Castle of the Cursed draws you into a gothic world with its dark, mysterious castle and eerie atmosphere. The setting is beautifully described, and Estela’s exploration of the castle’s hidden horrors had me intrigued. The gothic elements—looming gargoyles, haunted rooms, and unsettling secrets—are well-executed, creating an immersive vibe that’s perfect for a spooky read.

However, the story itself didn’t quite meet my expectations. The romance between Estela and Sebastián felt rushed, lacking the depth needed to make it convincing. The dual timelines were confusing at times, with abrupt shifts that made it hard to keep track of the story. The pacing also dragged in places, making it a bit of a struggle to stay engaged through some slower parts.

While the book had a lot of potential with its unique world and gothic tone, the execution didn’t fully deliver. If you enjoy atmospheric reads, Castle of the Cursed might be worth a try, but it left me wanting more in terms of character development and plot cohesion.

Castle of the Cursed was a great and eerie read. I enjoyed all the paranormal aspects of the story and they paired well with the mystery and crime case at the beginning. It was a great upper YA supernatural book just in time for fall and spooky season!

Thank you NetGalley and Wednesday books for the ARC!

I really wanted to like this one. It starts out alright, has some good mental health representation in the beginning; especially when our leading girl believes she is imagining the mysterious shadow man in the castle. Unfortunately it becomes a hot mess by about 65%. By 80% calling Castle of the Cursed a hot mess is being kind. I skimmed the last 50 or so pages. Honestly I don’t think properly reading them would have helped my understanding or buy-in to the story at all.

The overall issues that sucked the life out (and not in the good dark fantasy way) of Castle of the Cursed:
1) It’s 13 days from when our gal shows up at the Castle to the end. It needed to be 13 months! Everything just happens with no foreshadowing, no change management, or even a hint of what is actually going on. Had it transpired over a longer period of time then maybe the foreshadowing needed could have happened?
2) Almost every major event feels random. Without any build-up, foreshadowing, hinting, or even an idea of the ‘magic’ until it’s dropped on top of us I found myself feeling very skeptical. I needed Nicholas Benares to ease me into some of the concepts and plot points. The ‘twists’ didn’t feel like twists where I had any chance of knowing they were coming. They felt more like an asteroid that was dropped on top of me and I was supposed to try and climb my way out of the dense material I was coated in.
3) Castle of the Cursed needed direction and purpose. Too much happens that is disconnected; but the novel doesn’t seem to know what it wants to be. I’m all for genre spanning stories; but you still need to cement the story in a few places. It starts as a dark romance, gets awkward, introduces a ton of lore and magic, and suddenly we’re drowning in plot and the romance is mostly lost. Yet at the end suddenly that romance is super relevant again… it just didn’t flow or feel natural.
4) 13 days is not long enough to really know someone; never mind fall in love with them.
5) I never really felt enough of a connection with most of our characters to care if they lived or died. There are some well done aspects of a few side characters; but I needed more, especially from one of the twist defining characters.

Overall, this was a very disappointing novel. Had I not been curious to know the final ‘result’ (as it appears to be a stand alone novel) I would have DNF’d. Instead I skimmed the last few pages and brought myself to the ending; which ironically felt like it fit with the first half of the book. But somewhere between 65% and 90% all that story got lost in massive magical rules, lore, memory sequences, etc. It’s too bad as I liked some elements but overall execution is critical to the reading experience. Sadly this one lacks direction, cohesiveness, and foreshadowing.

Please note: I received an eARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley. This is an honest and unbiased review.

Once I started reading, I could not put this book down!! Gorgeous writing, a FMC that I connected with, and a wonderfully unique story that kept me enthralled until the last page. This will be one of my top reads of the year.

Thank you for the opportunity to read in advance!

Castle of the Cursed - Romina Garber. This book was so weird! The story was gothic and fabulous and had such a unique storyline. After Estela’s parents are killed, she thinks she is alone until she finds out about an aunt she didn’t know existed and who lives in a house that needs something unusual to keep it alive.

Pulling back the layers on Estela’s life was fascinating to unfold. I wasn’t a massive fan of the romance in it. I think it would have been soooo much better without it but that's a personal choice. I think the author could have gone darker and more in depth on the house and the magic and it would have been one heck of a read. 4 stars

TW: Death of a parent, lots of death

Wanted to give a heads up to those who may struggle reading those topics! But let's dive into this book. Where to begin:

Castle of the Cursed is the over the top, fast paced book that makes me think of a telenovela, but add in vampires, dark undertones, and fantasy elements.

I'm glad my Spanish is still going strong and I barely had to use a translator. But as the book goes on, it translates more for the reader, just like Estela learning Spanish.

My overall opinion:

Loved it! I barely had time to read anything at the beginning of the month, but once I had time, I did not want to put this book down. If I could have called off work this week to read, I would have!

I love gothic things, vampires and telenovelas. So all those things combined was perfecto 👌

𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘬 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘵𝘰 𝘕𝘦𝘵𝘎𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘺 & 𝘚𝘵. 𝘔𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘯'𝘴 𝘗𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘥𝘷𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘱𝘺 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘣𝘰𝘰𝘬.

