Wasn’t sure if I would like this but it was done well. Handled trauma and other heavier themes well.

My mind is so numb and broken after reading this (in a good way!!!)

This is full of family trauma, nature, vortexes, and just everything creepy. It’s almost frustrating in a way, the way the characters interact with one another (specifically Chase and her parents), but when you find out all that has happened to make them that way, you understand.

After Chase’ sister Guthrie goes missing in the woods, and comes back with her voice gone, and her essence gone basically as well, the family moves to a lookout in Pando.

However, there’s a negative vortex there and things from the past that come back to haunt them. And knotholes!!! It’s eery. It’s chilling. It makes goosebumps rise on your skin.

They are a traveling family, their van/bus/home known as a skoolie. Ever since her grandparents died when they were little, Chase has longed to go back to Boone, where they lived since that’s the only place she felt like was home.

I really enjoyed this storyline and felt like I could relate to Chase, even as someone who has lived in the same house, town, and state my whole life.

The chapters were short, and packed a punch which i really enjoyed. I liked the tiny bit of romance that we got from Chase and Wilder. I thought it was great that Chase was able to find a home in someONE rather than someTHING and that she had someone to lean on during the absolute rollercoaster that was this book.

I’m really satisfied with the ending and how everything turned out. I wish nothing but the best for this family and how they will move forward/are moving forward.

This has a much darker vibe to it than Kate’s’ debut “Here Lies Olive” but I really enjoyed it. The psychological/realistic fiction of it all. It really makes me want to visit Pando IRL (since it actually exists!!)

Sad, hopefully and mysterious. Lonely Places was great, a story about trauma, denial and coping. I loved all the characters and their relationships. The way Chase development was built and the way she started trusting the people around her was beautiful. Although her and her family had their ups and downs (and got me going crazy sometimes) at the end they truly cared for each and changed for the better, they did what was right to be able to move forward.

Thank you NetGally for giving me the opportunity of reading the eARC

There is magic in the woods, it’s often subtle in its beauty and power. When the Wolf family moves to a new town Pando, they have the most unique opportunity to live on a Fire Lookout Tower. But there is a sense of unease with the locals whenever the Lookout is mentioned and the story builds masterfully. Kate Anderson’s Lonely Places is a beautiful tale that blends the dynamics of nature with human relationships for an intricately woven and mysteriously spellbinding journey filled with the right amount of horror. A profound and moving story about our connectedness and the fragility and resiliency of the human spirit. This was such a treat to read on my plane ride to and from Utah!!!

An atmospheric setting, creepy plot, and guilt combine for a satisfying young adult tale of psychological terror.

Lonely Places is a new young adult psychological horror story by author Kate Anderson, and its rich, evocative setting will have readers jumping in their seats at every unidentified noise. The young protagonist is realistically portrayed, and many readers will easily relate to her and her feelings, effectively edging up the engagement in this absorbing tale.

Chase Woolf is the older sister and narrator of the story. Soon to turn 18, she’s desperately unhappy with her father’s choice of the family’s vagabond lifestyle. She longs for a stable, traditional home, specifically the one from her childhood memories in Boone, North Carolina, where they lived down the street from her paternal grandparents until their deaths. Instead, her father has committed the family to living at a remote fire lookout station for a year. Her goal is to make enough money over the summer and upcoming school year to escape her current life, as well as the guilt she bears for leaving her much younger sister, Gus, behind in the woods at her family’s campsite six months earlier and the young girl’s resulting trauma. Lost for hours, when the family finally found Gus, she was tear-streaked and terrified and hadn’t spoken a word since, except to mumble to herself and now the trees that surround the fire lookout station their father has brought them to for the coming year.

The setting in remote Utah in the middle of the Pando Aspen Grove, a real location, is vivid and creepy and plays a main role in the unfolding tale. The slow reveal of past issues at the fire lookout station are eerie twists that serve to intensify the growing suspense as Chase watches her younger sister start to change for the worse. As a parent, I wanted to shake the girls’ parents; both of these girls needed more help than a change of scenery or just ignoring it could provide. In addition to the unique and compelling mysteries of what was going on at Pando, there is the start of a normal romance for Chase at the nearby summer camp.

