I love a little bit of weird and this addition to the series paid off! The protagonist wakes up next to a dead body, he has no memory but it looks like he’s the killer!

The residents of this domicile should have picked another place to live. There’s a game where one wrong move & you could be dead.

Read this for fun & if you don’t mind body horror. Good narration.

Holus Bolus by William Pauley III is my favorite book in the Bedlam Bible series... well, I think I say that after I read each book in the series. Seems I love them all! The characters are freaking brilliant! Brilliant! Comical and delightfully strange, Holus Bolus is both brilliantly written and organically crafted. The narrator does impeccable character work and the cover is one of my favorites.

I received a review copy of this book from the author/publisher through NetGalley for my honest review. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.

Was intrigued from the get go and listened to the audiobook in two sittings because I wanted to know what happened. I didn't realise until after that this was part 6 of a series, I'm definitely going to seek out the rest of the stories. It was a fun and interesting read. The audiobook narrator also did an amazing job with giving the characters distinct voices, it was very engaging and enjoyable. Had a similar vibe to Chuck Palahniuk and the movie Memento.

Received this from Net Galley in exchange for my honest review.

Out of this series, this one is my favorite. I it was definitely crazy and kooky but I kind of love that about it. The story was easier to follow after reading a few of the other books and understanding the unreliability of the setting. It's a new age horror story with a bit of suspense too.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an audiobook. This book was a really good experience. I’m usually not into these kinds of books that feel like a fever dream, hence the 3 stars.

William Pauley has written down such a solid piece of work here. I am just awed by how incredibly deep this story is. The eighth block tower is written more like a character than a place. The world building is in the tower itself. The tower is a creature and it drives other creatures to madness, pursuits, murders, irrationality and even spirituality.
The story starts off with our main character waking up amnesiac. Not remembering the reason for tattoos on his arms or the corpse lying in his room, or the book in the dissolved flesh of the corpse, be runs out of the apartment and is taken hostage by a group of people whose mentor's was the corpse in the man's room. So basically, this book follows these people trying to find who killed their mentor, sensei. This sensei was a spiritual person and was trying some real big stuff with his disciples.
The thing with this eighth block tower is that it is crazy It is paranormal. It's an animal and it's horrifying. There are these rivers or streams of immaterial substance that binds the residents to the an unseen core of the tower. It is a living creature and people are irrevocably bound to it and and it insidiously draws them in. It binds them in a sweet bewitchment where their soul is emptied and mind is switched off. Sensei wanted to break free of this curse, to stop slumbering to the radiating hummings of the tower, to wake up and overcome the power of this tower. And he makes a huge plan. The ending turned out to be a lot like the Jigsaw film and it was cool ngl.

The concept of this tower having a giant brain is so awfully cool and deliciously disturbing to me. So the thing with this this book is that William Pauley doesn't treat it like a spooky children's story. It has those Stephen King vibes creeping onto it where there is a depth to things, a message, an emotional nuance. The tower is the fear of residents, they live to it, they die to it and it's an evil entity for me, people can't live outside of it even if they do find out a way to get out.

The story was over all well written with a little blandness at times but managed well still. Just like the other stories the ending was everything here. The eeriness brought to the highest crescendo at times, with a transcendental tint at others. I especially found the concept of The Beyond very intriguing.

So here's the thing, William Pauley KNOWS how to bind the reader by putting in his story the most bizarre things and then making it more impactful by keeping some things unexplained. Things like the voice in the head, the purple television, the bedlam bible stuff. While I do agree that things can become more interesting and concrete if there is given more time to world building and overall descriptions aside from the characters and actions, I also think it comes with its own uniqueness of flavors. At least it's true for me.

Having mentioned everything, I also want to talk about his gore scenes. I have always found body horror fun to read. And yes I do admonish myself for my sadistic wants but that's just how it is, I love gore and this book satisfies much of my fantasies. Not that I enjoy the painful moments but I like to be haunted by a book.

So yeah, an amazing ride, always recommended. Perfect fast read for spook lovers.

*Audiobook*

When the protagonist wakes up next to a dead body and a tattoo on his arm that says “I did a bad thing,” he thinks he may have committed the murder. He has a condition where his memories reset when he goes to sleep each night, so he has no recollection of what happened. With the help of the voice inside his head and a book found on the dead body, the protagonist realizes someone else may be to blame. He runs into a group of outcasts who are also trying to solve the murder, and they work together while also suspecting each other of the crime.

I really enjoyed the narrator. There are a lot of characters to keep track of which can be difficult while listening to an audiobook, but he used specific voices for each character. But even with the stellar narration, I found the first half of the plot confusing. I know that this is a series (though I don’t think the books are necessarily dependent upon each other), so I think that caused some of my confusion. It took awhile to understand Pauley’s style—which is not bad, but definitely unique—and I wasn’t super invested in the story. Plus the unreliable narrator made it difficult to figure out what was going on at times. The second half gripped me, and at that point I couldn’t stop listening. It finally became the psychological thriller I was expecting. Thanks to NetGalley, Doom Fiction, and William Pauley III for this free ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you NetGalley and publisher for this ARC!