Wow. This was... something else: part magical realism, part gothic creepiness, part science fiction, all mixing together to create a very fevered story that was hard to follow and even harder to enjoy.

Estela spends the firs 20% of the book wishing she was dead. Something awful has happened to her, and her will to stay alive just leaves. She has suicidal and harmful thoughts and urges. The mental health representation - while strong - made it difficult to connect with Estela, only because we didn't have any concept of her personality or who she is when the story begins. We go straight into her suicidal head. It was rough (and dark).

The castle, her aunt Beatriz, the spooky feel of the town, and the mysteries of the castle kept me initially interested. However, a lot of the scenes once Estela is in the castle have a stilted feeling. We jump from scene to scene with little explanation, dialogue feels out of place, and emotions crop up startlingly. There were some issues with the flow of writing.

More than that, though, was the romance and the science fiction elements that felt extremely out of place. Some people might love the dimensional twists the author takes with elements of the story, but I wholeheartedly did not. Also, regarding the romance - someone needs to put Estela back in a medical institution because she somehow equates "scary" and "wants to kill you" as "yes, I should be attracted to him." I get the whole "enemies-to-lovers, shady little love interest, dark-hearted boy who you just want to lust over" is a whole trend right now, but it did NOT work in this story.

Also, vampires (kind of). I forgot that part.

Honestly, I read about 40% and then skimmed the rest. What I saw made me glad that I didn't waste any more time on this story. Sure, the black magic finally came into play and some action went down. The romance got more graphic than a YA should. There were some plot surprises that I wish I could have been excited about cause it was actually kinda sneaky.

Less gothic, more eclectic fever-dream is what Castle of the Cursed ended up being.

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and Wednesday Books for this advanced copy. You can pick up Castle of the Cursed now.

As spellbinding and captivating as this book sounds, I found myself unmotivated to pick it up and not as invested as I would've liked. I honestly think that has more to do with my current reading mood than the book itself, so it wouldn't surprise me if I chose to pick this up again later, when I'm in a gothic, spooky mood. But at the moment, I find myself tuned out while reading it and not absorbing it as much as I'd like to.

But from what I've read so far, if you enjoy atmospheric, gothic, paranormal delights, this book is up your alley!

This book is a maybe for me. There were elements of the book that I really liked and found creepy or slightly unsettling while there were other parts that simply fell flat. Overall it is a decent story/read that I would recommend to a specific type of reader.

The setting and tone is what really sold me on this book. I thought the description of scenes and the emotion that I felt is what made this book so captivating. The castle being alive added another element that was unique and brought the story to life as well.

Other than that, this book wasn't my favourite. Estela was a bit bland for my liking. I wish her not speaking played a bigger, or longer, role in the story. It was such a huge life event she went through and it was made to seem like her refusal to speak was a big deal, but she started speaking only a little while later.

Her relationship with Felipe was nice in the beginning, but as soon as he started to turn, I couldn't understand why Estela kept forgiving him and allowing him close again. The rest of the relationships in this book also developed in strange ways. She went from hating her aunt to being extremely close. I thought the addition to the lore about twins in the story felt forced, and when the uncle arrived, I was surprised, but didn't care enough to be shocked.

In the beginning of the story, it seemed like Sebastián was older, and he was described as being in his teens or early twenties, and knowing Estela was only seventeen, I didn't love that detail. Again, this relationship turned fast, going from enemies to lovers, and cringy love at that.

Much like with the uncle, I wanted to care about Estela's twin, but once it was revealed that she had turned evil, I lost interest. I had hoped their relationship would have been a good one.

Overall, I enjoyed the gothic, dark aesthetic of this book, but the actual plot and relationships were boring and frustrating.

Thank you to Netgalley and Wednesday Books for sending me an early copy of this audiobook! All opinions are my own!

I think I could absolutely devour everything that Garber ever writes, and my soul would just be so happy. I loved the way that this book had such a unique world to dive into. It was built up so slowly that it felt very natural, like we were truly discovering everything right alongside Estela. Each new piece of information made me that much more intrigued and in love with the world.

My one complaint was that the romance felt a bit flat and like it came about too quickly. I felt like there was just something lacking from it. But then by the end I also really wanted to see them together and find out what their future would end up being like.

I think my favorite part of this book was the journey of self-discovery in the midst of grief. The book is so unique in the way that Estela has to battle not only her enemies but also her inner self, which is sometimes even harder to do. She's taken on a journey of trauma and grief and watching her learn about herself and what she wants in life is so refreshing.

And do not get me started on the cliffhanger!!! I need the next book immediately!

Not for me. Instalove, weird vibes from every single man, infodumping, extremely long flashbacks, and lots of romantasy tropes that don't appeal to me. Also, this is a little too mature to be considered YA.

