This book captured my attention right from the start. A family is grappling with the aftermath of a tragedy for years, facing genuinely frightening situations that will keep you awake at night. It has everything I look for in a good read. I felt a strong connection with the characters, and the storyline was intense and excellent. The author created such an intense atmosphere that there was never a moment to catch my breath.

The horror elements kicked in quickly, completely drawing me in, and the way the tension escalated was remarkable. I loved all the characters, and the story was fantastic.

90/100 or 4.5 stars

This was a bloody good time! The dialogue and references were a little cringe sometimes and felt a little dated, but I had fun and it is also a quick read. I will be interested in picking up other works by Greenwood!

Really wanted to enjoy this book very much more than I actually did. The premise was good - one I fell for but the writing style just was not something I enjoyed or gelled with. I also didn't enjoy prominent characters being killed off. The monsters were interesting so I do wish that they and their origin story had been fleshed out more. I understand that the story was meant to be a symbol of the things that families hide or don't wish to examine too deeply (monsters metaphorically) so in that respect, the story made its point! I don't think I would care to read any more of the author's work.

Gage Greenwood has yet to disappoint! If you're a fan of any of his other books, definitely give this one a go. Thanks to Netgalley for the opportunity to read it!

"On a Clear Day, You Can See Block Island" by Gage Greenwood is a captivating and evocative exploration of love, loss, and the passage of time. Set against the picturesque backdrop of Block Island, the narrative deftly captures the beauty of its landscapes while intertwining personal stories that resonate deeply.

Greenwood’s prose is both lyrical and poignant, painting vivid imagery that immerses readers in the setting. The characters are richly developed, each navigating their own struggles and desires, which adds layers of emotional depth to the story.

At its core, the novel is a meditation on connection and the significance of place, making it a reflective read that lingers long after the last page. "On a Clear Day, You Can See Block Island" is a beautifully crafted tale that will resonate with anyone who cherishes the complexities of human relationships.

I am a huge fan of bleak, nihilistic horror, and this book gave me exactly what I was looking for. Grief horror is hard to get right, and this book does the subgenre so well. The second act of the book was slightly lesser in quality than the first half, but overall it was a great read. Reading this book made me feel like I had the flu in the best way possible, a truly miserable and depressing experience that I highly recommend.

Four years after their lives and family were ripped apart by a monster, siblings set out to revisit Block Island in hopes of facing it down. This starts out hot on a pretty shocking horror scene and then goes into the aftermath (anxiety, alcoholism, drug problems, perceived behavioral problems) before building back up into a fresh nightmare for all involved. 3 stars.

A horrific story of grief and the never ending horror of coming of age. This book starts with a bang that continues til the very end leaving you grasping for what is going to happen next.

The writing is smooth and easy to read, and the characters were well developed and have depth, the monster is brutal and creepy, and I loved the little details with it’s behaviour, like when it tilts it’s head when you talk to it, added to the creepiness.
If you like your creature features a little on the dark and creepy side, then you will love this.

The horror aspect starts right on the first page with one of the siblings being eaten and continues all the way through, so there's no waiting around for the horror to kick. I loved the dynamic between each of the siblings and how each time the creatures appeared there was thorough description which kept them from turning into vague furry boogeymen.

The only issue I had in the book is that there were so POVs, but it also worked out because you got to see the trauma from each character.

Thanks so much to NetGalley and Tanner's Switch Publishing for access to an eARC in exchange for my honest review!!

what’s it about? ⬇️

"Welcome home, you pains in the ass."

The Keating family's move to Block Island was meant to be a brand new start after the tragic loss of their mother. A chance for their father to prove that he was going to step up and be there for them, and all around a chance for them to start to heal and move on from their losses. But a horrible. nightmarish tragedy struck one day, and suddenly the family was one member short again. But if the family was to be believed, their eldest sister Wreath was eaten by an awful monster that disappeared afterward, so how is anyone meant to help with that?

Four years go by, and the four remaining Keating siblings spend their days struggling to go through life as if everything is fine while their traumas follow them with every step they take. With Wreath gone, their brother Bryan all but lost to them having turned to drugs to get by, and their father having left them to stay with their aunt as he uses alcohol to cope with his losses, Charlie is left to fill the role of the eldest sibling and to take care of the others despite his crippling anxiety keeping him from truly living his life. Chrissy doesn't remember much about what happened that day and has developed an obsession with horror media to help her try and get back her memories, and Angela...well, Angela is angry, withdrawn, and terrified of the dark. Because she does remember. And she sees that monster every day, hovering in dark corners, watching her.

