Annaya is a teenager with the ability to see and touch the dead. These tangible, violent Dead can not only reciprocate, but are suspiciously drawn to her. They attack anywhere, anytime in Annaya's vicinity, immediately inviting readers into her high stakes world. Chapters from her POV are interspersed with ones from a detective, plus a mysterious, frightening antagonist who is hungry for...more than the roadside diner offers. The latter and Annaya are on a collision course throughout the book, a skillful escalation of tension. The first leg of the plot reminded me of King's Firestarter, with a supernaturally gifted child on the run with a parent, but utilizing folk magic rather than scientific experimentation to attribute powers. I prefer this, personally.

This book had an interesting take on "the Sight" compared to other ghost stories, extending to all senses. Another tidbit I enjoyed was the use of music: specific songs are playing on the radio throughout the book, giving the plot a fever dream quality - this could almost be our world.

The settings, and descriptions in general throughout the book are impeccable. I could see grimy wallpaper peeling off walls; smell the stale, oily fragrance of aged roadside dinners in rural Appalachia. The high school is decaying almost as badly as the Dead corpses who torment Annaya, and the crumbling, poorly maintained building is a fitting stage for inciting incidents of the plot.

The minor issues I had didn't detract much enjoyment from the book! Sometimes the narrative was a little unclear (I mistook the Collector for the Eater), and some staples of the plot, like the Dead being tangible for those with Sight, were puzzling: did the fluids and remains of vanquished Dead slowly rot unless those with the Sight cleaned them up, or did they kind of vanish video-game style? Buuuut questions like this also successfully leave it open for a sequel or expansion of the story's universe, and exposition would have stopped the book's rapid pace, which had me gripped as a reader.

All in all, a fine addition to the horror genre, and a must-read if you're into backwoods horror or podcasts like Old Gods of Appalachia.

TWs: violence, murder, gore, death, dismemberment, mutilation of child characters on-page, violence towards child protagonist, walking corpses, consumption of human bodies, brief depictions of bullying.

Backwoods horror at its best! This was such a new setting of horror for me. I was sucked into the Blue Ridge Mountains immediately with the colorful descriptions. Annaya's gift of seeing the Dead leads to some unexpected and gruesome situations. This book still has me wondering who started it all and what else is creating chaos in the mountains!

This book follows the teenager Annaya Roth while she’s quite literally fighting for her life. Wherever she turns she gets attacked by what she calls “The Dead”, but unbeknownst to her something much worse is about to enter her life…
I found some parts of this story a bit confusing, both in some of the characters backstories, as well as some of the choices they made in the book. Similarly, I did not particularly enjoy the ending, but I was intrigued enough to want to pick up a sequel if that were to be written. However, all in all this was a fairly entertaining, quick and fun read. I enjoyed the plot and there was never a dull moment. I also liked that despite this book having its fair share of gore and violence, it did not feel disgusting and nasty, like a lot of books that rely on gore do.
You should definitely give this book a try if you like a good horror story, especially zombie- like stories.
Big thanks to Netgalley, BDA Publishing, and the author A. W. Rene for allowing me to read an E-ARC of this book.

I've never really read horror books before but this one was so good I might give the genre another try. I read it in one sitting.

Firstly I love how descriptive the book is. It was so easy to picture everything. The setting, the characters, even the Dead. Secondly it was so fast paced. There really was never a dull moment and it took so many twists that I really was not expecting. It didn't feel rushed, though. It was a great balance.

It was a really good book that I thoroughly enjoyed.