A nice little modern gothic horror, a Bird Box for a post-COVID world. It was an enjoyable horror read, I just wish we could know more about the world the characters are living in, rather than hyper focusing on just these two characters. I didn’t feel a strong connection to them, and found the story to rely mostly on vibes rather than substance. It was still an enjoyable read, with a great concept. I think I just wanted more.

The vibe of this book captured some of my favorite elements of Bird Box and Cabin at the End of the World as well as the hopeless, lonely feeling of the pandemic. Really nailed the dreary. The main character is really neat. Just a rock solid psychological horror story that I devoured.

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TL;DR: If you’ve a fear of being alone, have intense feelings of the pandemic or enjoy more topical mental hellscape type of horrors - this is for you. If you’re here for the creepy, the supernatural, or any type of humor or human endurance? Pass on this.

Your Shadow Half Remains reminds me a lot of Sister, Maiden, Monster which I read last year (and honestly deeply disliked as well). It has a very modern, relevant to our times theme and keeps us trapped in the minds of clearly unwell people during these times. This is a very pandemic centered novel, focusing on the mind of a women trapped in a pandemic, this one where you cannot look someone in the eye without being instantly driven to homicide.

Not only is it intensely brutal (for the shock factor of it all), it also looks at the way in which we become numb to the atrocities around us during extreme times. This was an interesting conversation but the slow decent into madness we experience with Riley was very… well cringe for me.

If you’ve a fear of being alone, have intense feelings of the pandemic or enjoy more topical mental hellscape type of horrors - this is for you. If you’re here for the creepy, the supernatural, or any type of humor or human endurance? Pass on this.

Please keep in mind this is very intense. A lot of gore, themes of a possible stalker, suicide aplenty, animal death/violence, death of a parent, an attempted sexual assault in the past, and possibly more that I missed

2 Unneeded Crow Murders out of 5 (the hell was that scene?)

I enjoyes this weird story. I did not know where the unrelianle narrator was taking me on her journey. I love this kind of story where I cannot guess where to next. The only reason for the 4 stars is for the open ending.

The worlds latest pandemic was hard enough but to be in one where you cant even look up at someone , where you have to fear what they may do to you. The idea is worse. scary. I liked the concept. I did not like however, how long it was taking to get to a plot of what was gonna happen with the characters. It was interesting but moved slow. I found it to be interesting and I was invested in knowing what was going to happen. The length was nice too. Makes for a good Halloween time book.

Your Shadow Half Remains is a post-apocalyptic horror novel that takes place in a world where eye contact incites violent madness, with the infected killing anyone around them before killing themself. The story centers on Riley, a young woman who has been living in isolation for years since the first outbreaks. Relying on online deliveries and what she can find in her home already, Riley hasn't encountered another person in years - until Ellis arrives.

I find this one hard to review because I did enjoy it - I tore through it in one day, staying up way past when I had planned to turn in for the night - but I don't feel totally satisfied by it. The writing was great - tense, atmospheric, adept at conveying Riley's paranoia and spiraling mental health; the story itself also unsettled me.

The story could be a bit repetitive at times, though - Riley's fears are largely the same ones again and again and there isn't much action in the present day.

My biggest problem, however, came near the end - I don't have a problem with unreliable narrators but I like the story to make more sense after a big reveal, not less. And in this case, I felt like there were too many loose threads and unanswered questions. [SPOILERS!] Why is Ellis so avoidant about his past? Why the build-up about Ellis' ex? Did Riley completely make up the footprints in the yard? I understand she's clearly having breaks from reality but having a whole scene confirming her fears of someone stalking her, only to reveal that she seems to have hallucinated the entire conversation (but not the man) was kind of frustrating for me. [END OF SPOILERS] I did really love the ending scene, however!

I still think this was a good read and I liked it and I would definitely try more by this author. If you enjoy tense, paranoia-inducing horror with unreliable narrators, I think it's worth a look.

Your Shadow Half Remains is a short but gripping read. It explores themes of isolation, grief and the longing for connection as well as the normalization of horrible situations and how we adapt. We follow Riley well into a sort of pandemic where looking into someone’s eyes leads to madness, violence, and death. Having moved to an isolated cabin she is surviving in isolation with drone deliveries for any necessities when her solitary existence is interrupted by the arrival of someone new who breaks that routine. At the same time strange things begin to happen. Is it the newcomer Ellis responsible or someone lurking in the shadows?

Being dropped right into the middle of everything that has gone down creates a tension that doesn’t let up. The relationship between Riley and Ellis is something the reader longs for as well as dreads at the same time fearing what will happen as various odd events start occurring that create a sense of distrust. Having an unreliable narrator keeps the reader questioning what’s real; memories, dreams, and events that happen blur together in an almost dreamlike way. The ending is ambiguous and haunting in a way that suits the story well.

Would definitely recommend to readers who enjoyed Bird Box or I am legend. A great read for horror fans looking for something dark and mysterious with layered depth.

I received an advance review copy, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of this book.

