I wanted to like this book so much more than I did. Overall, the premise is really good, but it just felt so absurd to me that every teenager in this whole town would act so standoffish and horrible. This book thrives on rituals and rules, but I just couldn’t really grasp much about how the rules came to be or why everyone felt so inclined to follow them. We all know “rules are meant to be broken,” or more realistically, in a group of teenagers, at least a few are bound to break the rules. So the fact that this entire novel revolved around the rules, without the ability to ask questions (a rule) or get more information seemed really absurdist and made it difficult for me to enjoy much of the story.

The story itself though was good. This is a bit supernatural horror, a bit social horror. There were certainly bits of the book that were truly scary and incredibly haunting. The horror in this book serves as a haunting reminder of this country’s racist past and present, the story forming parallels between the horrors of today and the horrors of 50 years ago.

I wanted to love this book. It was definitely scary. I just couldn’t get past the rules and the extent to which they were followed. That was more unrealistic than any ghosts in this story.

A curious sequence of two narrators, two cousins, who don't seem to know one another or know much about their family history, but much unfolds. I don't think the book itself lived up to the setup--a town's fear of water, a mysterious incident, family secrets. It's a great combination, but the book was not wholly memorable.

i tried so much but i just couldn't get into it :( the title and cover look so interesting but i was having a difficult time following the story as i wasn't sure when the povs changed or time jumps happened through the audiobook

Swimming is Bronwyn’s life, so much so that she hopes her future includes being a part of the Olympic swim team, so when she moves to Hillwoods for a year–her grandmother is dying and her family is there to care–and is told numerous times that “We don’t swim here,” her heart drops. The school’s pool is empty behind locked doors, along with the rec center’s pool, leaving Bronwyn with many questions about the town and their aversion to swimming. Anais, her cousin, lives in Hillwoods as well, but she won’t give up its swimming secrets. Bronwyn, who refuses to simply accept things, begins her own investigation, taking her to places with the potential for danger. ⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣

We Don’t Swim Here is an interesting, young adult supernatural thriller that I flew through. The events are seen through the eyes of cousins Bronwyn and Anais, allowing me to immerse myself in their lives and the mystery through their unique, individual voices. While Bronwyn did seem like a whiny teen at times, she, as well as many of the other characters, are honestly portrayed. I appreciated how Bronwyn is not only a strong, independent character, but she is a member of the LGBT community and a person of color. While she represents these groups well it wasn’t overly focused on; these things were a part of the story but they didn’t overshadow the mystery within the narrative. We Don’t Swim Here is a page-turner of a novel that kept me guessing throughout, revealing a few surprises along the way. Revenge, mystery, family secrets…what more could one want? ⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣

The audiobook honestly left a lot to be desired. While iiKane gave Bronwyn and Anais their own voices and personalities, bringing these characters to life, there were a lot of long, awkward pauses in places that they didn’t belong and parts that were sped up and full of inflection that did nothing to aid in the telling of the story. It became a rather frustrating audiobook to listen to; I stopped listening to it fairly early on because it was taking away from my enjoyment of the story.

Thanks so much for the opportunity to review this Book. I loved it, although i didnt really love the voice I am very Happy to read the book and will recommend

We Don't Swim Here by Vincent Tirado, an audiobook Narrated by iiKane null is a thrilling young adult horror story set in the creepy town. Book with twists and turns and sad elements.
This book was beautifully written and narrator iiKane displays her adaptability in this mystery story. I couldn't believe there was just one narrator! Her voice changes to reflect advanced age and illness and also has notes of tenderness when she reads Lala's parts. Then she voices the ghostly entity with a deeper voice that successfully transfers agony and pain. What was surprising was that iiKane narrates some parts in clear Spanish.

Bronwyn and her family move from Chicago to Hillwoods, Arkansas, to be closer to her dying Dominican grandmother, Lala. She is supposed to be there just for a year but things change and unexpected events take over. Bronwyn's cousin Anais is trying to protect her from learning about the rituals and why the kids do them as there is danger everywhere!

Thank you, NetGalley and TantorAudio for the advance copy. I didn't manage to download it in time so I am glad that I managed to listen to this book on Scribd/Everland.

This wasnt for me.
I guess i didnt know it was a YA novel.

If you like Horror | Mystery & Thrillers | Teens & YA you might like this.

Thank you NetGalley & Tantor Audio for this Audiobook.

We Don't Swim Here by @v_e_tirado - I read this one months ago, back when I was just diagnosed with CFS and was feeling down and this book was so damn amazing, I'm so glad I chose that exact moment to read it. This book was the perfect amount of spooky, but it also had such a deeper story to it. I LOVED Burn Down, Rise Up, and since I loved this one too.... that means this author is now an auto-buy for me! Don't sleep on these books.

In this story we are following Winnie after she moves to a new town to be closer to an ill relative. When she moves there, she finds that all of the swimming pools have been drained and all the towns-folk will tell her is an ominous "we don't swim here".

