An incredible culmination of obsession, friendship, queerness, and growing up.

There is a very real longing and melancholy throughout the novel. Knowing the time you have left in this era of your life is fleeting. Wanting it to stay the same but knowing you can't will time to stop.

There are beautiful themes throughout this novel and I highly recommend spending the time to delve deep into this story.

The last reason to read this book is from the acknowledgements "Finally, to all the queer girls. You're the most important thing in this world. Make art and make magic and love each other beyond words."

I really enjoyed this. I loved the queer relationships and horror aspects of this novel. I liked the prose and how Mallory Pearson wrote the characters.

It’s just very deeply fine, and I couldn’t really get myself invested, so I ended up just abandoning it at about 50%.

A tribute to that fleeting time of endless potential and ambition that seems to be especially potent to college students. Combined with the claustrophobic feeling of feeling like a small cohort of peers and friends are and can be your whole world forever, it really digs into what would you do to have both things be true, to have friends as close as your own soul but also the creative ambition that requires you to climb over them. I think I am not enough of a visual artist to fully appreciate to the depth of its core, but there's enough about the act of creation and pouring your soul into expressing your art that it still resonates.

I do kind of wish it had either been more ambiguous throughout that the ritual was or wasn't real, or had just said it straight out - it tries to pull off both by having it be ambiguous and that creeping psychological horror but then also totally turns on a dime and makes a decision towards the end and it doesn't feel as satisfactory as I'd like.

All in all, a great entry for the queer dark academia shelves

Part The Craft, part dark academia, a tale of hunger and obsession queer a crazy narrator and descent into madness.

A story of five young women entering their senior year at a prestigious arts college. Only one student in the program will be chosen for a solo showcase at the end of the year. They all want it desperately. As the pressure they put on themselves to produce art they deem good enough grows, our girls turn to a ritual to bring them good luck and curse a self important, pervy professor. As always, while it seems to work at first, things soon to fall apart.


Pearson's writing style, which is a bit much. really works here. It shows the hunger and obsession Jo feels to keep her beloved friends close forever and the desire to become a great artist. I love the dynamics of the clique. They're so weirdly enmeshed with each other and it's fascinating. It was a wild ride watching the cracks start to form. I really enjoyed this book.

Voice Like a Hyacinth by Mallory Pearson was unsettling and tense. I really enjoyed reading this novel.
A gripping dark academia sapphic novel that was so compelling I was hooked till the end.

This book had been on my radar so I was very excited by this one and I was immediately drawn into the darkness and danger, great read overall.

I was highly anticipating this novel, mostly because the cover is beautiful and I like to keep up with new horror releases! But unfortunately, this fell super flat for me. I did enjoy that the horror Went There, since that's one of my biggest pet peeves in horror, when authors are afraid to make things dark. My biggest complaint is that all the characters were more or less the same person with a few different personality traits, but none of it was enough for me to distinguish them from one another. The ritual and folklore aspects were super interesting but I wish they were more flushed out, considering how long this book was, I feel like we only got glimpses of what it could be. Overall, I enjoyed the writing a lot (enough to be more interested in reading more from this author) but this felt like a middleground horror novel for me.

Feeling like a blend of The Craft and dark academia, Mallory Pearson’s Voice Like A Hyacinth grips from the get-go, and doesn’t let go. Part coming of age story, part occult nightmare, it’s a tale of young co-dependent friendships (we all had them) and dabbling in the dark arts (we all did it… right?).

The novel is perhaps a tad overwritten and a few pages too long, and while the epilogue was pleasant in its (still slightly spooky) softness, the bleakness of the actual finale felt more fitting for the genre. That said, it positively drips with Gothic ephemera, from the pathetic fallacy of the locations and the weather to the heavy focus on art and the tortured artist. The scares are great too, a blend of the supernatural and the psychological, increasing in intensity with every page turn. And there’s even room for a brief tear in the eye.

As rich with delicious writing as it is with encroaching dread, Voice Like A Hyacinth really does deliver on its blurb’s promises. It feels far too early in the year to have found my book of 2025, but Voice Like A Hyacinth is going to put up a hell of a fight.

