👻Book Review👻
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Summary; Spirits are drawn to salt, be it blood or tears.
Roos Beckman has a spirit companion only she can see. Ruth—strange, corpse-like, and dead for centuries—is the light of Roos’ life. That is, until the wealthy young widow Agnes Knoop visits one of Roos’ backroom seances, and the two strike up a connection. 
Soon, Roos is whisked away to the crumbling estate Agnes inherited upon the death of her husband, where an ill woman haunts the halls, strange smells drift through the air at night, and mysterious stone statues reside in the family chapel. Something dreadful festers in the manor, but still, the attraction between Roos and Agnes is undeniable. 
Then, someone is murdered.
Poor, alone, and with a history of ‘hysterics’, Roos is the obvious culprit. With her sanity and innocence in question, she’ll have to prove who—or what—is at fault or lose everything she holds dear.
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Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
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My Thoughts- this book was so good! It was the perfect blend of spooky and historical fiction! I loved each character and really felt for Roos. This book is totally unique and in some sections it genuinely freaked me out 😂. I loved the relationship between Roos and Agnes and seeing Roos finally be able to be her own person. It was a really cool dark blend of different genres. Overall this book was fantastic, I highly recommend it for horror and historical fiction fans. It reminded me of Mexican Gothic or La Hacienda. But it was totally unique and fun!
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QOTD- do you believe in ghosts ?! I’m a sceptic myself 👻
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#bookreview #bookrecommendations #mydarlingdreadfulthing #johannavanveen #bookstagram #booksofig#booksofinsta #bibliophile #bookobsessed #bookaddict #bookaesthetic #horrorbooks #horrorreads #horrorbookstagram

🕯️My Darling Dreadful Thing by Johanna Van Veen 🕯️

Thank you @poisonedpenpress, @johannavanveen1997 & @netgalley for this amazing Arc!

"I can't think right now. If I do, I'll think and feel too much."

Pages: 375
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Book Goal 2024: 57/100

This is the kind of ghost and possession story everyone needs!!! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 I’ve read my fair share of haunts, spooky stories and books that should give you the willies but normally a ghost book will fall flat for me.

Often they are too “silly” or unrealistic. But the way Ruth (👻) is just a part of Roos as a main character makes this one believable. Oddly enough…This one is a gloomy gothic tale that I didn’t know would have a nurturing peaceful atmosphere included in the story line.

What you will find in My Darling Dreadful Thing
✨Séances
✨Spirit Companions
✨Murder
✨Love story
✨LGTBQ+
✨ Multi Timeline with an investigation

My darling dreadful thing is already out and can be added to your TBR now! If you’re a horror fan, I would snag this one!

"There's a reason the word 'haunting' is rarelv used in a positive way. To never be free of someone, well, that's not always a comfort."

#netgalley #review #read #0to100 #mydarlingdreadfulthing #reads #reading #booknerd #booksbywomen #books #book

I absolutely flew through this book. It was written so well. I was absolutely obsessed from beginning to end.

I tried really hard to get into this one, but I just wasn't able to. I am still really thankful to the publisher, author, and netgalley for granting me advanced access to this digital collection before publication day.

A sapphic horror that manages to be soft and romantic as well as horrifying. The description of rotting dead bodies is definitely horror-based, but it's not really scary, and in fact often done with love. Overall, a horrifying but still emotional and hopeful story that focuses a lot on death and abuse and trauma.

Holy crap, this was fantastic!! I went into it not realizing how sapphic the vibes were, and was definitely pleasantly surprised. I loved the way so much heart and emotion was woven in this otherwise creepy, weird little book -- I don't think I've ever read anything else like this, and I didn't at all expect how invested I'd become in the story about Roos and her creepy friend.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for allowing me to read this ARC of ‘My Darling Dreadful Thing’. To say I devoured this sapphic book would be an understatement. I loved this story so much it consumed me. This is the exact horror book I have been searching for. I love the representation in this story. Everything was done so elegantly and yet horrifying it was *chef kiss*. I hardly read the synopsis of this story, and honestly I think it was better that way. I had no idea where this story was going and it was perfect. The ending felt satisfying. this story has everything I wanted; horror, sapphic romance, madness, mystery. Highly recommend!