The author’s easy-to-read writing style, evocative setting, vulnerable protagonists, and slowly simmering suspense of the story kept me interested and invested from start to finish. I recommend LONELY PLACES to readers of young adult psychological horror and thrillers.

Always love a YA horror, and this one was great! Thriller aspects, and dives right into the atmosphere of it all. It was well written and satisfying!

Lonely places was my last October read and I couldn’t have chosen a better book to close out spooky season with. Taking place in an isolated fire lookout, a family moves in and has no idea the place and surrounding woods has a haunted history. The area soon starts to affect the youngest child, and mysterious events start happening soon after. Trauma is a strong theme in this book and I really loved how that played a part in both the past and the present. ⁣
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Atmospheric and filled with plenty of chills and thrills, this one sucked me right and in and didn’t let go. The storyline is tense and it’s one of those books that really hit you on a visceral level. I think expected to feel a bit of the creeps with this one, but I didn’t expect to feel all the things from the aforementioned trauma and I loved that. Add this to your tbr if you enjoy:⁣⁣
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🍁Themes of grief and trauma ⁣
🍁Isolated eerie settings ⁣
🍁Spooky, woodsy horror ⁣
🍁Family bonds ⁣
🍁Atmospheric stories

After travelling the country for years in a converted school bus, a homeschooling family takes up residence at a fire lookout in Utah. The youngest daughter no longer speaks, traumatized by what happened in the woods That Night. After reading this book, I could go the rest of my life without hearing that phrase. which is repeated over and over in a slightly different font from the book's main text. There's also that thing that happened at the lookout that no one wants to talk about. The aspen grove is filled with creepy bones which the youngest daughter keeps picking up and bringing home. It's a young adult novel, so Chase, the older daughter, is extremely critical of her parents and looking forward to getting away from her family at the first possible opportunity. There's an intriguing story here and some really creepy imagery, but it takes a while to get there.

Wow this had everything. It has first love, whimsical neglectful parents, trauma, staircases in the woods, pando, and some of my favorite Utah locations. It was beautiful and creepy. I have a lot of thoughts but I can't put them down due to spoilers. I will say that I enjoyed this very much.

Slow moving start to the book, even though there were a lot of potentially spooky mysteries that could have been delved into. Instead we kept getting references to "that night" on almost every other sentence, and the character development was very weak, especially in the parents. New characters arrived at about 80% of the way into the book, who served no purpose in advancing the plot.

At about 80-90% into the book, there were some actually creepy parts that made me think this would be like an M. Night Shyamalan movie, but I thought the resolution to "that night" fell flat, and I was astounded at how terrible the parents were at parenting. Even for free spirited hippies, they were bad. Yet they had the foresight to tell their teenage daughter to let them parent. If someone really was free spirited to the point of being neglectful, I don't know that they would have the acuity to tell their teen to let them handle adult matters so she could enjoy being a teen.

I actually found the author's notes at the end more interesting, as she shares her journey to publication and some of the places in the southwest that inspired the book. I'd like to read more of her work, but I think this was very much a novice effort. 2.5 stars rounded up to 3.

First of all I want to thank Net Galley and North Star Editions for an ARC of this book to read and review.

I really liked the book, it's slow paced but not in a bad way. The author did a great thing by keeping a slow pace and still making sure there was tension.

Obviously I like the idea of 'the lonely places' being a trauma warrior myself. The inner battle of Chase is depicted very well from a teenager's point of view. The themes of trauma-romance-friendship are well-combined in the book.

What I'm missing is more insight in Guthrie's memory and feelings of what happened 'that night'.

Awesome creepy and mysterious vibes in this one. It keeps us on edge, turning the pages to learn the secrets, we want to understand what Guthrie can now perceive and see or hear in these woods that others can't. The family moved to an isolated house in the woods without knowing something terrible happened there before. Also, something in the past made Gurthrie a ten-year-old stop talking, but now she talks a little to the trees. Couldn't put it down.

Lonely Places by Kate Anderson is a haunting, atmospheric tale that blends folk horror with a powerful exploration of trauma, family, and resilience. Following sixteen-year-old Chase and her family as they settle into an isolated fire lookout in Pando—an eerie grove of interconnected Aspen trees—the novel quickly immerses readers in an unsettling world where nature itself seems both beautiful and menacing. Anderson captures the setting with chilling detail, creating a sinister forest where birds sing in haunting loops, and bones inexplicably sprout from the ground, setting the stage for the story’s eerie mysteries.

