My favorite book of 2024! I absolutely loved every page of Don't Let the Forest In by CG Drews. It's all dark fantasy, mental health, creative energy, and obsessive queer love that's packaged in beautiful prose. I grew up loving fairy tales and folklore that had more bite. This book made me feel things deeply. I described it to a friend as one of those stories that sticks with you and settles into your bones. Needless to say, I look forward to reading the author's upcoming works.

Don't Let the Forest In by C.G. Drews is a hauntingly beautiful and eerie tale that keeps readers on edge from beginning to end. The atmospheric writing draws you into its unsettling world, where mystery and magic blur together. The protagonist’s voice is sharp and authentic, making her journey of self-discovery both captivating and emotional. While the plot occasionally meanders, the underlying tension and the well-crafted, layered characters more than compensate for it. It’s an unforgettable, darkly enchanting read for those who enjoy suspenseful, character-driven stories. A well-deserved 4 stars!

3.5 / 5 stars. Beautifully atmospheric and delightful prose! I began to wind the pieces together at the end, but it did feel a little rushed when those pieces do begin to fall into place. But still an enjoyable read and very easy to get through.

This book was so beautiful! I felt like I was able to imagine myself there in the forest with them. It was so creepy but yet some beautiful emotional. “All my stories are about you. They will always be about you.” GOD rip my heart out!!!!!

This book was one of my most anticipated books of the year. It has everything that I love in a book, gothic, fantasy, horror, and mystery. Set in an alluring gothic setting with some fantasy aspects, follows the two MMCs, Thomas and Andrew. One day Thomas’s parents mysteriously vanished and hoping to find out what happened, Andrew follows Thomas to the woods only to find out that his sketches have to come to life. A captivating story of romance, thriller, and mystery, this book did a wonderful job at keeping me at the edge of my seat. I can’t wait to read more from this author!

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

Utterly haunting and beautiful, this is the type of book I want to see more of. I don't think there is anything I would change.

The story was full of mystery, I really enjoyed how much I was unsure about characters, trying to figure out if they were "good or evil".
Our MCs were completely delightful, even when they were doing bad things. 🤣
There is something i really enjoy about the gray area, and showing that characters don't have to be perfect.

Plus the MONSTERS ARE AMAZING.

I zoomed through this book! The characters were fleshed out and felt so very real, I swear I was right there with them. I loved the relationship between the main characters and only wished we had gotten a little more of the sister. Overall, an enjoyable read and I can’t wait to see what else the author does.

This was a really interesting book with a unique premise. I enjoyed the story a lot and found the mysteries to be really fascinating. I also appreciated the LGBTQIA+ representation. It’s a perfect gothic horror novel for young adults.

Thank you to NetGalley and MacMillan for the early copy of Don’t Let the Forest in by CG Drews!

I found Don’t Let the Forest in to be atmospheric and the prose to be excellent, though I admittedly did not enjoy this as much as I’d hoped. I think this ended up being a bit too YA for my taste, which is totally ok! I found that the horror elements did not really connect for me and I struggled to get through the first half of the book. For what seemed like a super interesting plot line, this was disappointing for me as I really only started feeling engaged with the plot twist at the end.

I do think this is objectively a beautiful book, though I truthfully did not feel overall connected to the plot or characters. This also isn’t the biggest issue but I was a little thrown off at first that this was a modern story (definitely went “wait what” at the first mention of a cellphone) so this could be why I felt disconnected from the story.

This was a 3/5 for me personally!

Read 11/29/24

Sadly, I have to give this book 3 stars. It was 2 stars, but the ending improved. This is a case of had I physically read the book I might have liked it more. The narrator, Michael Crouch, made it very hard to differentiate between whether it was Andrew or Thomas speaking. I have come to realize I do not enjoy this narrator, I've given every book I've listened to that was narrated by him 3 stars or less. Maybe one day I'll reread this physically and hopefully enjoy it more.

Obsessed doesn’t cover it! I can’t wait to read more from this author. The dread and psychological horror was chefs kiss and this will be one of my new favorites.

Overall enjoyed this! I’m a massive horror fan, so I’ve been highly anticipating this one for a long time. I do think I’d enjoy it more as an audiobook though

This one started a little slow for me; although the writing was excellent, I had some difficulty getting engrossed in the story. Thankfully that quickly changed.
This book is filled with lines that read like poetry.
Angsty and beautiful, pain ridden odes to love and finding yourself so consumed by another person that it's terrifying. It's gorgeous...
I honestly don't want to give too much away because this book is a carefully curated experience that I think readers should just dive into. That being said, I really loved this line: "People didn't just kiss and continue on with their lives. They undid buttons and touched mouths to hot skin and lost themselves within each other."
Kudos to author C.G. Drews. Thanks to Macmillan Children's Publishing Group, Feiwel & Friends, and NetGalley for the advanced copy.
Content warning: Blood/gore, body horror, panic attacks, grief, eating disorder, bullying, and self-harm.