“I was terrified of the possibility: how untethered and expansive it was, how there seemed to be no limit to our belief in the potential of magic. I was afraid that this was a precipice we could not walk back from”

For fans of If We Were Villains, Bunny and The Craft, comes a dark-academia-horror novel about art, obsession, and a hint of the occult.

Set in a prestigious art-college, we follow a group of 5 young women, tangled in a specific kind of deep friendship that can only exist in a high-stake environment, between young people. They are each other’s confidants, each other’s obsession, and each other’s muses when it comes to their art. When artistic-, academic- and peer-pressure combine into a fatal chain of events, their friendship is put to the ultimate test. An occult ritual, aimed to spark their inspirations, results in the death of their professor, and continues to haunt them throughout the rest of their academic year.

What I loved:
My big gripe with many dark academia novels is how often the actual dark-academia-elements get romanticized, thereby missing the entire point of the gerne. Voice like a Hyacinth luckily doesn’t fall into that trap. The codependent, obsessive, toxic and sweltering dynamic between this group of friends (and in the art school at large), is the star of the show from the start. It’s a group of young women, not completely formed in their individual identity, clinging completely to each other in a semi-cultish and ritualistic way, before the actual occult elements even come into play. Their devotion to each other is unrivaled and I loved how the author explored the beauty of that, but also the deep unsettling wrongness.
The characters themselves are largely underdeveloped and it took me a while to even tell them apart, but considering the books themes and its exploration of that formative adolescent-phase in a high-pressure environment, I think that’s the point. They’re pretentious and childish, immature but obsessed with the “image of maturity”. If you’ve even been to college, you’ll recognize their accuracy from a mile away…
I enjoyed how the horror was a mixture of psychological and supernatural as well. Without giving away massive spoilers, there’s a scene involving a bore on a deserted road at night which genuinely gave me goosebumps.
Finally; my biggest concern going into this book was the writing style, as I DNF’ed Pearsons debut because I couldn’t get past the overwritten prose. She greatly improved in that regard. Yes, we’re still teetering on the edge at times, but she toned the purple prose down just enough to land in the territory of lyrical writing, fitting of the dark-academia genre.

What I didn’t love:
The novels major flaw is its predictability. Dark Academia as a genre is absolutely oversaturated and between all the familiar tropes it uses, Voice like a Hyacinth does little to innovate. If you are an avid Dark Academia fan, this is an easy recommendation to get your next fix. But maybe don’t expect it to completely reinvent the wheel or rock your world.

Many thanks to 47North Publishing for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

never look me in the eyes and tell me you didnt like this book…what a novel im about to swan dive no word of a LIE i need this injected into my vains asap.

Voice Like a Hyacinth is dark academia meets horror meets lit fic meets queer love and yearning. It’s 🤌🏻 perfection.

Set in a tiny art school in rural Indiana, the novel follows five girls through their senior year where they must compete for a chance to display their paintings ✨en solo✨

While the five girls, Amrita, Saz, Caroline, Fitch and Jo, may have spent the last several years developing an unbreakable bond, the pressure of the competition takes its toll, and when the girls turn to a little black magic to ensure their odds, everything takes a horrific turn for the worse.

There is so much going on in this novel, from the complex platonic and romantic relationships, to the search for meaning through art, love and success, and the life of ANTHROPORMANCY and The Boar King, and yet, it all works together perfect. It’s jam packed and I was hooked on every single page.

For fans of Bunny and The World Cannot Give.

Mallory Pearson really cooked with this one. If there’s one thing about me it’s that I love an academic setting where everyone loves/hates each-other. Add in 5 lesbians and a ritual sacrifice and you have me sold.

An emotionally charged and lyrical exploration of identity and love. Pearson’s voice is striking, weaving tenderness and intensity into every page. This book will linger long after you’ve finished.
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I do usually find Dark Academia dense, and this is not a exception, but Pearson has such a evocative writing style that it was quite enjoyable! The way the relationship between the five girls was so tangible as well, the reader being completely drawn into the group.
The horror doesn’t come from on-page (although the description of the horrific things are graphic) but rather the consequences of actions, which is a stronger horrifying effect in my opinion.
The end made me shiver, the implication that things never do leave, but can shift to become more hopeful.