The main thing I can give this book credit for is being an incredible "slump breaker". Nothing was capturing me for quite some time and right from the start, I loved this book. This is one of the creepiest atmospheric novels I have read. Our main character, Roos, is such a complex person and I loved learning more as the story progressed. Overall, a very spooky time.

“My Darling Dreadful Thing” is a unique and unsettling read, blending gothic elements with eerie undertones. Roos Beckman's strange bond with a specter named Ruth sets the stage for a chilling narrative filled with ambiguity and mystery. As Roos navigates her past involvement in seances and her present circumstances under Dr. Montague's scrutiny, the line between reality and illusion blurs, creating a creepy and atmospheric tale. With a well-crafted plot and engaging character dynamics, this book keeps readers guessing until the end.

Rating: 3.5 stars.

Grateful to Poisoned Pen Press and NetGalley for the ARC!

I got an ARC of this book.

Woah. This was woah.

Everything from the cover to the way it was written was made perfectly for me. I can’t even express how much I adored this book. It was dark. It was weird. It wasn’t excessive. It was the exact sort of horror that I would binge and not even notice I had.

The book is told from the perspective of a young adult girl who had been abused all of her life by her maternal figure. It is unclear if this woman is actually her mother or not, which is just part of the abuse she faced at the hands of Mama. Some of the abuse was typical and easy to TW against (forced eating disorders for example). The others fit the world more. There was locking Roos into the floor so she can pull off fake seance events. The first chunk of the book really hammers home just how abusive Mama is, but it is the only thing that Roos has ever really known. Then throw in Ruth. Ruth is what changed the book from creepy to perfect.

Ruth is Ruth. She defies description in a way that is effective. I could tell you about her, but she is still amorphous in looks and plot and yeah. She is fascinating and Ruth might be my favorite character, if she really is a character. That is how fun the unreliable narration gets. Ruth for sure exists for Roos, but does she really exist? It is not clear. The story has a transcript of an interview conducted by the psychiatrist and his notes. It gives some perspective and some foreshadowing to what happens. It is wild. That slight medicalization was a wonderful touch. It is clear that even if Ruth is not real, Ruth does not cause distress so does her existence really matter in the scheme of metal illness? Wonderful!

I could go on and on about this book and never say anything that would make any sense. Even if I was to get specific, this book is weird enough that it would require context and such to really make sense. I suggest just diving in. It isn’t difficult to follow, but it does meander. It is not a fast horror. It makes you wait and experience all the scents of horror.

Clearly influenced by the Master of the Macabre, Edgar Allan Poe, Johanna Van Veen masterfully officiates a most unholy marriage of the macabre, the supernatural, and the tragically beautiful in her debut horror novel, My Darling Dreadful Thing. One of Poe’s most haunting tales, The Fall of the House of Usher, provides the gothic architecture Van Veen builds from. She builds her own harrowing house of horrors and skillfully incorporates new surprise rooms and trap doors for the reader to discover, successfully resurrecting an old story with new twists to haunt the masses. Similarities immediately visible include a thematic presence of claustrophobia and isolation, death and decay, and myth and madness. The Rozentuin, the decaying family manor, is also likened to a living and breathing thing, dying out with the end of the Knoope bloodline. As expected, the Knoope siblings, Thomas and Willemijn, are uncomfortably dependent on each other and so emotionally entangled together the reader immediately detects the symptoms of a sick, incestuous relationship between the two. Thomas’ wife, Agnes, is revolted by their relationship but stays for her fondness of the family manor and meager prospects should she divorce her husband.

Roos Beckman appears to be a powerful spiritual medium, easily subverting critics and holding steadfast believers bewitched with her preternatural gifts during staged séances held at her mother’s house. Roos has her Ruth, a spirit companion whom she permits frequent bodily possessions to deliver the expected theatrics during these sessions. Roos’ Mama exploits her child’s “madness” for capital gain by hosting these séances to prey on grief, financially consuming the most severely afflicted individuals with mortally wounded and agonized souls. Living in the Netherlands during the 1950’s, Roos should have some level of independence and have access to a few promising avenues for her future as a young woman, but her Mama has isolated and controlled her so totally, she is instead half starved, both physically and mentally, with no regular food or knowledge of the world. Agnes Knoope is a wealthy widow who first appears as a potential patron Mama is trying to impress, but during the séance where Roos pretends to channel Agnes’ dead husband with Ruth’s help, things go far beyond what was initially planned. Agnes offers to outright buy Roos, and disgustingly, Mama sells her daughter. As fearful as Roos is to leave, she’s also hopeful and suspicious that Agnes can see and feel much more than she’s admitting to.