At the heart of Lonely Places lies Chase’s relationship with her younger sister Guthrie, whose traumatic experience has left her silent, yet seemingly more attuned to the forest’s strange pull. Anderson masterfully explores the tension between Chase’s fierce protectiveness over Guthrie and her need for independence, heightened by her connection with Wilder, a camp lifeguard who offers her a glimpse of normalcy. This pull between her family’s demands and the desire to escape is deeply relatable, especially for teens dealing with trauma and change, and Anderson handles these themes with nuance and empathy.

The book’s folk horror elements are woven seamlessly into the psychological landscape, with the forest serving as both a literal and symbolic mirror of Chase’s fears and unresolved pain. As Pando draws Guthrie deeper into its thrall, Chase is forced to confront her own buried traumas and the ghosts of her past. Anderson’s portrayal of grief and healing feels both raw and authentic, adding emotional depth to the story’s suspenseful undercurrent.

Lonely Places is an unforgettable YA novel that combines the dark allure of folk horror with a compassionate look at family bonds, trauma, and the ways we find strength in the face of fear. Anderson’s writing is lush and evocative, capturing both the beauty and terror of the natural world. This is a compelling, eerie read for fans of horror, mystery, and emotionally rich storytelling.

What a beautifully crafted book. The setting is richly atmospheric, pulling me into its dark, moody, gothic allure from the very first page. The mysterious small town vibe adds an extra layer of intrigue, evoking a sense of isolation and secrets that lie just beneath the surface. There is something captivating about this small communities with hidden histories they draw you in, making you feel like you are a part of their world. I like the character arcs here, many dynamic character sketches can be seen. The writing is sharp and suspenseful keeping me on the edge of my seat as each chapter unfolds. It's the perfect read for autumn evenings, where every shadow seems to whisper a new secret.

Actual Rating: 4.5/5 stars

"The bones had grown into the roots and the roots had grown into the bones… And Guthrie had gathered bones from the dirt like wildflowers.”

The Story:
16-year-old Chase has never known what it’s like to “have roots” in a place. Newly moved into the remote lookout-tower in the Pando-woods after having spent 8 years traveling the country in a converted school-bus, Chase is glad to stay in a single place for more than a few months. Perhaps the stability of a place to call home will help her family recover from the trauma of *that night*; the one that originally sent her parents on the road and rendered her younger sister selectively mute.
When Chase gets a job at the local summer camp and befriends her fellow-camp-counselor Wilder, she learns her family isn’t the only one carrying secrets. Strange events have been happening in the wilds around Pando and Chase and Wilder embark on a quest for answers, in the hopes of saving both their families.

What I liked:
The Lonely Places exceeded all my expectations and made for one of my favourite YA-reads of the year. It strikes that perfect balance between heavier themes of mental-health, trauma and grief, slight eeriness and horror-vibes, and a strange feeling of nostalgia that belongs in liminal spaces. The author does a fantastic job bringing mystical woods of Pando (which are a real place that are now on my bucket-list to visit…) and the small town of Boone to life to the point where the atmosphere oozes off the page and I felt myself completely transported there.
What originally seems like two separate mysteries (the story of the strange events and disappearances in Boone, and the history of our central family) are beautifully intertwined and the central metaphor that connects them is a powerful one.
From a grief/trauma-representation perspective, this was really well done. The topics are approached in a sensitive and compassionate way and I loved the emphasis on healing together as a family from a shared trauma. All characters are flawed, and all grow throughout the book, but they truly feel like they care for each other from beginning to end. I especially love the dynamic between Guthrie and Chase, which is far from ideal (acknowledged on page!) but so relatable and true.

What I didn’t like:
The very first mysteries that’s introduced (the one relating to a disappearance that happened in Pando before), never gets a true resolution. Although I’m not the type of reader who needs every question answered, this mystery was so central to the plot that it did feel a little unsatisfactory.
When it comes to the trauma-representation, I have a single personal gripe with the language, which is entirely personal to me. I personally dislike “therapy-speak” from characters (or authors!) who have no background in psychology or therapy. It feels disingenuous, quasi-professional and misplaced. This book fell into that a couple of times. Phrases like “unpacking your trauma” don’t belong in a conversation between16-year olds and lose a lot of their meaning when they’re overused. Again, this is quite a niche gripe I have, so do take it with a grain of salt.
Overall a novel I’d highly recommend, especially as a transitional read from late-summer into early autumn.

