Thanks to both netgalley and the publisher for the ARC copie. This has not affected my review at all, which are my own thoughts and feelings about the book. Also, any negative thing I may say in this review is not an attack to the author, whom I do not know, it is just my view. That said, onto it we go!

In "Between the lines" we follow Ethan, who has recently moved, with his mother, to Havenwood, the town where his grandparents dissappeared a few years prior. She gets a job at the local newspaper while Ethan has to adjust to a new school with new classmates and some tension with them, moreover because Ethan's hiding some weird things that have been happening to him lately. But it's not only him: strange things are happening at Havenwood. Sided with new friends, family and a mentor, Ethan's determined to resolve the town's mystery, the dissappereance of his grandparents and of his own magical abilities.

So, this book was mid. Definitely better than other things I've read lately, but ultimately mid. Albeit, entertaining, with a couple of good twist, a fun read on some parts and fast to go through. And, this last bit, I fear, is what made me not like it more.

And fast we go, because the action stars with Ethan arriving with his mother at Havenwood and it all speeds up from there. He meets Jamie not long after at his (Jamie's) work, then meets his friends who also become Ethan's new friends and some classmates that will create petty conflict. I understand that these are teenagers and the world look different than when you later grow up, but the reason for Ethan's conflict with Tyler (a classmate with whom he shares sportsteam too) seem both too obvious and shallow for me. No spoilers, but I believe the ordeall could have been treated in any other way by the narrative, because there was no indicative, just some passive-agressive comments for a situation that neither of the three could change by the time the truth is revealed. Just my opinion.

But yeah, Jamie and Ethan get together by page 40-ish and love each to the end of the world and back. Nothing wrong with that, but there was barely any chemistry there, and so the "romance" felt empty both at the start and through most of the novel until the end, where they have had more scenes and soft moments together, so it was a little more believable, but barey. Since it had started so soon, it was hard to get into the romance and feel it stood out of the page by the end of the novel.

Another part that could have been better was Ethan's training. So, his abilities make him a Realmwalker, allowing him to see and travel to other dimensions, some of them good, some of them...less good. After some casualties and talks, he finds a mentor, a Realmwalker like him, that is willing to help and teach him so he doesn't end up who knows where and dies because Ethan's not able to control his magic. But it was so repetitive, all telling and very little showing, and quite vage in my opinion. The main goal was to make Ethan control his emotions so he wouldn't travel between dimensions with no control. So, the mentor made him practice breathing exercises to calm himself and such. Every lesson was the same, but instead of showing us the mentor walkin Ethan through the process, or Ethan himself trying it out and seeing if it would work for him or not, he just narrated that "mentor told him the exercise and he did it a couple times to get the hand of it". Like, sure mate, whatever you say. And it's not like we saw anything coming from this lessons, because Ethan didn't seem to get a hold of his emotions when it most mattered.
The repetitive part was also Ethan's days, and I joined it with the previous paragraph because it was: waking up, going early to school to practice breathing, then run track while his tension with Tyler grows (until things happen and it changes) and clasess. Then, maybe, some talking with his new boyfriend Jamie. And like that for various chapters until the mystery started to finally pick up.

And I'm going back to more repetition, because, God🙄, the repetition. Over. And over. And over, of Ethan feleling that things at Havenwood weren't going to be ordinary, or something was <i>definitely</i> happening, and he couldn't help/shke off the feeling that something big was about to happen. We get it, boy, Havenwood's a new place and you can travel to devastated places and such, but it gets boring after the 10th time and annoying after the 25th.

Overall, the characters feel quite one-dimensional and underdeveloped. I could say we get to know a bit more of Ethan 'cause he's the main character and narrator, but it would be a strectch. The same happens what the worldbuilding. Is promising, looks interesting, parallel dimensions is something I always eat up, but in this book, it wasn't delivered as good as expected, the worlbuilding a bit jumpy, not fleshed out and not daring to go the extra mile to make it believable.

Anyway, if this hadn't been an ARC, I would have probably DNF'd. But it was short, the mystery was quite intriguing and Ethan was a likeable protagonist as underdeveloped as he was. It also looked like this could have a sequel (?) or, at least, some other book within the same universe, but I'm not sure if I'll be reading it.

To sum up: could have been better, but it was entertaining, and overall better than some late readings, so a point in its favor.

[I received a digital ARC for an honest review]

Spoiler-free summary: A teen boy and his mother move to his mother's home town, in the hopes of having 'a new start', as well as possibly(?) solve the mystery of his mother's parents disappearance.

Things I liked: the LGBTQIA+ representation

Things I did not like:
Overall, I will admit this book was not for me. I really wanted to have a good time, but I had a very hard time getting pulled into the story due to a few issues.

My main concern was with the flow of the story. All of the events that were happening to the characters happened in a very linear fashion. For example, the MC would meet a person, then become friends with that person. Then they would meet another person, there would be an issue with that person, then that issue would resolve before introducing the next 'event'.

Next, was the characterization. The reader is expected to start caring about the characters very early on, without letting us get to know the characters first. This would not be so bad if that character-building came eventually, but by the end I was still left completely disconnected from all of the characters.

Finally, overall the book just doesn't feel finished. The stakes are unclear, and the book feels like a long lead up to an end that is quickly swept through and over before you know it. The concept is promising, but it needs to be reworked a few more times.

Too many cliches and "this was only the begining" Couldn't cope to get through the whole thing sorry but the plot seemed interesting it was just some of the writing I can't get past.

