Teen Summer Camp Slasher type stories are having a bit of a moment in YA horror right now. My general librarian philosophy is to give the kids what they want, and to that effect I've been reading a lot of these types of stories. Comparitively, this one ranks somewhere in the middle of the pack.

The set-up is strong. "My father was a serial killer and now I'm back at the camp where he killed" is a premise a potential reader will immediately be drawn to if this is their kind of story. I like it when horror books initially leave you wondering whether the goings-on are supernatural or not. In my opinion, this book makes it clear which side of that line it comes down on a little bit too early, but that is very much just a matter of taste.

The main reason I don't rate this book higher than I do is because there's something about the way that it's written that's just kind of... confusing to me? I found myself often having to reread sentences a few times, because it was often unclear to me who was speaking to who, or where things were supposed to be, or sometimes even just what was going on.

Overall, I'd say this would be a pretty good buy if you've got a lot of horror reading teens, but I'm unsure if it would appeal to readers not already kind of savvy to the genre.

Rating: 3.5 (rounded up)

Content Warnings: murder, violence, gore, death of a parent, desecration of bodies, stalking, child abuse, fire/fire injury

Temple, the daughter of an infamous serial killer, returns to the woods in which she was raised - the woods where her father's victims were discovered - hoping to find the truth of her mother's disappearance. But the woods, now a campsite, are still a site of multiple missing persons cases, and Temple soon finds herself investigating a possible copycat of her father's crimes.

So, this was definitely different than I was expecting, but I think it was different for the better! Ellis definitely does a good job invoking the energy of a horror flick with this book - her writing sets the spooky atmosphere, and the descriptions of gore, while not my exact cup of tea, are definitely reminiscent of a slasher film. Going into this, I was definitely not expecting a paranormal kind of horror, but once this element is introduced, it works really well. Plot-wise, I think this is really great. It's full of twists and turns, and it's fun to see all of the various plot threads introduced throughout the book come together to create a cohesive narrative. My only issue with it, really, was that I wished we were given more information sooner, because frankly, I don't think I fully comprehended what was actually going on here until the 90% mark or something. I totally understand wanting that 'unfolding mystery' vibe with your book, but for a little too much of this book, I just felt a little too out of the loop, which didn't make for the best reading experience. That being said, totally possible that I'm just dumb and other people would totally have grasped everything earlier! And everything did totally come together - definitely a case of 'when it clicks, it CLICKS'.

Still, I think plot was the strongest element here. I really wanted to like Temple as a character, but she sort of gave off 'not like other girls' vibes. (Like, come on, aren't we over calling other girls 'Barbie' as an insult?) Ultimately, I think her character arc was pretty good, but I did find it difficult to warm up to her. I'm really glad the book didn't have a romance though - I was worried it might and it SO didn't need one, so I was glad everyone was just bestie vibes only at the end.

Huge thank you to NetGalley, Sami Ellis, and Amulet Books for the eARC!

Your Father is a Killer, a now on death row a serial killer convicted of killing 20+ people and one of them was your mother
We follow Temple as she poses as a Camp Counselor at her father’s killing ground turned overnight camp. When a girl ends up dead, Temple goes on a mission for answers To protect her fellow campers she must face that her father may have not been the only monster in these woods…
This book was definitely a mixed bag for me. I really wanted to and say that I loved it, but I didn’t. I can’t say that I hate it either, so it pretty much falls in the middle for me.
First and foremost, I got lost so many times with the way the author wrote this book. A lot of the jumping back-and-forth between past dialogue/scenes and case notes had me so confused. I just wanted it to be a straightforward story about a girl trying to protect the campers from an unknown entity. And to add on that a lot of the characters didn’t get as much development time as they should have. I can’t really say that any of these characters, including the main character, are my favorite. Which is kind of a bummer because you really want to like the main character or at least a character. The all kind of felt like they were on one level if that makes any sense.
What I liked:
I did like that it was LGBTQ+Friday the 13th inspired type of novel mainly and a good portion of the dialogue had me cracking up in its wittiness.
The big reveal was kind of a shocker. Cause I honestly didn’t see it coming which is a plus but the way that it ended was kind of like being left with a severe case of whiplash. And not necessarily a good case.
Overall, this book was a so-so book. I was kind of expecting more from the spooky cover and the synopsis. It just felt like a lot of parts were rammed together to create this story and I wouldn’t say they connected the way I would have liked.
Would I recommend this book?
I’m always the kind of person that wants every reader to give it a chance. Just because I didn’t particularly like it, doesn’t mean everyone won’t like it. I would give it 3 stars. A wobbly queer inspired slasher novel that left me confused and unsatisfied.