But as Charlie forms a new friendship with siblings Tiffany and Doug, they begin to pull him out of his shell, and when Chrissy makes an unsettling discovery that leads her to remember parts of that awful day, the siblings and their new friends travel back to Block Island in the hopes of finally gaining some sort of understanding and closure for that night four years before. But instead, the nightmare is there to welcome them home again. But will they all make it out alive this time? Can they?

my thoughts? ⬇️

The second I saw this book compared to the works of Mike Flanagan, I knew I had to check it out, and honestly? It really delivered on that promise in so many ways. I would say it mostly compares to/takes a lot of inspiration from Flanagan's Haunting of Hill House and the struggles with media coverage on a family in tragedy and that family's journey of coming to terms with that tragedy years after the fact. On a Clear Day, You Can See Block Island was spooky, intense, and atmospheric, and Gage Greenwood does an incredible job of setting the scene and building up this all encompassing sense of dread for his readers. And the action/horror sequences were so well paced and layered well with the rest of the story. I absolutely adored reading about characters like Angela with her constant struggle to find a balance between her fear and her anger and Chrissy with the way she leaned into the horror genre to find some meaning behind what happened to them, and I *adored* watching these characters try so hard to convince themselves and each other either that what happened was real or a figment of their imagination. Greenwood wasn't afraid to play on certain common fears like loss of trust in oneself, subtle claustrophobia, and the heavy presence of the darkness, and I loved sinking deeper and deeper into this book's atmosphere the more I read it.

Now, for the not as good parts. Occasionally, a few scenes felt somewhat out of place--the use of Bryan in particular felt almost more like a shock value additive rather than a presence that carried real weight in the story. He was meant to fill a role, almost, and was only there to fill that role to the minimum extent before being moved on from, which considering his plotline felt a little messy. And similarly, some of the big moments for the characters fell flat with so much else going on at once, and more than a few times I felt like a big 'horror' or 'tragedy' coded moment would be thrown in and not given much of the time or respect that they deserved,

At the end of the day, there was so much heart buried at the center of this messy, horrific little creature feature, and I genuinely loved it. I'd recommend it for fans of Mike Flanagan and Haunting of Hill House (Netflix) looking for a fun read that might not need to be taken as seriously.

trigger warnings ⬇️

addiction, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, overdose, death by overdose, gore, violence, injury detail, body horror, blood, suicide, grief, death of a parent, death of a sibling, death of a loved one, death, fire, fire related injury, family trauma, car accident.

I had this book on my Kindle app for a while before reading it, and I’m sort of kicking myself for not reading it sooner, this book was the first from this author, but before I finished it, I already went and added a few more onto my kindle app.

I don’t know why, but I was expecting more of a gothic slow burn, but instead it is action packed right from the start and doesn’t let up, I loved it.

The writing is smooth and easy to read, and the characters were well developed and have depth, the monster is brutal and creepy, and I loved the little details with it’s behaviour, like when it tilts it’s head when you talk to it, added to the creepiness.
If you like your creature features a little on the dark and creepy side, then you will love this.

Want supernatural mixed with a family's sad life. It starts out where the family has moved into a house on Block Island because the mom was killed during a work accident and it's where she "came from". The mom never wanted them to live there, and dad wasn't sure why. Fast forward to horrible deaths and alternate dimensions. This poor family unknowingly has so much history. Had the family just been honest to begin with, the book never would have occurred.

It was fantastic, horrible, and I couldn't put it down. Gage did a wonderful job getting you to love the people you needed to love and root for them to have a huge hole ripped out of your chest at the end.

It's been four years since the Keating family witnessed something they'll never forget, and something they're all struggling to move past. Charlie's anxiety is out of control; Brian is a drug addict; Angela is afraid of the dark; and Chrissy struggles to remember much of what she saw. But when new information comes to light that promises to give them a kernel of understanding what happened, they jump at the chance. They've always steered clear of Block Island, but sometimes, the best way to push past your demons, is to confront them head on. After heading back to the island, the soon discover that the darkness has been waiting for them to return, and perhaps, these demons are more than they bargained for...

The cover of this one really caught my eye when I was scouring through book titles. It's so simple yet so striking. The title felt a bit odd, but in the end, it did its job and made me intrigued as to what the story could possibly be about. This story was a lot deeper than what the title suggests, and I was here for it. It's not just a run of the mill horror story, it's a story that deals with heavy subject matter. It looks at the way a traumatic event can impact one's life moving forward, as well as the healing, or not healing in these cases, can impact that as well. This is a story that deals with grief, loss, PTSD, and trauma against the backdrop of a horror story that is quite unsettling.

