Wilhelmina’s mother suddenly vanishes, she suspects the highly unusual Church of Adam and their leader, who happens to be her best friend Elwood’s father, for her mom’s disappearance. As Wil gets closer to the truth, her friend Elwood has to face his own discovery: his fanatically religious community plans to sacrifice him. But Elwood isn’t at all what he seems. And neither is this church.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 4.5/5
🌶️ 0/5

Tropes:
Friends to enemies to lovers
Magical Adventure
Paranormal Powers

Triggers:
Religious fanaticism
Ritualistic Sacrifice
Body Dysmorphia
Murder
Parental Neglect

My Thoughts:
If you love the 1980’s teens-on-an-adventure feel of “Stranger Things”, you will love this book. Not only is the story delightfully creepy, but the character development and plot twists will keep you on the edge of your seat for all 272 pages! A perfect campfire/ spooky season story!

18 year-old Elwood runs away when he overhears his father talking about sacrificing him for the church he resides over in the Garden of Adam Community, located in the Upper Peninsula. He’s been told throughout his entire life that he’s a burden. He’s been punished and unloved by his parents. 18 year-old Wil is sure that her mother was sacrificed by the church and Elwood’s father. Wil and Elwood help each other hide from danger, investigate the community’s weird happenings, and try to find out what happened to Wil’s mother. Their lives will be thrown into chaos before it's over.

Likes/dislikes: I enjoyed the creepy aspect of Elwood’s family and his father’s effect on the community. The prose represents beauty and pain, hurt and happiness, perfectly. The story was too quick to achieve well developed characters.
Mature content: PG-13 for Underage drinking and smoking, passionate undescribed kissing (PG)
Language: R for 79 swears and 6 f-bombs.
Violence: PG-13 for Bloody sacrificing of a rabbit, sacrificing son by bleeding him to death, father plunges knife into son’s chest.
Ethnicity: falls to white.

Take the teens from Stranger Things, add in a frightening fundamentalist cult, and throw them in a small, snowed-in town during Christmas, and you’ll get an idea of this book. Fans of Shea Ernshaw and Maggie Stiefvater will be delighted.

"Together We Rot" by Skyla Arndt invites readers into a genre-defying journey that intertwines young adult gothic horror, romance, and coming-of-age. As the story unfolds, protagonist Wil Greene's relentless quest to unravel the truth behind her mother's mysterious disappearance leads her to form an unlikely partnership with Elwood Clarke, a young man trapped within a dark family cult. I adore the different personalities; Elwood is so soft and sweet while Wil is so prickly and fearless.

Through Wil and Elwood, the story skillfully navigates the complexities of the small-town experience, tapping into the haunting specters of religious manipulation, the lingering trauma of abusive childhoods, and the grief of a lost parent. Readers are drawn into a world where the darkness of familial secrets collides with the tender emotions of a blossoming romance. The atmospheric and gothic tone perfectly complements the weighty themes at play. As Wil and Elwood uncover chilling revelations, they lean on a group of interesting friends for help; the secondary characters make the world even more immersive.

The living forest and supernatural presence add layers of intrigue, mirroring the inner struggles and traumas the characters are grappling with. There are moments when the prose seems a little excessive, but it is nonetheless highly enjoyable. "Together We Rot" is a testament to Arndt's ability to create a haunting and heartfelt story with a touch of bittersweet. Deeply enjoyed this one!

Thank you to Netgalley, the author, and Penguin Teen for the eARC. This is an honest review.

Together We Rot had some really beautiful writing and some evocative turns of phrase. The book dealt with a lot of difficult themes and events and while I enjoyed the story, I felt that it was missing something. Some of the transitions were really clunky and at times, I wasn't sure who the POV chapter was for as Wil's voice and Elwood's voice were similar at times.

Speaking of Wil and Elwood, while I did like these characters, they didn't seem different enough in their POV chapters and while I thought the switch was necessary in order to move the story along, I would have liked to have seen some different characterization for them. Both of them were angsty teens (for different reasons) and it left a sense of sameness.

The idea of a forest needing sacrifices is as old as the hills and I would have liked to see more background on how the cult became as it was. I also had some issues with the time flow. At times the plot seemed to plod along, and I wasn't sure if we had changed days and other times, I was sure that it was supposed to be same day, and come to find out it wasn't. I chalk those issues up to the clunky transitions between some of the scenes and the formatting of the e-arc itself was godawful. There were numerous times when I wasn't sure which character was speaking.

I didn't really feel a sense of characterization from any of the secondary characters. The story careens around (sometimes literally as it is winter in Michigan) and it felt like Arndt didn't really know what to do with Ronnie, Kevin, or Lucas. And while they were necessary to the climax, I didn't feel like it had to be these specific characters.

Just overall, I really just wanted some more oomph from this book. I think Arndt is a talented writer, but the story needed more growth and stretch to it.

Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Group for the arc for review purposes.

Thank you to Penguin Group, Viking Books for Young Readers, and Netgalley for access to a free e-arc in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts are my own and were not influenced by anyone else. 🪰

There is a backbone to what could be a really interesting story here. But after finishing, I feel like not everything was fleshed out, and I wish the book was actually a bit longer.

I liked how the main characters Wil and Elwood had a complicated past and weren't immediately friends at the start. Wil has accused Elwood's family of being responsible for her mother's disappearance, thereby straining their friendship. There are flashbacks to when they first met leading up to the present day, and I liked reading about how their friendship blossomed into something more.

Wil is strong-willed and independent. She isn't like most YA protagonists in that she is hesitant to look for answers and plunges into the mystery of where her mother went head-on, much to the chagrin of her friends, family, and the community at large. Elwood's characterization was also a nice change of pace for a YA story. He is kind, sensitive, and a nature lover. He expresses his emotions and is rather passive. He felt like a slave to his circumstances, and in a way, it was interesting to see a male character so vulnerable.

All this being said, I felt the plot was seriously lacking. We are told that Elwood's father is the leader of a mysterious church group and that he has plans in mind for Elwood's future that also align with the future of the church. Elwood knows his life is in danger and that the woods outside are calling to him. There are hints dropped throughout that Elwood is changing into something, but we are nevet quite made to see what this is. I wanted more backstory into the church and how it came to be. I wanted to know what was hiding in the woods. I am almost hoping there is a prequel novel coming that explains all of this in more detail.

The writing is solid for a debut, though. The dialogue was believeable, and the pacing was steady. Like I said earlier in this review, I think there is potential here for a really interesting story, but I wish there was more to go on. I hope that in future books, the author takes time to show the reader more of the ins and out of the worldbuilding. I would be interested in reading another book by the author if reviews indicate this.