This is a weird little book about a group of young women in their last year of art school. This was a mixed bag for me, the first 40% I wasn’t really interested in much of anyone or anything but right as I was about to DNF it caught my attention. I loved the gore and the body horror was perfection but I just couldn’t get past how repetitive and slow it kept getting. If you like a slow burn weird girl book you will probably enjoy it. Thank you NetGally and the publisher for an advanced copy for my honest review.

This was a haunting, animalistic story that explores being queer, finding your identity/coming of age, and female friendship with some occult elements. While this is marked as fantasy, I’d say it’s more horror especially as the novel continues forward!

I loved the prose and atmospheric writing! I highlighted so many quotes and could at times relate to Jo. She often times feels insecure and anxious, overwhelmed with her love for her friends and already feeling nostalgic about their time together.

The writing brought this story to life, allowing me to perfectly visualize Rotham, the characters, and their art! The characters felt so raw and realistic, each with their own unique personalities to set them apart. I especially loved the queer love and friendships throughout the story, the affection they had for one another added to the believability of the characters and their shared history!

Their story (taking away the horror and occult elements) felt nostalgic of my own college experience and the friendships forged 💗 And finally a 5 star read for 2025!! I would highly recommend for fans of Brutes by Dizz Tate, Ethel Cain, The Craft, and/or “Weird girl” books especially if you want a book with queer, folkloric/witchy, artist vibes ✨

TW/CW: blood, sexual assault (brief), death, grief, gore, body horror, animal death, homophobia, lesbophobia, drug use (brief)

Rep: lesbian MC and side characters, bisexual side character, non-binary minor character, Asian side character (saz has the last name Choi)?, Indian side character, lesbian author

3.25 stars

Codependent, queer art students performing grotesque rituals to get ahead academically? The unravelling that comes along with a ritual that didn’t go quite right? This had all the makings of a book that I should’ve absolutely loved, but something about it fell really flat.

I wanted the codependency and academic pressure to feel claustrophobic. I wanted it to be the driving force for the actions the characters took, and I wanted to feel caught up in the mind of an unreliable narrator. Instead, what we got was a narrative that felt inauthentic and somewhat shallow.

I think the author tried to create a story that hinged on the intensity of the relationships between the main characters, but without allowing us to fall in love with the characters in the first place. You can see a shadow of what the author was trying to portray in Jo’s inner monologue, but ultimately, it wasn’t executed well. Despite wanting to love these characters, I just couldn’t get attached to them in any way. I think the author relied too heavily on repetitive statements about how much the main character loved them, without really showing us why. Maybe if this was written from the point of view of one of the other characters, it would have worked better.

That being said, I still loved the premise, and the horror elements were interesting. The prose might be a bit too purple for some people, but I think it helped create a creeping atmosphere that worked well within the context of the story.

Ultimately, it’s hard to rate a book that you both loved and disliked in equal measure. I’m mostly just disappointed that this wasn’t what I thought it would be, especially since the author is so clearly talented. The prose and imagery were phenomenal; the characterization was just too weak for a book that leaned so heavily on it to progress the plot.

Mallory Pearson's Voice Like a Hyacinth is a dark academia thriller following a group of five best friends (Jo, Saz, Amrita, Finch, and Caroline) at a competitive art school. As seniors, students in the painting program must compete to earn the top spot as soloist, which is pretty much a guarantee at a successful career after graduation. The girls all hate the idea of one of their five not getting the solo spot so they decide to perform a mysterious ritual that will boost their creativity and productivity...at a price.

It's going to be very difficult to put how much I loved this book into words. It's truly the modern sapphic Dorian Gray of my dreams! From the first page of this book I was absolutely with the dark academia vibes and the relationships between the five main characters. The tension that Mallory Pearson was able to build along with having Jo as an unreliable narrator made me fly through this book. I can't wait to read more of her work!

Voice Like a Hyacinth by Mallory is a Queer Horror that is hauntingly wonderful. I was fully emersed in the atmosphere and the chosen family between the girls. The undertone of unease and the lengths that one will go to succeed. An entrancing story of 5 young women who have a bond stronger than family, whose ambitions and the art that once connected them slowly deteriorates that bond. Sapphic romance, platonic love, rituals, curses, hauntings, sacrifice, and the determination of our lead character to keep her friends together.