This book did an incredible job of creating a creepy and unnerving setting whilst also incorporating supernatural elements. I could feel Winnie's frustration at not only having nowhere to swim, but also at the isolation that she faced all the while getting no closer to any answers.

The evils of this town felt very insidious and it added to an overall sense of dread that permeated through this story.

If you enjoyed Tiffany D. Jackson's horror books, this is likely to be a hit for you.

I loved Burn Down, Rise Up, and this book is quite similar in some ways, but I didn't love it as much. This is like a 3.5 for me.

Bronwyn is devastated when her family moves to rural Hillwoods after her elderly grandmother is admitted to a local hospice. She is disappointed to leave her friends and put her competitive swimming training on hold because there is no pool and Hillwoods, and the refrain from the locals is: "We don't swim here." The locals and even her own cousin, Anais, who she used to be close with are unhelpful, and unexcited about her arrival. There are cryptic rules and odd behaviors by the local teens, but no one is telling her what is going on. Bronwyn meets a college student researching the town for a journalism project at the local library. She is investigating the mysterious deaths of multiple visitors to Hillwoods over the years, including a relative. She hears rumors of a curse on the town and a supernatural entity that is rooted in a racially-motivated murder that occurred during desegregation.

Told through alternating voices, Bronwyn and Anais must both search for truth in answers before it is too late!

Included in this post: https://www.instagram.com/p/CuK1YXsg6mw/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

Haunting, suspenseful, powerful read. I was en emotional wreck while reading! I cried, got angry, felt moments of happiness. Mr. Tirade certainly knows how to craft a good story. I finished the book in a few days. I was consumed with this book!! While I listened via audio, the book made such an impression I had to purchase a physical copy for my bookshelf.

#NETGALLEY
#WEDONTSWIMHERE
#VINCENTTIRADO

This book. The age old curse that haunts a town from swimming was amazing! I was honestly on edge about swimming at the pool this summer after it. This gave 'Stranger Things' vibes and I am here for it!

Spooky and rooted in a small town’s racist past (and present), WE DON’T SWIM HERE had a lot of potential to say a lot of things. I think Sweetie’s story actually had the most depth. Both Bronwyn and Anais were missing that core emotional drive. Bronwyn asks a couple times about where she can swim, but for someone who has Olympic aspirations, she didn’t seem particularly invested in finding anything. And everything else with her character feels more like curiosity than suspicion or fear (which makes it hard to sell that fear to the reader). As for Anais, she’s just emotionally distant, and the hints of her character we get early on (like seeing ghosts, duh) just kind of… drop off? once the Sweetie plot picks up.

The bones of a really great story were there, but it felt like there wasn’t enough meat to sink your teeth into.

When talking specifically about the audiobook, I think it would have benefited from having two narrators; I found myself confused on occasion (especially later in the story) about which character’s POV we were in.

Told from alternate viewpoints - that of Bronwyn and Anais, two cousins who have grown up worlds apart. Bronwyn lives in Illinois and is training to be an Olympic swimmer. Anais is in Hillwoods, Arkansas - a town that has rules you must follow, the biggest one being “we don’t swim here.” When Bronwyn and her parents move to Hillwoods for a year to care for her ailing grandmother, Anais does her best to keep Bronwyn out of harm's way - while also alienating her. But Bronwyn is too curious to accept the secrets and rituals of the town without question and finds herself increasingly in danger.

The narration by iiKane was superb and had me totally hooked. A great read (or listen!)

As much as I hate to leave bad reviews for books of which I received a free copy, I just can't give this more than 2 stars. The premise behind the story was good, and I liked that it incorporated black voices, LGBT voices, and touched on social issues of racial discrimination. Unfortunately, that's where my compliments about this book end.

I was provided I free copy of the audiobook via netgalley, and I'm honestly not sure if it was an unedited version or the final cut. But if it was the final cut, I would not be pleased with my editor were I this author. There were some glaring errors even in audio format, not to mention some crazy time jumps that made no sense. There were multiple times when I had to go back and restart a chapter or scan back 2-3 minutes to see if I had missed something because the point of view just shifted from one character to the other with no warning whatsoever. Or, the point of view would remain the same, but the character would be talking to one group of people at school and then in the next sentence be at home talking to her parents. I do realize there were a couple of instances where this was intentional. The author was trying to show that one of the characters was going into like blackout states due to possession. But that was not the case every single time. Especially incidents where it happened with another character that wasn't Bronwyn.

Furthermore, there were things that seemed to have special significance but that weren't mentioned before. For example, there is a scene where the main character is twisting a ring around her finger. The ring obviously holds definite significance for the book, but there was never any previous mention of her finding the ring or someone giving her the ring or how she got it at all. It was suddenly just there, and we were supposed to understand that it had significance even though it had never appeared before. Unless I completely missed it, which is possible because, as I mentioned, the time jumps were ridiculous. They made it extremely hard to follow the plot and to stay interested in the book overall.

