Let Him In is a creepy novel about a family coming to terms with their mother's untimely death. Alfie is left to raise their twin girls alone when his wife dies of anaphylactic shock after a bizarre bite. Shortly after, the twins bring to "life" the Black Mamba, an invisible, shape shifting, friend.

This book totally had me on edge. I didn't know what to believe, who to trust, and what was real. The twins were odd and a bit creepy but it was also heartbreaking thinking of them being so young and losing their mother. Alfie was a hot mess who just kept spiraling more and more out of control. He was a bizarre character and I found it so strange that he was jealous of the Black Mamba and the twins' kinship.

There were a lot of surprises in this book and the ending was just delicious. I keep thinking about it!

I listened to this novel on audio and the narrators were pretty good. I didn't particularly like Julia's voice for Alfie or Alfie's voice for the girls, but it was a minor gripe. All in all, they were great at inflecting the required level of suspense and drama.

This novel was the perfect way to kick off spooky season and one I definitely recommend.

Thank you to Poisoned Pen, Dreamscape Media, and NetGalley for the copy.

Thanks to the publisher for the ALC and eARC.
This is a perfect creepy book for this October. A family is shrouded in grief, and the twin daughters start seeing an imaginary friend, but then things get weird. I loved the suspense created here. I was gripped by each narrative and every layer made the story that much more spooky. I didn't see where this was going and was kept guessing the entire time I read. The dual narrators was also a great thing. It added the element of intrigue and mystery. I wasn't always sure who to believe, which kept me wanted to ignore responsibilities and just read.

I gave this one a 3.5 and am rounding up rather than down for this review. I loved the multiple viewpoints. I also loved the twin dynamic that added an extra layer of creepy due to their connection.

This story follows its main characters as they deal with grief and how each character deals with it. The story tended to drag quite a bit and brought down the overall flow.

The book gave me very heavy Babadook vibes. I wish some things mentioned in the book had been fleshed out more. Maybe it was the author’s intention to leave us wondering what was actually going on but I feel like the book could have benefited more from it. I liked the idea behind the premise but I was disappointed by the end.

This book really leaves you wondering if anything was actually happening as well as confused. There was a lot of dream sequences and both main characters felt unreliable. I really disliked the relationship between Alfie and Julia. I would have found it less creepy if it wasn’t for Alfie’s dialogue about her. The scene involving Alfie and Julia just before the end was absolutely bizarre.

I just expected more and thought we’d get some sort of reveal whether it was about the house or Black Mamba himself. I actually liked the ending cause it leaves you unnerved.

A spooky gothic tale perfect for Halloween reading, Let Me In has a little of everything: demons, ghosts, and religious fanaticism complete with a family that has twin girls who claim to see a man who can transform into any animal: Black Mamba. The setting is an old manor with a storied and haunted past.

Let Me In will keep the reader guessing throughout, and has a couple of surprises along the way. It is a fantastic gothic read that would fill out anyone’s spooky season TBR. Listening to it on audiobook only amps up its mystery. The reader’s gasps only enhanced my experience.

This book started off wonderfully frightening. Twin daughter seeing a spirit in their room after their mother dies and the father is left coping with raising twin daughter who now have an invisible friend who starts controlling and taking over the little girls time. The sister in law is a psychologist and tries to help the girls while trying to to cope with her own trauma of growing up in her childhood home and her sister’s death. It’s never seams clear as to what or how the mother dies, but just that they all fear the spirit known as the black mamba.

I received Let Him In as a physical ARC and as an audiobook ARC. Unfortunately, I had a really hard time getting into it and enjoying is as an audiobook. I definitely enjoyed it more as a physical read but even then, I didn’t love it. It has its creepy moments but overall it fell a little flat. I hate saying that about a book, when I know how much blood, sweat, & tears authors put into their work. the pacing just felt off. There were times my eyes were glued to the pages and other times it felt like it dragged. And the book is short… If this book is on your radar, I highly suggest giving it as a try for yourself. But try it as a physical copy over an audiobook. I am looking forward to seeing what William Friend will come up with next.

Thank you Poisoned Pen Press, NetGalley, & Dreamscape Media for the chance to read and listen to it for an honest review.

Happy reading!

