I think that this book kept on stepping back from being actually genuinely impactful way too often for it to make either a good horror or a good romance, and also there was a potential for an absolutely perfect ending that would make it both more horror and more romance and then it just didn't happen. what i thought was subtext was just wishful thinking in the end

This book is so beautiful. The author painted such vivid pictures with their words - I felt like I was right there with Erik, experiencing his surroundings along with him. His journey to finding and accepting himself was gorgeous and felt like someone giving in to who they really are. Like…there was no world where he resisted because he somehow knew it was meant to be. Also, the ecohorror aspect was really cool. The fact that nature was constantly taking over/winding itself around/sticking to things from the very first page and the author used similar language for non-plant things was genius. I worded that weird but I promise it’ll make sense. The body horror/instances of Mother Nature just playing with its food (the sawyers) made me gag a lil. And the tree spirits - both terrifying and ethereal. When they all stood outside the window….watching….😩 lastly, the ending was a super non traditional end to a romance story, open to interpretation- but since it’s an eventual HEA i interpreted it as a really beautiful “end” to the first book. I’m excited for the next.

I'm not sure what is wrong with this book, but it seems like someone used a thesaurus for every sentence or ran it through chatgpt..

The flow and way things were worded were mechanical and felt like someone that knew the words nkt not actually what they meant..

I rarely rate anything below 2 stars but honestly this was broken, not cohesive and made the whole reason experience awful.

If this was written by a real person please toss the thesaurus and use your own words, your idea is good but the execution

I don't like to give negative reviews, because I tend to believe what doesn't work for me could work for somebody else. But in this case I honestly can't say it's good. The concept is interesting, don't get me wrong, it could have been a nice story, leaning on the horror and disturbing side. But the execution has too many issues, from the prose, to the pacing and the management of POVs. I didn't get along with the characters, not because they aren't fundamentaly interesting, but because I couldn't a good sense of them. It means that the romance isn't convincing either (I also struggle a bit with the dryad's behavior, too childlike in many aspects for me to be comfortable with the adult romance, but that might be a "me" thing).

To cut it short, I feel like this story has potential, the ideas are great, but handle to precariously for a good and enjoyable story to emerge. I am sorry to say something that harsh.

everything is just so off about this book. the prose is way over-the-top flowery and hard to trudge through. it seriously took so long to get through this little novella. there's something really amateur and heavyhanded about it. there is very little showing and a whooole lot of telling happening in the text. it feels like everything insignificant got overexplained and anything that could've/should've been compelling was sidestepped entirely.

there is no sense of personality from the main character, erik, at all in the actual internal narrative. it left me feeling really detached from him and unconvinced by his feelings. so many scenes between the two main characters that could've been intimate instead felt glossed over, with stilted and mechanical description. there are also several instances of switching internal narration perspectives to different characters mid-chapter, sometimes even mid-paragraph. made for a really jarring and frustrating reading experience.

the pacing is another issue that contributes to the weird detachment from the characters. i am a frequent novella reader so i understand that the pacing of a short book is different from that of a full novel, but this was just poorly excecuted. the romance developed in a weirdly fast and choppy way that just felt confusing.

speaking of the romance, i was really not convinced by these two. they had no chemistry. it felt like i was reading about a grown man dating a toddler. the whole "they act like a little kid but they're actually an ancient being" trope is a hard enough sell in a well-written book, so... yeah.

overall, this book's greatest sin is that it was dull. i was just bored for a lot of it, which is so disappointing because i love the concept and the cover art. this book had all the components that could've made for a really compelling and atmospheric read, but it fell flat. i'm a huge lover of romance novellas, and the paranormal flavor is a favorite of mine, so i really thought this was going to be a home run for me.

I'm so excited for this book to run in print!!! the writing style is so gorgeous, the pacing is great, and i love the premise. beautiful all around <3

Someone take this author’s thesaurus away from them, please, this is just embarrassing.

>Satisfied that his body was freed of the nature that consumed him during his work hours,<

What would you think that sentence means, if you came across it in a book? Because what is meant is that he’s washed off the leaves and dust from the day’s work, which…that’s just not how you say that. It doesn’t work on multiple levels.

>The cabin was cool; he’d need to rectify it with a fire and a quilt. The thought of such simplistic comforts left him happy,<

‘rectify it’? RECTIFY? And you mean simple comforts, not simplistic comforts, ffs.

>He racked his brain for a brief moment and tried to recount his day.<

Now, this would be completely fine, except that what is meant here is that the character is trying to remember what happened that day. Which is not what this sentence means. ‘Recount’ specifically means to tell someone about something; it does not mean ‘remember’.

>It had been on a whim, a decision made in panic.<

You’re talking about an impulse, not a whim, methinks. ‘Whim’ and ‘panic’ don’t really go together, even though technically it’s probably fine?

>But it was quite, cozy, and familial.<

This line is about a town. A town is familial??? Even if it contains members of your family, I don’t think that means you can describe a town as familial.

>He couldn’t stop his mind from wandering to his missing co-workers and the oddity of the situation.<

‘oddity of the situation’?

This novella is so overwritten as to be painful, a very clear case of someone who needs to let go of the thesaurus and back away slowly. The result is prose that manages to be both pretentious and jarringly weird, with plenty of sentences that just don’t mean what the author thinks they mean. I would be so embarrassed to submit this to a literary agent or publisher, and I have no idea why it’s being published in this form.

(Yes, I know this is an arc, but books aren’t generally completely rewritten between arc and final copy, so I’m going to presume most of this isn’t going to be edited out.)

Hey BDA Publishing, if you decide you need a new editor, I’m currently available. I also freelance as a copywriter, so hit me up if you want someone to wrangle this into submission, jfc.