Many thanks to North Star for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Lonely Places is incredibly readable and well-paced. The story gets you invested practically right away, up to the point where you lose track of time while reading.
It is a Young Adult novel, so the main character is a teenager, however, there is no "I'm not like other girls" trope and the romance subplot isn't too exposed. In my opinion horror doesn't need romance, but in the case of Lonely Places it all felt correct.
The story explores trauma, the importance of being in touch with your feelings, and liminal spaces. I found that mix to be extremely entertaining and engaging. The characters felt real, their responses natural to what would happen.
Personally, Lonely Places didn't feel scary or unsettling for me, but it had the right atmosphere to place the plot in and live out the entire story. A very pleasant, quick and thrilling read!

This starts off super slow but the creep-factor builds and builds. The odd skeletons, the stairs in the woods, the dreams and then add in the isolation, the disturbing behavior, and history with Tessa--a delightfully creepy read. Hated the kid names (Chase, Guthrie, Willow, Wilder) but their characters are well-developed and so interesting. Enjoyed the romance between Chase and Wilder. Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC.

Lonely Places is an eerie atmospheric YA story with themes of trauma and liminal spaces. This is a creepy tale with a backdrop of wilderness and small town vibes. I really enjoyed Chase's point of view, I felt like the teenaged voice was well done and it felt like I was on this journey with her. There was some found family and romance themes as well, and I felt like they flowed with the story pretty well.

Overall, this is a very readable, atmosphere heavy book that I would recommend to anyone looking for something in the YA creepy-horror genre. I wish there was a little more explanation to some of the mysteries and that the ending was a bit more climatic, which are the only reasons this was not a 5 star read for me.

I think before anything else I have to say I am surprised by how much I enjoyed this! For me personally, YA horror as a genre can be very hit-or-miss, often feeling too superficial or "twee". But Lonely Places really nails that sweet spot, where young adult explores genuinely deep themes whilst keeping that focus more on "coming-of-age".

One of the selling points here is that it feels more like the horror elements (a giant, single-organism forest called Pando which actually does exist) are used as a vehicle to explore the much meatier relationships between our protagonist Chase and her family. There's parentification, there's bone-deep guilt, there's the desperate desire for stability and normality. I understood why Chase does what she does, and that simple facet helps really immerse you.

I did feel at times that the speculative elements came across a little... thin or coincidental. Conveniently the explanations for these unexplained phenomena were always only one or two characters away. And the impact of Pando never quite reached the heights I thought it would. But otherwise, it was sufficiently creepy.

This is a strong 3.5 stars rounded up to 4 for me! A great read for fans who are looking for YA Horror is is maybe lighter on the horror but tackles some really well-constructed relationships. Thank you to NetGalley and Flux for this ARC in exchange for a review

Thank you to the author and NetGalley for this arc!

I really enjoyed this book. Lonely Places is a beautiful, eerie story that reads like a modern day dark fairy tale, while exploring the far-reaching effects of trauma and the frustrating, wonderful mess that is family relationships.

Teenager Chase does not want to go live at a fire look-out deep in the woods; her little sister Guthrie was almost lost in another forest recently, traumatizing her so deeply she hasn’t spoken a word since. After her family moves into the look-out, Chase makes it her personal mission to make sure Guthrie stays safe in the woods surrounding their new home. But these woods are not normal; animals behave strangely, the trees seem to have faces and eyes, and there are too many bones everywhere. The forest seems to have a dark influence over Guthrie, and soon Chase realizes that she may be in a fight with something bigger than nature for her sister.

Lonely Places is very well written, with excellent character building and a story that draws the reader in right away. It deals with some heavy themes gently but clearly, which is not easy to do. I would recommend this book to readers who enjoy dark fairy tales, creepy forests, and books that explore themes of trauma and family relationships. I really enjoyed Lonely Places, and would love to read more stories from this author!