Another example occurred when suddenly a character appeared that we were obviously supposed to know had a huge crush on the main character. But again, unless I missed it, this character had never appeared in the book before or had any conversation with the main character. It was really aggravating and broke up the flow of the book.

Finally, the book just dropped plot points. I thought the main plot was really going to be about this ghost bus that was introduced near the beginning of the story. But there was never any resolution or explanation or anything with that plot point. There were additional things like that is that were Introduced into the story and then just dropped without warning or explanation. For example, what was the issue between the 2 brothers that had them fighting halfway through the story? Why did the brothers' mom send them to different schools? Who actually ratted out the brother that was sneaking out at night if it wasn't the younger brother?

There was so much wrong with this book That I really wish I hadn't finished it. And it sucks because I think it could have been a good book. It seems like, though, it was written in a total hurry. Perhaps the author was on a deadline and decided that finishing A book was better than writing a DECENT book? I'm not sure. But I do know I was not impressed.

For the most part (at least up until two-thirds of it) this book borders on bizarre, and I loved that aspect of it.

That said, I was also a tad bit confused as to the direction of the story because there’s a lot of information incorporated in the narrative without any mention of why it’s relevant.

Vincent Tirado’s writing style is no-fluff, crisp, and entirely plot-driven. They have created an atmosphere of intrigue so well that your mind is constantly churning with possibilities.

Much like them, Bronwyn is of Afro-Latin heritage.

There are several paranormal plot points woven into the storytelling that I was excited about. But unfortunately, some of these fade into the background as the main conflict becomes the central focus.

I wished the author had explained more about the Ghost Bus, the ballot, and the ritual sacrifices. Maybe even tied them to the bigger picture somehow.

So if you don’t enjoy being kept in the dark or finding inconclusive storylines in a book, I’m guessing you may not enjoy reading this one as much.

Apart from a few grisly descriptions, I personally didn’t think the book was a creepy horror read.

The chapters alternate between Bronwyn’s and her cousin Anais’ perspectives. I enjoyed reading the former more as I felt that the story progressed quickly in these chapters.

In addition to highlighting themes of race, family tensions, injustice, and social policing, the author superimposes a mythical world onto Hillwoods, full of legends and superstitions.

Once Bronwyn figures out what’s going on, I thought the loose ends would be tied up by the end of the novel. That doesn’t happen. There are still questions left unanswered.

On the whole, I liked reading We Don’t Swim Here because of the underlying ideas and the premise. I just wish more effort had been spent on refining the flow of the story.

I am definitely planning to pick up the author’s other works as I think they have great potential.

I don’t really like the book a lot. It was difficult to follow all the friends. I got confused couple times. Thought I was reading a different book. For the most part, it was an excellent book. Black girl moves to an area where it’s predominantly white. She has difficulty fitting in. Read the book and find out why they don’t swim there in that town. I liked it a lot. Thank you Netgalleyand the publisher for providing the advanced audiobook to me.

Bronwyn and her family have recently moved from Illinois back to her father’s hometown of Hillwoods, Arkansas due to her grandmother's ill health. Bronwyn/ Wynnie have never even been to Arkansas before and is having to leave her entire friendship group and high level swim team behind. She was not feeling positive about the move, this place was so rural and she was used to the hustle and bustle of urban living.

When she starts at her new school partway through the semester Wynnie is nervous about fitting in, but as soon as she mentions swimming she receives an icy reception, why is everyone here so against swimming? People are acting very oddly and it’s obvious they are covering something up, even Anias, Bronwyn’s cousin who goes to this school is keeping her at arms length. So when Wynnie finds some of her Grandma Lala’s Spanish diaries from 1965 and things begin to reveal themselves, she needs to dig deeper.



A good YA supernatural/horror/psychological thriller. This was really a fun and creepy book, it kept me in suspense to find out the backstory of what was going on in this small town and why. The characters are well written and very believable and the descriptions really bring it to life, the only downfall was that it was very meandering, which made it hard to follow at times and I found something odd about the way it built up to the end. The premise was great, but something was missing for me.


Great narrator, with excellent clear character voicing.

We Don't Swim Here
by Vincent Tirado
Narrated by iiKane null

Rating: 3.5/5.0

Bronwyn and her family move to Hillwoods temporarily to take care of her ailing grandmother, Lala. The thing is, the town has a secret. They don't swim there. At all. Nobody, including Bronwyn's cousin Anais wants to reveal the secrets of the town, but Bronwyn discovers them on her own...

This book gets rounded to 4 stars for Tirado's fantastic imagery. It took a bit to get into this book, but once Bronwyn gets a little more up close and personal with the town's secret, I became more interested. I think this could be a fun movie or tv show, to be honest, with a few additional points of the book followed up on. iiKane null's performance was excellent; she brought the characters to life and was easy to listen to and understand. The cast of primary and secondary characters were well-developed and added to the story as well.

Thank you so much to NetGalley, the author, and Tantor Audio for the chance to listen to and review this creepy title!