Rating: 2.5/5 Stars ⭐️⭐️✨
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Look at the cover of this book - it screams HORROR. I literally am obsessed with the cover. But unfortunately it didn’t hit the mark of horror for me. It was more like a symbolic book on grief and what it can do to the mind of all ages while simultaneously a back mystery/story about a sort of religious cult type thing? Honestly, I’m not completely even sure I got that right lol.
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Creep factor was at 100% for the twins who could see Black Mamba, but Black Mamba could transform into so many different things, I just wanted him to do something more sinister - that would have given me that horror feel. Alfie was weird with his jealousy issues and what happened in the end was just weird to me.
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The story, I felt, had pretty decent pacing, I just kept waiting for something more to happen, something super scary - which I understand is totally be a me problem. I found the writing to be pretty decent as well! I liked that this one was written in a dual POV between Alfie and his sister in law Julia. I would have liked to have the twins POV thrown in too for some extra creepiness, but again, a me problem. The ending was pretty open ended in my opinion which is not my favorite, but I think it could spark some pretty great topics for a book club.
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I was able to listen to this one via audiobook and read. Let Him In is narrated by Jodie Harris and Jonathan Johns and they compliment one another great. They were able to bring that creep factor to life. Very well produced audiobook.
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While this necessarily wasn’t what I was looking for in a horror, I definitely think William Friend is someone to keep an eye out for. I will be looking forward to following his work. Let Him In will be released on 10/3!
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Huge thank you to Netgalley, Dreamscape Media, Poisoned Pen Press and William Friend for my ALC and eARC in exchange for my honest review!

This audiobook was too robotic and I could not get interested in the storyline.

Synopsis: Grief has settled in at Hart House. For nine months, Alfie has been caring for his twin seven-year-old daughters after the sudden death of their mother, Pippa. One night, Alfie wakes to find Sylvie and Cassia at the foot of his bed, claiming there’s a man in their room. Alfie finds no sign of a man, but it isn’t long before the girls start talking about an imaginary friend. What seemingly begins as a harmless coping mechanism for the two grieving girls quickly develops into something more insidious..

Alfie calls upon Julia—Pippa’s twin and a psychiatrist—to oust the malignant tenant from their lives, but he doesn’t want to leave. As his malevolent grip on the girls tightens—with increasingly dark and violent consequences—Alfie and Julia must contend with their own unspoken sense of loss, the haunting past of the house itself, and the true character of the force that has poisoned the girls’ minds.

I really struggled with the male narrator. Maybe my download wasn’t done well but he sounded super robotic and it was hard to sink into the story with his parts. The female was good.

This is a creepy story and i liked the twins. I had hoped for a little more from the story tho. I felt like there wasn’t a big enough climax. It just wasn’t the story for me.

This book is very reminiscent of The Haunting of Hill House. This was such a good, creepy way to show just how different each person is affected by grief. I loved the twins, they made me feel so uneasy SO MUCH. This story was wild and the perfect, quick read to start October!

Creepy, alluring, cognizant and pure emotional/psychological turmoil.

Incredibly debut novel, and really expecting/hoping for big things from this author.

I highly enjoyed (this feels like the wrong word all things considered) the lengthF the storyline and all the temptatious details throughout had my mind spinning. There were some slightly pacing issues but very minor overall.

Unfortunately, this book didn’t work for me. I felt there were some holes in the story, and it wasn’t as scary as I thought it would be.
While I enjoyed the twins and their creepy vibes, I didn’t feel like the eventual reveal behind their invisible friend, was believable. The book could have been so great if it wasn’t pieced together like it was. Maybe if it was from the perspective of the twins and not the father.. maybe it was the father that didn’t work for me.
The audiobook narrators were good, but didn’t add that extra darkness the story needed. I think I may have enjoyed it more if I had done it in print.

3.5 stars. Alfie's twin daughters wake him one night by telling him that there's a man in their room. Predictably, he rushes in ready to murder the intruder, only to find nothing at all. The twins then tell Alfie they have a new imaginary friend named Black Mamba, which is almost as unsettling to him as the thought of a <i>real</i> man spending time with them. Their obsession with Black Mamba only deepens and darkens with time — now the girls are blaming pains and bruises on the imaginary entity, and Alfie is really starting to worry. Is their home actually possessed by a demon, or are the girls just acting out over losing their mother?

This book wasn't really what I expected to be — it's much more psychological horror than outright jump-scare horror, but it's pretty sinister and creepy. The story does a great job of entwining the horrific aspects of grief, guilt, and trauma with more "traditional" horrific symbols like snakes and demons, and overall I enjoyed the tale. The resolution left me a bit confused (it's rather open ended), and I would have liked the pace to be a touch faster in places, but I definitely recommend this one if you're looking for a more subversive horror read this spooky season.