Thanks to the folks at NetGalley for ARC of this book. My review is a honest reflection of my feelings towards this book.

A fantastically fun YA horror set at a horror camp, with the main character Temple searching for her mother’s dead body. The setup and premise are thrilling and the writing is snappy, the stakes are clear, and the setting is spooky. While not totally scary, parts in the woods and creaky houses are definitely creepy.

The book does try to do quite a lot within a short space of time which at around the 30% mark is a bit disconnecting, but I found that I started to get sucked in all over again after this point.

As a lover of all things Scream and slashers, this appealed to teenage me who loved to be scared while rooting for amazing characters. Temple might not always be likeable, but she’s relatable and isn’t trying to be every other YA MC.

Definitely recommend for YA horror and thriller lovers.

I love campy queer horror (especially set at a summer camp), so on paper this should have been a book I loved. Unfortunately, it didn’t work for me. I disliked the main character, and I thought the way information was revealed was confusing. I never quite connected with the story. I’m sad that I didn’t enjoy this one. If you like YA horror that has a lot of different elements in it and is more action-heavy, you might like this better than I did.
Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC!

Temple goes to a camp for girls who like girls and tries to blend in while also looking for her mothers body after being sent there by her father who's a serial killer. First off, Temple was just unlikable imo. She was mean to everybody for no apparent reason and in her mind everybody was out to get her. I struggled to get through the beginning of this book and the end wasn't shattering. Yes, corpses come back and are chasing her around the camp but zombies are zombies. This book isn't horrible and if you're looking for a "campy" lil spooky read, this one's for you.

(3.5 stars!)
I’m not too sure on this one. The first half was just super confusing for me and I felt like I wasn’t getting enough information, everything seemed very cryptic and was starting to annoy me slightly. But when people started dying and stuff started happening I started to really get into it and thought the idea was actually quite inventive and clearly a lot of thought was put into the plot! There was also a lot of good character progression which I enjoyed, some of the dislikable characters start to become likeable and I do love that in a book! I would recommend this if you love a good slasher read, especially if you love a campy one at that as it’s very LGBTQ+ representative!

Thank you to NetGalley and Amulet books for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was a blast and I need to read more horrors! A YA slasher horror where everything isn’t quite what it seems when Temple goes in search of her presumed dead mother’s body at a summer camp which was once home to her and her serial killer father.

At first Temple was quite a dislikable character, with her the world against me attitude. But she grows so much throughout the story, plus given her history, it’s understandable! The story is told in third person, but Temple’s name was repeated a lot, in very quick succession which did get annoying.

This is the only criticism I have because I loved the story, I loved how everything wasn’t clear cut and several complications were thrown in for the girls to deal with. Sprinkling in some comedy and over the top gore helped to make this a fun read perfect for any slasher horror fan!

So well written, so entertaining and original! This kept you on your toes and engaged the whole time.

This book was SPECTACULAR. I was enraptured and could not put it down. The book opens with the main character, Temple, trying to dig up a corpse her father claimed to have killed, so you know what you're in for immediately. What follows is twists, turns, ghosts, and gore like you've never seen. It's probably one of the best YA horrors I've read, and it was probably the best paranormal thriller/slasher/mystery I've ever read. Highly recommend!

A gripping, terrifying book from start to finish, Ellis does a spectacular job pacing her story so you're always satisfied with reveals while itching for the next one. This book is a rollercoaster without a second to breathe, moving adeptly through every terrifying new revelation. Dead Girls Walking is a horror novel written by and for lovers of horror.