This was such an increasing read. I was pleasantly surprised how much I ended up enjoying this book. I went in to it blind but I am glad I did.

Judging by the reviews given by the readers familiar with this author, this is one of his strongest novels. It is also a part of the series, which I completely missed.

Holus Bolus is bonkers, in a really fun way. It was fun for the first 50%, and then I lost interest and getting to the end became a bit of a chore. I thought I had guessed where the novel was going but ended up being wrong. So, in summary, I have no idea what I just read.

This book was a bit confusing at times, very weird, but also very interesting. I think had I know more about the authors style or what to expect going in, I would have enjoyed it a bit more. I wouldn’t dissuade anyone from reading this but it will not be in my top reads of the year either.

First of all- THE SALT PILES?!?! I was screaming in my car. I genuinely feel like I need to get a cork board and some string to make sense of all the connections between Pauley’s stories. We start off Holus Bolus meeting Mondin, who wakes up next to a dead body and the bedlam bible. He has a condition that resets his memory when he sleeps, but lucky for him he has a voice in his head that is telling him he is not the murderer. We meet a group of tower residents who have formed their own religion(or cult, depending on who you ask) and all have secrets from their past they are hiding. You might want to grab some tower flower to help you get through this investigation because this story keeps you guessing until the very end.

I just need to read the names William Pauley III and Connor Brannigan and I know that I am in for a really good ride, I probably already listened (yes I say listen, because that's another really worth ride and I will explain it further in a little bit) to all or pretty much almost all of the bedlam bible and I cant recommend it enough. The stories are always original, weird, funny and disturbing and all of that at the same time, haha I know I really can’t get enough of it.

In this particular book, we have a weird character that every time he awakes he doesn’t remember a thing of what he did before, and he has a tattoo that says he did something bad before, that brought me back to pimento from Brooklyn nine-nine in that episode that he had the finding dory disease, but that's where the similarities end hahah.

The Gem of this all is the person reading this audiobook, Connor Brannigan, he makes this already very amusing story even better, he is a truly one man band, he does all the voices and brings the story alive out of paper, I really cant recommend this author and Voice actor enough!

Thank you NetGalley and Doom Fiction Audio for the free AAC and this is my honest opinion.

I enjoyed this book. It’s funny how it was able to stick with me. I started reading this book Back in Oct, got away from reading for quite some time yet I still had this book with me when I picked it back up to finish it.

This is one of the stranger books I've read recently, and I had no idea this was part of a series. The narrator of the audiobook did a great job of giving every character a distinct voice. Not sure I totally understand what happened, but it was a fast and wild ride.

It's harder to make the glass then break the glass

This is a great saying

1. The 8th block tower can be a great strength
2. You can transform your surroundings with ur mind
3. Master the 10 vibrations through mediation and personal growth

The 10 are cause and effect for one another

4. The 10 vibrations are
Openness
Love
Knowledge
Understanding
Wisdom
Justice
Equality
Peace
Freedom
Happiness

Through this book, we start with a scene where the main character wakes up with a corpse in front of him with a Voice in his head. Throughout the book, we meet 6 other characters who all have issues of their own and where more like followers of a guy called Sensi who follows the rules in the bedlam bible and meets every week.

This story was addictive from beginning to end and I binged the audiobook in one sitting, the voice of the narrator Conner Brannigan was great at doing all the characters with slight differences in each voice, which made me love the audiobook even more + his voice is very nice to listen to and calming.

This is the first book by William Pauley Jr for me and I do enjoy his writing style as well as his storytelling, I plan to read the rest of this series of books.

I cannot talk too much about this book or I will give the story completely away, but trust me this is worth the read.

Again. Took me by surprise and I ate it up. Such a strange mind you have William but please don’t ever stop.
This is a book I won’t forget after falling asleep.

I wanted so badly to like this. I loved the quirky characters, the banter between them all, and the story was ok. I just wanted, or expected, more. The concept was pretty neat but I kept getting bored and just wanted something to happen. The end was far better than the first half. I'm going to be trying other William Pauly III books, I am hoping they will be better.

I received this audiobook via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Many thanks to the author and publisher for this opportunity.

Weird…Wild…Creative
A story with equally weird, wild and creative characters.

The plot in this story is pure genius and so interesting.

The narrator really did an incredible job telling this story.

I love this series so much. Super creepy and super fun. This is book 6 and I have been reading them out of order without being too confused. Once again spending my time thinking "what the fuck" but in all the best ways. I can't stress enough how much I love these books.

5 stars

Ohh! I really liked how the author wrote all the books in the BB series using mix of genres; they are all in the horror genre but with mix of others. This makes this series is very interesting.
This book done as a mystery triller. The main character waked up in a room with a dead body , doesn’t remember anything, just has a tattoo on his hand that he did bad things, so he thinks he is a murderer and starts his own investigation. Classic!
Then he meet the group of other outcasts as he, who knows the dead guy. They do investigation together. The guy suspects everyone of them, they suspect him. Classic again!
But was really surprised to which direction the plot went.
Also really liked character development in this book, as well the side characters.
I enjoyed this book as the rest of the series. Very entertaining series.
Thanks to NetGalley for providing free audiobook.