Thank you to William Friend, Poisoned Pen Press, Dreamscape Media, and NetGalley for my advance audio copy.

📕Some twin behaviour freaks me out. Especially the twin girls’. I don’t know if it’s because of the Stephen King books or something else. When there are twin girls, there is trouble
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📗When I read black mamba, first thing comes to my mind is Kobe. But black mamba in this book was totally something else: some shape shifter, mind boggler, only visible to certain creature! And yes, twin girls could see it: they loved it, they wanted to be together with it, they called it dad
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📘This book sneaks upon you. You don’t feel the thrill until it really smacks you in the face. The ending is the testament to what I said earlier: where there are twin girls, there is trouble

Thank you to NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for this ARC.

What I liked about Let Him In:
- Creepy kids and creepy imaginary friend
- dual POV and great narration!
- good writing and plot line

What I didn’t like:
- Pippa and Alfies relationship, it felt super weird and because of this I didn’t like the ending.

3⭐️

"Daddy, there's a man in our room..."

Yep I was already creeped out with this line!

After their mother passes away, two twin girls tell their dad, Alfie, about their imaginary friend Black Mamba - a man who can shape shift into a snake/bird/moth/etc. Their Aunt Julia, who is a therapist and is still grieving the loss of her twin sister (so many twins!), comes to help the girls deal with their grief and help Alfie cope with how to handle their imaginary(?) friend.

Creepiness and strangeness and many questions ensue - Are Alfie and Julia starting to see Black Mamba too? What are those noises? Is their house haunted or cursed? Why have so many people in their family died in strange and unexpected ways? Is their Grandma in a religious cult and influencing their thoughts? Why are twins just so creepy? Is this all in their head and just a reaction to their grief? Why did the imaginary friend have to be called Black Mamba (just a personal question from me - started to feel comical when hearing it so often on audio).

The audiobook was good with male/female narrators alternating chapters of Alfie and Julia and it definitely started off with a bang. I was invested in the story and the creep factor and wanted to know more. It did get a tad slow and repetitive sometimes but overall this was enjoyable and really made me wonder throughout what was real and what was not.

This book ends in a very abrupt way. It is eerie - especially on audio - but very abrupt and I found myself checking my phone to make sure it didn't skip ahead or pause by accident because I expected more. There were just SO many unanswered questions - which maybe was the point, but I found myself wanting more. I wished that the author would have taken out some of the repetitive parts that dragged and used that space to give us more answers or at least more details to come to our own conclusion about parts of the story and characters.

Overall - super enjoyable and good for spooky season. My favorite thing about this book is the COVER! One of the best covers I have seen in awhile - reminds me of one of those Rorschach tests where black blobs make a picture but the picture may be different for everyone or change depending on how you look at it.

I would definitely be interested in what this author writes next.

I received a free audiobook copy from NetGalley in exchange for a fair review.

A grieving father and his twin daughters are haunted by a presence the girls call "Black Mamba", a shapeshifting, malevolent creature that seems to become more powerful as time passes. As their father, Alfie, and their late mother's twin Julia, slowly get worn down by Black Mamba's poisonous presence, they try to untangle the mystery surrounding his appearance and affinity for the twins.

The book is creepy. Like, super creepy. There is a very slow, very gloomy build up of small incidents, confusing nights, and suddenly, WHAM. I'd recommend this book to lovers of the Whisper man, the Shining, even Babadook. Definitely not advisable to read before bed!

Thank you to NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for the ALC

Spooky twins who talk to possible demons. A haunted house. A shapeshifter who may or may not replace a father… all tropes that can either be fun or fall flat in horror. Unfortunately for me, this didn’t hit. The twists and turns were too obvious, and while told in the first person the scenes were gutted of any tension or suspense because the author felt the need to use massive amounts of exposition.

Overall, English horror is often a miss for me, the tension just isn’t there, even when I try to reorient my thinking back to the semester I spent in Nottingham… It is fine, but there are so many scarier books with an actual message this was just, expected.

What a great, fun, spooky listen, this book was! I enjoyed this author, and narrator so much! Perfect season to dive into this book! It was creepy, and eerie, but not so much so that I couldn't read it at night! And a huge shoutout to the narrator!