This book hit! I'm fairly new to the horror genre but this was so fun and totally creepy. The way the main character was gripping the edge of reality and insanity had me hooked. It would be so easy to loose it in a world with no human contact. I really enjoyed the authors writing and can't wait to read more of her work.

One thing I loved about this book is that the reader is plopped right into Riley’s current life, and only given 176 pages to figure out what the hell is going on. This book will not be for you if you like everything laid out for you in black and white right from the jump.

After the puzzle of catching up to Riley’s current situation, the reader follows along as she risks everything to have human contact again after several years of isolation. This book focuses a lot on grief and the things that we are capable of in the name of survival.

Check this one out if you like horror, I Am Legend, post apocalyptic worlds, and unhinged narrators!

**Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for the eARC of this creepy a$$ title!**

I honestly didn’t find this scary or even particularly unsettling. It felt like a critique of the rather chaotic response to the COVID pandemic, namely the isolation of quarantine (but dial it up to 11 because you can’t safely be around other people at all). But it also totally fell apart if you tried to dig deeper - like infrastructure would have all but totally collapsed, so no electricity or ordering of food or production of any kind.

Riley was too narratively distant. So as things started to devolve, I felt rather indifferent to her paranoia, which is a big miss when that’s supposed to be the baseline of the fear.

I did like the casual mention of how an Autistic person who generally did not make much eye contact before making eye contact was deadly would have a different reaction than a neurotypical person. (Also liked that said Autistic version was consistently referred to using they/them pronouns even though they never actually appeared on page)

Your Shadow Half Remains by Sunny Moraine
Publication Date- February 06
Publisher- Tor Nightfire, Tor Publishing Group
Overall Rating- 4 out of 5 stars

Review: Review copy given to me by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

This is a novella that packs a punch clocking in at just 176 pages. This book is chilling and at times hard to read but in an expected and good way. Your Shadow Half Remains asks the question of what would happen if we could no longer look each other in the eyes. As a therapist by day, I found this question thought provoking and engaging. I feel like everyone should entertain this thought experiment. With social media being the real pandemic we all face, Sunny Moraine helps us come face to face and look loneliness in the eyes even when it hurts.

I don’t often note trigger warnings for books but with some horror and other specific triggers I think it’s important. For this one you should know there are intense conversations and thoughts about suicide, what it means to be alive, there is body horror, grief and loss of self. These topics are done in a thoughtful and considerate manner that adds to the story. Sometimes with horror I find heavier topics are used just for the shock value. Sunny Moraine uses them to tell the story deeper. You think more when you look someone in the eyes and choose connection. I look forward to reading more by them.

I wish there'd been an excerpt, because no matter how hard I try, I can never find myself enjoying a book written in third person present tense.

Your Shadow Half Remains is a short horror novella. It has been compared to Bird Box, but I think that comparison doesn’t quite fit it. Keep in mind that I've never read the book, only seen the movie. Therefore, I'm basing that comparison off my experience with the movie. Where Bird Box felt more like a creature feature, this book is purely psychological.

In the book the main character, Riley lives in her grandparents home near a lake in practically the middle of nowhere. She’s lived there for quite some time. How long? We are never told. Even Riley herself doesn’t know. She can’t remember. Civilization is gone. She has one semi-working computer, no clocks, no television, and as of the first couple of chapters of this book, no cell phone because she tossed it in the lake.

At least ten years before the start of the book, some sort of pandemic occurred. If people make eye contact, at least one of them will go insane and both of them will wind up dead. So, people who survive the initial onslaught of this pandemic have to adjust their way of life. And, to do that, they cut themselves off from each other. There are no more portraits, no more face time, no more faces on tv, and little to no more human-to-human contact because all those things are dangerous and could get you killed. Fast forward back to the present, we have Riley who has lived along for who knows how long.

The book is told from a one person point of view, and that single solitary view is Riley’s, and Riley is unstable. Riley is the picture perfect textbook definition of an unreliable narrator. Everything she thinks, speaks, hears, or observes is questionable. But, that’s what happens when you live along for so long that you don’t know how long it’s been. Riley is settled into her routine of nothingness until one day someone named Ellis comes knocking and throws Riley’s life all out of whack.

Riley begins to think and feel things she hasn’t experienced since the start of the pandemic. She also begins to want things she hasn’t wanted in a while. This leads Riley to an extreme amount of discomfort. She begins to question everything slowly slipping further and further into perceived madness. I mean even she thinks she’s crazy. But, because she’s an unreliable narrator, how are we supposed to know if she is actually losing her mind or not? She could just think she’s losing her mind but not actually losing her mind. Do people know they are insane when they’re insane? Do they even know how insane they are?

This book is a tale about how a civilization changes through shared trauma. It’s about how that trauma becomes less and less jarring everyday until we are no longer shocked about that trauma as we continue to experience it. It is also about loneliness and moving away from human contact into more distant forms of communication like texting. It is also a study about anxiety and PTSD as well as hopeful recovery from both.

Thank you to Tor Nightfire for the advanced copy of this book. All reviews are my own. I leave them voluntarily.