When Roos and Ruth arrive at the Rozentuin with Agnes, Thomas Knoope is already dead, and there is a mysterious, intractable illness plaguing Willemijn Knoope, swiftly ushering the last living member of the Knoope family tree to a premature grave. Roos and Ruth are finally happy and starting to allow themselves to feel happier things in life, but they can’t escape a creeping feeling there is something sinister a foot at the Rozentuin, one that Agnes is fearful of acknowledging at all and Willemijn delights in provoking. This is a propulsive page turner since the author does such an excellent job at crawling under the reader’s skin using tantalizing clues and grotesque incidents around the house. Her writing is dissonantly lyrical and darkly atmospheric, which effectively conveys a peculiarly unsettling tone throughout the book. Roos and Agnes’ relationship is one sapphic love story that seems damned from the very beginning, but it is so lovely and gentle and true, even death will have trouble holding them apart. For her love of Agnes, Roos is desperately trying to fix what may be wrong, but the harder she tries, the deeper she digs into dark, derelict spaces she doesn’t belong, and before long, reality is cracking, time is running out, and death will come knocking to be let inside…Echoing Poe, Van Veen buries the reader in some archly disturbing truths, but she tunnels even deeper into the reader’s psyche by deftly conducting a postmortem examination on something we are all dying to possess but fearful to keep---love. I can’t give enough praise for this book, and as a hopeless romantic, I need some time to stitch back together my own bleeding heart and mourn for Roos and Agnes. Read this book. Its horrifying but also tragically, queerly beautiful.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the ARC and the opportunity to share what I think! All opinions are my own. Publication date was May 14th! I have posted this review to my Goodreads account, in addition to my FB group, The Book Banquet, and retailer websites.

All the Gothic tropes are here and then some, in an unusual story. The time period is supposed to be 1950s, but could easily be Victorian, in both setting and language. The world is experienced mostly through the narrator’s eyes and the reader is left to discern fact from fiction, or what is real vs delusion. The book is well written and paced, kept me reading and left me guessing.

I enjoyed the background and inspirations for this story. I loved the eery vibe and liked the context. It had many things packed into it. I did not care so much to being told everythng so there seemed to not be much suspense. I wanted to know the characters better as well. over all i would say it was cool and good but for myself not fantastic. I liked it so wanted more too it.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC. This is my honest review.

When I first picked this up I was intrigued because the premise reminded me so much of the movie Crimson Peak and honestly, it still does. It had the same creepy, morbid atmosphere. There is a mystery shrouded in death and hauntings. Our main character Roo, can see and speak with the dead. And Agatha and hers relationship is so tender and sweet.

I have to say, I wasn't sure I was going to like this. I don't like investing my time in stories with so much sadness, but Roo's Sprit Companion, Ruth, arguably made it all worth it. Even with the similarities to Crimson Peak as well as others have said The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allen Poe, I still felt this book was wholly unique, unsettling, morose, and disturbing. The fact that it's also just unapologetically queer made it all the better.

Rating: 4 stars!

This book feels like a fever dream. With the ship unreliable narrator, its hard to keep track of what's real, what's a spirit, what's made up... Its the wildest ride I've been on in a book in a hot minute. As the reader you catch yourself thinking, "If it ain't real, then how...?"

Thank you NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Reading "My Darling Dreadful Thing" by Johanna van Veen was great. From the first page, I was drawn into a dark and fascinating story that blends horror with a touching love story. The book centers on Roos, a girl with a special bond to Ruth, a spirit who has been her companion since childhood. Their relationship is both comforting and eerie.

Roos and her mother perform fake séances, but things change when Agnes Knoop, a widow, attends one of their sessions and invites Roos to live with her in an old, creepy estate in the Netherlands. The growing attraction between Roos and Agnes adds excitement to the story, but when a gruesome death happens and Roos is blamed, things get really intense. The story alternates between Roos's account and her sessions with Dr. Montague, her psychologist, who is trying to understand what really happened.