4.5 stars This has action, magic, mystery, and many more elements that work well together. The depression and how Estela moved forward were graphic but in a good way, I related as someone who suffers from major depression and the loss of a parent. The love story was a bit rushed but as it was a supernatural being, not a major issue. There were twists and turns everywhere in this book and even if things look predictable something will twist that prediction into something else entirely.

I enjoyed Castle of the Cursed more than I expected to. It was very atmospheric, with mystery, romance and horror aspects. The story follows Estela, a teenager that lived constantly on the move in the U.S., as she relocates to Spain following the sudden and mysterious death of parents. There she attempts to find out about her past, while hoping to create a future where she can stay in one place. I thought this was one of the more unique stories that I’ve read recently and offered some surprise twists that were not completely spelled out in the leadup.

I wanted to like this book so much at the beginning. I was super intrigued by the premise and I was totally down for a gothic story with a sentient house. What I was not expecting was the vampire. And as much as I love a good vampire story, this was *not* it. Several other aspects pretty much came out of nowhere and I was just not about it (including, but not limited to family drama and several parts of the relationship with said vampire). I made it through the whole book by sheer force of will and just plain curiosity. I should have stopped reading before the epilogue. I was mostly okay with this book as whole until literally the last line. And I will not forgive Romina Garber for that any time soon.

CWs: depression, suicide, death of a parent, sex, violence, mental health issues, blood

Thank you to Wednesday Books for sending me an ARC to read. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

4.5 stars

I highly enjoyed this one. Right from the beginning, Garber starts the story out with a bang and sets the tone for the book. It’s bleak, dark, depressing, and it feels hopeless at times. I was really able to connect with Estela, the main character and narrator, as she struggled with her parents’ deaths and her own feelings about living. The author did a fantastic job of showing Estela’s mental state, and I thought she handled it with care. I really loved seeing Estela learn about her family history, and also coming to realize that she wanted to live. Her journey as a character was really well written.

The supporting characters were well written, and I liked how they had an impact on Estela’s investigation and journey of discovery. Felipe was an interesting source of information, and Beatríz was a good character. I liked that we got to peel back the layers on some of the characters to see their truths.

Sebastián was a great character. The shadow beast is first introduced through glimpses, and I loved the mystery and intrigue of him. Once we met him, the fear and uncertainty he presented kept Estela pushing for answers about the castle and her family. I loved the progress of their relationship, and I thought the romance was sweet and made sense. It wasn’t an overpowering romance, but the characters worked well together.

I thought the pacing was good, and the atmosphere of the book was fantastic. The author did a great job of making the story and the castle feel unsettling and strange. The ending was fast-paced and exciting, but it was a little bit confusing at times. I struggled a little bit to understand the magic and the other realms, but I feel like on a reread I would have a better grasp of it.

This one was dark, gothic and mysterious. While Castle of the Cursed isn't my usual read/genre, I enjoyed it! At first, Estella was giving off major unreliable narrator vibes and by the end she finds her voice (quite literally) and becomes a strong FMC. The writing was descriptive and simple yet beautiful-I definitely highlighted numerous phrases I appreciated the author's note at the beginning of the book

Thank you NetGalley and the publishers for sending me this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Let me preface by saying I LOVED the premise. A mysterious thriller with creepy castle vibes and toss in some paranormal/supernatural elements and I was sold. I really enjoy the first 20% of the book, I thought the depiction of Estela’s grief and survivor’s guilt was an accurate portrayal and was very interested to see how it would continue but unfortunately for me the middle of the book fell a little flat.

There were many moments were it felt as if scenes were just being repeated, characters were doing the exact same thing expecting different results and it was frustrating to read how these characters could be so gullible. I VERY surprised with the speed of the romance between the mains. 2 weeks pass and they are in love. I just didn’t see any genuine connection with the couple. I would have liked to see more conversations between the two, exploring their connection more. I felt some scenes between them (the rope scene in particular) were just tossed in as an effort to add *spiceness* but in my opinion it wasn’t spicy at all.

I felt the latter half of the book kind of dumped a lot of information without any clarification. Where was grandfather from? How did he originally come to be on earth? The other worlds part of the story just seemed disjointed in parts and I would have liked to have that fleshed out a bit more.

I found the final ‘battle’ to be quite rushed through and the very end in opinion was EXTREMELY frustrating. Because of the epilogue and that last line I had to drop it from a 3 star to 2.5. I just couldn’t understand how after everything that was where the story would end. Even if there is a sequel I would likely not read it as in my opinion those last pages invalidated any true knowledge or awareness between the 2 main characters.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.

Romina Garber never fails to write mesmerizing tales that still is able to reflect our real world. With just a hint of romance, we follow Estela as she discovers more about her past, all while trying to heal from the tragic mysteries of her past. Her past intertwines endlessly with her future the further she digs into the truth, bringing the audiences deeper into the depths of Estela's secrets that even she has hidden from herself. Romina will forever be an author that will be an auto-buy for me.

Absolutely beautiful and stunning gothic fantasy romance. The worldbuilding, and characters and just... *chefs kiss*. I couldn't put it down!