This story starts with a bang. Straight away we are introduced to Mr. Keating, and his five children. We learn about how they ended up on Block Island, and we see them on their first evening in their new home. Then we're treated to a horrific event that I'm sure we've all had some nightmare variation of across our lives. Flash forward four years and we're meeting the Keating children and their father, as they are now. Even though the beginning of the story is obviously slowly submerging us into the world and getting to know the characters, I never felt like it dragged at all. I was intrigued as to the resounding "why" of what had happened and whether it HAD happened as we saw, or whether it was something else. The story was a regular, run of the mill horror in its formulation, but the monsters in the dark and the characters are what fleshed the story out and gave it more dimension. I loved the lore that was used here, as it's not something that I'd ever seen before and I'm so curious as to whether it's based on an actual myth, or whether Greenwood came up with it all on their own. Either way, hats off and a huge round of applause for bringing something different to the table of the horror genre.

The characters are very well written and incredibly complex. Each of the Keating family have immense trauma from what they experienced, and it has impacted and affected each of them in different ways. I loved how genuine Greenwood's depiction of the varying mental illnesses was and how much thought and detail were put into all of it. Every single character is different to the next and I absolutely loved that. In a cast of characters of this size and multi POV story, it can be hard to keep track of who is who sometimes. That's not to say that the cast is big, but it's sizeable. I had no issue at all with this story, from the get-go I knew every character from the next because their personalities were so real and raw. They were all so different to each other and flawed, so beautifully flawed, which is something that I love. I feel like having flawed characters can add a sense of reality to an otherwise unrealistic story. This story didn't feel unrealistic to me, it was bleak, and I felt a sense of hopelessness, that which the characters were feeling throughout. The feeling of being stuck with nowhere to go was palpable, and when you like all of the characters, that can be a hard one to swallow. Not knowing who was going to make it and who wasn't, whether anyone would, kept me on the edge of my seat and needing to keep reading. I also loved the character relationships in this one, a family that loves each other so much, yet hates each other all the same. Is it because of who their trauma turned them into? Or is it because they remind each other of what they've been through?

There were some things that I was unclear on, that left me with questions, and that's okay. The story does wrap up relatively cleanly, there were just a couple of things I am still pondering. For instance, the dog? I would like to know the purpose behind the dog. Who was the dog? Was the dog just a dog? See? Questions. None that I believe would be considered breaking it, just queries.

All in all, I found this to be a very atmospheric read that tickled that part of the brain where your nightmares live. I feel like everyone has experienced something in their sleep that they'd rather not see again, and for me, this story really did tug on that fear and use it to its fullest extent. The story isn't just a horror, it really looks at how a person's demons can shape who they become, depending on what they do at the time of meeting them. It also shows that sometimes, the people you can count on the least, are the ones who will show up for you in the end. Not all the time of course, but sometimes. I enjoyed this one and loved the injection of different lore. I'm off to research said lore, and also look at what else this author has written, because I'm keen to check out more of their stuff.

I enjoyed this read, and definitely recommended it to a few people who would appreciate it. I live the in the moment writing, and the connections between the characters.

Thanks to Netgalley, the publisher, and author for the copy of this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Ah this is so good!
I put off reading for a bit because I worried it wouldn’t live up to Bunker Dogs. It did though!

A family in the aftermath of a terrible attack are drawn back to the Island which holds terrible memories for them. All of the surviving members of the family are struggling in their own ways but when Chrissy finds information that makes their story believable they head back to Block Island.
The monster attacks are fantastic. The characters are well rounded and not babied for their ages. And the book races towards its dramatic and violent ending.

Well worth reading!

(Also I loved the casual mention of other indie author books! )

Very original monster story, could see being a mobie pne day.
Trauma mixed with the supernatural topped off with folklore whats not to like.

Such a fun horror read - as much as horror can be fun! Fast-paced with great characters and a unique story. Will definitely check out more from this author.

I am convinced this author has never talked to a teenager in his life. Although fast paced, adventurous, and horrifying, On a Clear Day, You Can See Block Island introduces us to a slew of unbearable characters. The kids’ dialogue felt shallow and punctuated in a way that would make them stick out like sore thumbs in any high school let alone middle school. The friendship they all formed felt too, idk, easy? You're telling me that in the course of just a few days they all would be willing to go monster hunting together? Yeah, right.

It was just all a little too convenient for me - It really left nothing else to define them other than their very individualized trauma that were each so specialized. This one has anxiety, the other sees things, the next hyper fixates on escapism reads, etc. and that's it as far as characterization.

The adults are equally as unbelievable with the father being the most throw away character ever. I think we get a total of half a paragraph with him wrestling with the idea of his poor parenting before he tragically, and expectantly, dies and now, what, are we supposed to see him as a redeemed man? Also, he describes himself not as a regular alcoholic, but a “frat boy dude bro alcoholic” which gives Jimmy Buffett running away from raptors in Jurassic World with two drinks in his hands energy, but unironically which just makes it sad.

Clearly I am too caught up with these ridiculous characters to even get into the horror aspect of things, which is unfortunate because I think if the characters were not what they are, I would have really enjoyed this book.

Thank you to NetGalley, Gage Greenwood, and Tanner's Switch Publishing for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review!