Van Veen’s writing kept me hooked from start to finish. The relationship between Roos and Ruth was my favorite part. Ruth’s protective nature and the lengths she goes to keep Roos safe are both heartwarming and spooky. The gothic setting of the old estate, filled with secrets and ghostly presences, added to the creepy atmosphere.

The book is a perfect mix of horror, madness, and love. I loved every minute of it and couldn't put it down. The way Van Veen handled the supernatural and psychological elements was impressive. Even though the story sometimes felt like it took place in a different era, the 1950s setting worked well for the plot.

"My Darling Dreadful Thing" is more than just a horror story. It’s a beautifully written tale about love, trauma, and the supernatural. It left me haunted and deeply moved. I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a thrilling and emotional read. Thank you to NetGalley, Johanna van Veen, and Sourcebooks for the ARC. I can’t wait to read more from this author.

I wanted to love this book since it ticked most of my boxes; a historical Gothic, female centric ghost story with themes of mental health and grief. I overall enjoyed it, but I didn't end up connecting to it as much as I thought I would. I don't know if it was because of the extremely slow burn, which is typical of Gothic horror so I don't think that's the case, or the old fashioned style of language/language barrier, but it took me a while to get through this one, and even when the action finally did start picking up, it didn't feel like much happened.

Set in the Netherlands in the early 1950s/post WWII era, Roos Beckman is a fake medium, forced to perform séances for money by her abusive mother, who actually can see only one ghost - her spirit companion, Ruth. When wealthy widow Agnes Knoop comes to channel her dead husband, she offers Roos a chance of escape by "purchasing" her as a ladies companion. Upon their return to Agnes's estate, Roos discovers that Agnes also shares her gift. When Agnes's invalid sister in law Willemijn convinces Roos to try to turn Thomas, Agnes's husband, into a spirit, all hell breaks loose, and their descent into madness ends in death and destruction. I sometimes have trouble with ambiguity in the books I read, preferring them to be cut and dry, and in this story you're left feeling very unclear whether Ruth and Peter, Agnes's spirit companion, were real spirits or the products of their mental illness. The 1950s weren't that long ago, and while I'd love to say the treatment of women and their perceived mental illnesses has improved since then, that's sadly not the case at all, and it's still just as easy for a husband to commit his wife to the hospital when he tires of her antics, so Roos and Agnes's plight still felt timely. The ending did make you think about how people cannot be helped unless they want to help themselves, the effect of childhood trauma on your psyche, and how your inner demons can win out in the end, even over love.

3.5* rounded up to 4
This novel absolutely drips with horror and atmosphere, pushing all the gothic buttons; in this respect it is a beauty of a book. I did feel the ending was a little rushed, and as a hopeless romantic that ending also was never going to be the right one for me… I so hoped for a Sarah Waters-style twist! Alas, there was none.

Prose wise I kept feeling there was something a little flat about the writing, and I wondered if this book was originally written a different language, with something intangible lost in translation? I don’t know, but it didn’t quite do it for me. Still, the book is haunting, heart-wrenching, horrific and beautiful all at once, and I look forward to reading more from this writer!

From the first page I was ENSNARED by this haunting dark, gothic intense book and couldn't help but keep the lights to keep the eerie feeling away. Roos' life assisting her mother with fake seances and communicating with a spirit only she can see was so different and interesting from other gothic reads I have picked up lately. Then things take an unexpected turn during one of their sessions, leading them to a decrepit mansion brimming with secrets. The story weaves seamlessly between Roos' troubled past and a suspenseful present where she is interviewed by Doctor Montague about a crime. The clever blend of first-person accounts and doctor's reports filled with dialogue adds a layer of intrigue and kept me questioning everything.

The dark, atmospheric setting and strong female characters, combined with the author's clear love for the Gothic genre, make this a compelling and chilling read where as soon as the sun goes down, you can't help but feel like there's something in the room with you while you read. The hybrid narration brilliantly blends sharp, witty, and edgy storytelling techniques to make it an immersive experience. With its eerie descriptions and paranormal elements, 'My Darling Dreadful Thing' is a gothic, sapphic novel that captivates from start to finish.

I really enjoyed this story. I was blown away with how wonderful the writing is. I was expecting a little more of a horror expect, but I really enjoyed the gothic vibes. I felt like the story became a little stagnant in the middle after having a really strong beginning, thankfully it did pick up again at the end. I still don't know if I believe Roos. She was quite the unreliable narrator.