Overall pretty good for a YA Horror - I'm into horror as a genre but get put off by strong gore, and this was a perfect middle ground for me.

The FMC was slightly irritating - I didn't love the 'I'm not like other girls' stance and while it's great to see LGBTQ representation, it seemed to be the only thing she talked about and made it her entire personality.

Overall an easy, fun scare that I will recommend but character development could use a little work!

It’s every gay for herself.

Temple Baker is going to a girls camped aimed at the gays and horror lovers, but she isn’t going for a good scare. She is trying to find her moms body that she knows her serial killer dad killed.

This is a great YA horror novel for someone who is trying to get into horror or just wants a good scare with not in detailed gore.

I mean this book does make being gay this girls whole personality. The line at the top is literally from the book…

The story did start out pretty slow feeling very YA with Temple starting out talking about how she’s like not other girls and she hates everyone.

About the 50% mark it finally picks and we get to the good part. The last 50% really speeds up and we are sent through a wild ride. The twist at towards the end of the book… 🤯

This is also a good book if you are looking for Queer / BIPOC rep

Genre: YA Horror
APK: Ebok
Pages: 368
Rating:⭐️⭐️⭐️.5
Series or Standalone: Stand-alone.

This book is dark and I found it a bit of a challenge to get into. It's definitely one for horror fans! The main character, Temple, struggles with the trauma of being the child of a notorious serial killer. She finds it hard to reconcile the father she thinks she knows with the killer that everyone else sees. She is also desperate to find out what happened to her mother. So when she gets the chance take part in a camp back on the woods where she grew up she takes the chance to find out more about her past.

This story explores whether your past and your family can predict your future or whether your actions have more of an impact on what happens in your life. I liked that most of the girls at the camp were ready to embrace each other, flaws and all. However, it is very much a horror story and as such, I would definitely recommend caution and that any educator reads it themselves before recommending it.

Something about YA horror just hits different. It never takes itself too seriously, and if written correctly, can be genuinely scary. Adult horror isn’t the only kind of horror that can be actually scary! Dead Girls Walking, while categorized as horror, I wouldn’t label this one as scary exactly, but had all the thrills and intensity of a supernatural murder mystery. Sure summer camp horror isn’t the most original of tropes, but it keeps being written into horror for a reason….because it’s fun and it works! Plus, I love this new trend I’ve been seeing of representation in YA horror, and I hope it continues on.

Temple’s dad is an actual psychopath. To find out if he really did kill her mom like he claims, she signs up to be a summer camp counselor solely to get access to the premises so she can see if she can find her mother’s body. She is unsure why her dad sent her to this camp filled with horror obsessed teenagers, but she is here to find out.

This book wasn’t anything groundbreaking, but I wasn’t expecting it to be. A lot of horror is just commonly done tropes being redone, but as long as it’s entertaining, I’m fine with not every book being original. My main complaint was just how young this book read. Some YA doesn’t feel YA at all (outside of the characters being teenagers) and read the same way as an adult book. This was not one of them. It was just too young for me I think, but then again, this book wasn’t geared towards my age group. It felt almost middle grade, but with swearing. That was the main issue that kept me from enjoying this; it was just super super young, even for YA.

This got better at the end, but the beginning just felt like it was trying too hard to be scary when it wasn’t. It was a really quick read, but tbh I would’ve dnf’d this if it weren’t a Netgalley arc. But, it did get better near the end. I just couldn’t get into this one. It was just ok, and I’ve read better YA horror. 2.5 out of 5!

Thank you to Netgalley and Amulet Books for sending me an advanced copy in return for my honest review.

Rating: 5/5 Penguins
Quick Reasons: mind the gore; psychological horror at its finest; the paranormal was an amazing touch; could not put this down until the end; excuse the language, but fucking WOW

HUGE thanks to Sami Ellis, Amulet Books Publishers, and Netgalley for the ARC of this title! My review of this book is voluntarily written and in no way altered or impacted by this gesture.