This is a book about paranoia in the wake of a deadly virus. When eye contact can turn you into a violent, homicidal maniac, survivors like Riley have isolated themselves from the world. But when Ellis moves into the area, Riley finds herself drawn to her despite her growing fear of the new world they're living in. However, is Ellis a safe person to be around? Can Riley trust that neither of them have been infected without realizing it?

This was a dark book that didn't hold back. Seeing the world through Riley's eyes, all puns intended, the reader could clearly understand the way isolation and fear changes a person. A quick but incredible read, I highly recommend this novel if you enjoy dark fiction.

The first time I read the description for Your Shadow Half Remains, I knew I had to read it as soon as I could. I was so excited when I saw that I was approved for an eARC by TOR and NetGalley.

I read this book in a day and could hardly put it down. It took me on a journey- I started the book believing one thing to be true only to be doubting everything I thought by the end. And that ending!!! I got to the last page without realizing it, turned the page and saw the acknowledgements, and said “WHAT?!” I love books like that. This book is a novella but felt like a full book because of how fleshed out the plot is.

What an incredible and feverish story to crash through! The premise and our unreliable narrator were the perfect way to tell this flavor of unhinged woman at the end of the world. Really loved the stream of consciousness and character study in this!

Thanks to Netgalley and Tor Nightfire for gifting me an early copy. Below is my honest review.

This short novel is quite powerful. What happens to us when we can't look others in the face? When we lose all true connection and contact with people? How do we define ourselves when we can't even figure out if we're sane anymore? What happens when complete isolation is the new normal? Or, even more importantly, when someone decides to break that isolation without giving you a choice?

If you're a fan of Malerman's Bird Box or Saramago's Blindness (or their visual adaptations), this book will hit you hard. Just be prepared that you might not like what you see when you have to look at yourself as deeply as Riley does.

Definitely recommended for fans of psychological thrillers/suspense/almost horror.

3.5
rounding up!

"As it turns out, for no apparent reason, something can break in your world, and suddenly, all around you, people are dying bloody and screaming every fucking day.
It’s horrifying. Then it’s weird. Then it’s inconvenient.
Then it’s just every fucking day."

it's taken me so long to write a review because I can't decide which words I should use to describe the book. bizarre? definitely. delightful? also true. insane? well, Riley would certainly have an opinion on that.

we are plunked right in the thick of things, in the semi-boring part of an apocalyptic situation where everybody is kinda just ,,,, doing their best not to die. Riley is our mc. she's recently moved out to the countryside, to her grandparents' lovely cabin on the lake. don't ask about the bloodstains in the foyer or Riley's dead mom back in the city or Riley's nonexistent neighbours. everything is fine. Riley has internet still and can pay to get premium delivery so she at least has groceries!

she takes a lot of walks and looks at a lot of birds because that apocalypse I mentioned? it's transmitted through eye contact. specifically eye contact with another human being. this 'disease' or what have you causes people to act very, very aggressively once triggered, by which I mean they murder anyone around them that they can get their hands on and then kill themselves. it spread pretty quickly, wiping out entire family units and then neighbourhoods and then small cities.

so Riley moves out to the middle of nowhere, to minimize her chance of getting infected and going crazy. one day, as she's taking her little walk, she meets someone new. this is an electrifying scene; the audience has been told over and over again that being around people is bad, seeing people is bad, meeting new people is bad! but then here's Ellis, meandering around in the woods, greeting Riley like the two of them are old friends.

things get quickly ,,,, trippy. I loved the way Your Shadow Half Remains is written; it's so dreamy, the language slow and syrupy. everything feels over-saturated in a way I can't really articulate. chapters kind of alternate between memories, dreams and reality but the lines are so blurry that it's difficult to discern what's true and what's imagined.

overall, I liked this book. the language is lovely in a relaxing, unhinged way, and it did a great job of undermining any confidence you might have in Riley excruciatingly quickly. a quick read with a wild finish, I'll be recommending this book to horror fans who are open to something a little ,,, different.


rep - agender (no pronouns used) love interest
thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for the arc ✨

This book is perfection - complete and utter perfection.

While I am both an avid reader and a fan of horror movies, it is only in this month - December 2023 - that I decided to give horror books a try. This is the fourth horror novel I have ever read, and I am completely and utterly in love.

You naturally have influences from the comp titles - the Last of Us and BirdBox - but Your Shadow Half Remains is a hauntingly beautiful piece of fiction that had me on the edge of my seat the whole time. I was both rooting for the romance and distrusting of the love interest. I was scrambling to piece together pieces of information right beside Riley, and even when it was all said and done, my mind is still swirling with questions.

It has stuck with me, and I believe it will continue to do so for a long time yet.

I have added this to my re-read list, because I am going to need to re-read it over and over again.

This book is a nightmare.

The world is in utter chaos. It started a little while ago... when you look into people's eyes, you both go mad. Riley seems to have lost everything, living on her own, no family, disconnected from the rest of the world.

But when a stranger shows up, the slight peace she has built is shattered, and we start to see what real madness may look like.

Horror seems at its best in short format... where you are driven brutally from act to act before you can catch your breath, and Moraine gets full marks for using this fact to write an utterly gripping tale of post-apocalyptic woe.

My thanks to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.