I requested the ARC through NetGalley because I was intrigued by the cover design (gorgeous!), the title, and that it was labeled as LGBTQIA+.

The language and writing style immediately drew me in. As the book went on, the plot moved a lot slower than I intended with some side plots sprinkled throughout the middle section of the book. I didn't want to feel like I wanted to ditch it, but that is how I was feeling about midway through.

For me, it wasn't because it was YA or poorly written. It was just moving slower than I hoped it would. I didn't feel connected to the characters for their personalities or the plot, I truly just enjoyed the words C.G. Drews used together to describe things. The drama of the atmosphere and the overall stakes of the story kept me going through to the end (although much faster than I was at the first part of the book).

I would read another C.G. Drews book! This would have hit the mark for me if it had a tight, intense plot without the added characters or subplots.

I absolutely lost my mind over this book!! The dark vibes and amazing imagery gave me goosebumps. The cover is beautiful and pulls you in and the story keeps you guessing until the end. Andrew is beautifully tragic and I yearned for him and Thomas for them to be more and more. I could not get them out of my head and my heart. Please read this!!

Okay I have to be open honest and for real. I’m not finishing this. I’m a quarter through and I’m bored. I know I’m supposed to be wondering ~*whats going on*~ with the love interest and the parents and the forest. But I’m not. The writing is pretty but when it’s coupled with barely any action it ends up feeling overwritten and long winded. I also don’t care about the manic pixie dream kids at school. They don’t feel mysterious to me. I’m just bored bc they don’t do anything apart from think big emotional thoughts about each other 😬 I am bummed that I didn’t end up liking this though!

Don't Let the Forest In by CG Drews is the story of two boys at Wickwood Academy. Something strange is happening to Thomas, and Andrew is very worried about him. So one night, Andrew follows Thomas into the woods and realizes that Thomas's drawings have come to life and are trying to kill anyone close to him. This story is so beautifully written, and I highlighted so many lines. "'I think someday you'll hate me.' Thomas's voice stretched with a loneliness Andrew had never heard before. 'You'll cut me open and find a garden of rot where my heart should be.' Andrew let the silence sharpen between them, waited until Thomas's breath caught in quiet anguish from being made to wait. 'When I cut you open,' Andrew finally said, 'all I'll find is that we match.'" Drews is such a talented write; I can't wait to read more of her books. Thanks to NetGalley for the free digital review copy. All opinions are my own.

This book was unbelievably good! Going into this blind made all the twists and dark but beautiful writing so much more surprising. The two main characters were so beautifully written in all their haunted and twisted glory. Their love was intense, overpowering, and poetic. I would definitely recommend!

3.5 Stars rounded up

Thank you to NetGalley, CG Drews, and Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group for this advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This creepy, atmospheric, YA horror fantasy would have been the book of my dreams in middle school/early high school. It's the perfect book for dark, angsty teens and my younger emo-self would have devoured this. It's dark, poetic, and atmospheric. Drews leaves the reader wondering what just happened in this absolute mind-bender. I love a good plot twist and this sucker twisted. As an adult, I felt like I wanted just a little more out of this, but I'm also not the target audience. I think this was worth the read, and would recommend trying it out if you're interested in a dark YA with plant-based horror.

what a cool premise but lackluster execution. the majority of this book had me hooked, i won't lie. mostly i had questions like, "how will this be resolved? what's the truth? are they going to survive?" as i read on, i started to get annoyed by the redundant, purple prose and the overuse of specific terms to describe the atmosphere. for example, "rot" is the first word to come to mind, overused in possibly every line it was in. the writing set the tone great initially but wore itself out quickly. some scenes were great, and the author is skilled in developing haunting imagery, but 300 pages of repetitive inner monologue, reactions, and dialogue overwhelm this imagery.

as for the characters, they were fine. the majority of the book is andrew and thomas together. therefore, it became andrew describing thomas in overused prose. the dialogue was melodramatic and awkward; inserted for the mere aesthetic of it. it could have been great if the book utilized creative fairytale lore, wrote about the clever ways andrew and thomas attempted to defeat the monsters, rather than relentlessly killing them.

andrew is an incredibly frustrating character, and i don't mean that interestingly. he is self-pitying and coddled to the max. to an extent is understandable; struggling with mental health in high school is a relatable experience. however, the author attempts to make the reader feel sympathy for andrew before writing him as a character and fleshing out his qualities, which makes me sympathize less. (that's how i am, at least)

now a common theme i find in YA books is the insertive, out-of-place therapy conversations. mental health or sexuality is never explored naturally or seems fitting for the context, but just... there. clearly set up for the mc's self-acceptance arc, and not a natural development. that's how i felt with andrew's anxiety and sexuality discussions. his eating disorder felt side-lined, something to layer on top of his miseries, a topic the author didn't want to fully commit to. a disorder to his degree should be all-consuming, yet it wasn't.

it seems im in the minority for hating the "plot twist". i'll be vague, but if this plot twist didn't exist, it would've made andrew's melodramatics much more bearable. instead, the twist came off as uninteresting and predictable.