Y'all... it's been several weeks since I turned the final page on this read and I am STILL astounded. This is a horror read at its finest--the psychological thriller matches the paranormal terror and really drives this read over the top. I think I forgot to breathe for well over half of this--and I was ensnared from the very first page.

This book took all the things we horror movie buffs thrive on (spooky forest setting; tiny teaser reveals leading to the big bad scary; believable characters and motivations) and packed it all into a book worthy of staying up late for and sleeping with the lights on after. Sami Ellis is a master storyteller, weaving this tale with passion and creativity. If this journey does not find you on the edge of your seat, clenching your muscles to run, ready to scream...you're reading it wrong, somehow.

I definitely recommend this to horror fanatics, readers who love all the things that lurk in the shadows, and purveyors of monsters. Be mindful of the gore--there are some pretty gruesome moments. Are you ready to find out the secrets of The North Point killer, Penguins? The truth is bound to leave you gasping!

This book sounded like something I would absolutely adore as a slasher and horror fan which is why I requested the ARC of it. However, unfortunately it didn't live up to my hype and expectation for it. I couldn't connect with the characters at all in this story which meant I couldn't care about what they were going through as it wasn't all that scary.
I'm sure this would be someone's cup of tea but it wasn't it for me. But that's not to say that I didn't appreciate the writing, I could see the author delivering a storyline full of emotion, darkness and slasher vibes so I give them props for that.

I think if you truly love YA and slasher/mystery then this is definitely one for you.

I am confident this is going to be a hit with young adult readers and will be recommending it for our YA book club. I was happy to see queer representation! This book is definitely creepy, but not unsuitable for younger teen readers. Thank you for the opportunity to read!

YA isn’t my go-to genre. I’m a horror reader, through and through, but give me Black queer girls in a horror novel, and I’m all in. I think this book did a great job of capturing the multifaceted nature of queer Black girlhood. As a queer Black girl myself, I know that this exactly the kind of representation that I really would’ve appreciated growing up. The author does an incredible job of representing black culture as well.

That said, I struggled to get into this book and I think I’ve more or less figured out why. As other reviewers have noted, Temple is a very hard-to-like main character. Unlikeable characters often still have some redeeming qualities, or something about them that makes me relate to them, or helps me to be able to root for them. Temple, however, was just needlessly mean to people, taking out her (totally justified!) anger at the world on people who didn’t really deserve it, and I really struggled to relate to her in that respect.

I also really wanted to get behind Temple‘s growth and character arc, but I found her beef with Anysaa really convoluted and difficult to understand.

Story wise, I think that this book tries to do too much and the pacing suffers as a result. I had a really hard time getting into the book in part, because there are a lot of references in the first half to things that we don’t have the full picture of, but they’re written in a way that it feels like we should know more, and by the time they’re actually explained, it’s really far from the context. I forced myself to continue reading until it got interesting about 40% of the way through.

I think that’s there are too many pieces to the puzzle, and they never quite come together to make sense in the way I think the author wanted them to. The coins, the brands, the Carey Lauren book, the North Point history, Temple’s flashbacks and family history… I really struggled to keep track of all of it and see how it all fit together. If I as a 30-year-old woman struggled with it, I’m not sure that teens or people newish to the genre would have much of an easier time.

Overall, I think that more books like this one need to exist, but that this one in particular may have benefitted from some additional editing, or a change in the way the story is told. Another reviewer suggested that it may have been easier to follow if it were written from Temple’s first person perspective, and I have to agree. I think that also would’ve made it easier to relate to her, because it would’ve given us more insight into her thoughts and experiences.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy for review.

This was a brilliant and gripping read that hooked me from the first chapter. I loved Temple a lot and while it took me a while to get used to the side characters by the end I loved them and was fully rooting for them. The story was dark and suspenseful the whole time and it had me on the edge of my seat while reading every page and I never knew what was going to happen next. I highly recommend this book to everyone who loves horror, especially gory horror.

A horror story that I'm sure my students will devour as it's just the right balance of scary but not terrifying and relatable to today's teens rather than one from 2000-2010. This novel was so funny and the voice made the pages fly by. Pretty sure this will be a hit!