Between the Lines by Zachary Steele presents an intriguing premise with its mix of multiverse theory, hidden powers, and small-town mystery. The story follows Ethan Morris, a seventeen-year-old who discovers his ability to traverse multiple realities, and Jamie, a musician whose melodies can bridge dimensions. Together, they must navigate Havenwood’s secrets and stop a cataclysmic collision of worlds. While the concept holds promise, the execution falters in several areas.

The world-building is one of the novel's stronger points, with the town of Havenwood feeling atmospheric and mysterious. The idea of multiple realities is compelling, and there's potential for a deep exploration of identity and alternate lives. However, the story's pacing is uneven, with slow stretches bogged down by repetitive dialogue and an overabundance of exposition. The plot takes too long to develop, with Ethan’s discovery of his powers feeling rushed despite its central importance.

Ethan’s character, while relatable in some ways, lacks depth. His internal struggles as a newcomer to Havenwood and reluctant hero could have been more compelling, but instead, he often feels like a passive observer, waiting for things to happen around him rather than driving the story forward. Jamie, while a potentially interesting character, is underdeveloped, and her relationship with Ethan feels more like a plot device than a genuine connection.

The book’s biggest flaw lies in its predictability. The “secrets of the past” trope and the eventual showdown between worlds don’t feel fresh or surprising. The twists are telegraphed well in advance, and the resolution lacks emotional impact. While the stakes are high, the writing fails to make readers feel the weight of the situation or care about the characters’ fates.

Ultimately, Between the Lines has an intriguing premise and a promising setting, but it is held back by pacing issues, underdeveloped characters, and a lack of emotional depth. For fans of multiverse stories, it might still be worth a read, but it doesn't quite live up to its potential.

A gay teenager must come to terms with his supernatural abilities while finding his place in a New England small town. Briskly paced and light on YA angst, Zachary Steele’s starter novel in a planned fantasy series is breezy and largely enjoyable.

Seventeen-year-old Ethan Morris is the hero of the story. The only son of a single mom, Zoe, Ethan has to confront starting over at a new high school and making new friends due to Zoe’s decision to take a job as the editor-in-chief of the newspaper in her hometown, Havenwood. Ethan is a dutiful young man who doesn’t complain about the circumstances. He and Zoe are more like partners in their small family, having gone through the losses of Ethan’s father and his grandparents, together. Still, like any teenager, Ethan is saddled with worries about fitting in at Havenwood High School when the story begins.

Then, before they’ve even brought the luggage into their new home, an unusual birthmark on Ethan’s wrist itches and erupts in a bright glow, and he has a brief, disturbing vision of the town having turned into a smoldering post-apocalyptic wasteland.

Ethan keeps that to himself at first. Havenwood has an, albeit questionable reputation for hauntings and ghosts, and if he’s having a panic attack, he’d prefer for it to just go quickly and quietly away. But those psychic episodes keep happening, especially after some local kids show him an occult stone altar in the woods. He feels like he’s time traveling through Havenwood’s history, and when he sees his grandparents on one of his strange journeys, he realizes it’s time to tell mom.

Through Zoe and his physics teacher, Mr. Martinez, who’s been studying local paranormal activity, Ethan learns that he’s a Realmwalker, gifted with the ability to traverse time and multiverses. Mr. Martinez is certain that a recent spike in otherworldly phenomena around town means that the barrier between dimensions in Havenwood is in a precarious state, and Ethan must be the key to preventing nefarious entities entering the town from other worlds.

While that drama unfolds, Ethan grows closer to a boy named Jamie who is a talented guitarist and songwriter. Romance blossoms, but a third boy Tyler isn’t happy about it and tries to get in the way. That storyline feels like a set-up for intriguing, future friend-group tensions, and other classmates, girls and boys, rally around Ethan’s mission to save Havenwood and are poised to follow him in future installments. This first book in the series establishes a heartwarming tone, with teenagers finding love with minimal internal or external conflicts and friends devoted to looking out for each other.

Steele’s writing style is economical, which helps push action sequences forward, but for readers looking for prose that sings with innovation, his novel will fall short. He’s created an immensely likeable cast of characters, so it’s disappointing that the writing gets a bit uneven and repetitive, particularly in the novel’s second half. Overall, a good read for fans of gay YA and YA fantasy in particular.

Reviewed for Out in Print

This was rough. Like, I can’t lie. I ended up rating it 1 star. I think the story could’ve been cool if more effort had been put into it, but as it currently stands it honestly feels like the author used AI to help him write it. And I don’t feel comfortable supporting that. So…I think can safely say that I won’t be reading anything else by this author.

This started off really well, there's a new boy and his mum moving to a new town but we find out very quickly that his grandparents disappeared without a trace many years ago and it's still a mystery. He has moments where reality seems to change and he doesn't know what's happening. none of this is a spoiler as it's right at the start of the book. We follow him as he settles in, makes friends, meets a cute boy and finds out his teacher is like him. A Realmwalker.

This was a fun read, I actually enjoyed it quite a lot and was interested to see where it would all go. The part that got me was, unfortunately, near the end. It was going really well and then there were a couple of chapters which I feel could have been a bit more interesting from the perspective of the two boys. It makes sense why it was done this way and it was good but I would have preferred that.

The ending leaves it open for sequels or potentially as a stand alone. Would I read another book in the series? Probably, yeah. I'd be happy to see where the characters go from here.

2.5

On paper, I should have loved this queer, YA multiverse novel, but this was unfortunately not for me. Firstly, the writing style. A simple writing style for YA is common, but it felt very clunky and repetitive. The dialogue didn't read like believable conversations and more like something someone wrote in high school. I also didn't have any attachment to the characters, nor were they distinctive in any way. Their romantic relationship also developed so fast without much interaction. Lastly, the plot also felt a bit predictable and was overall not engaging enough.

Thank you, NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book kept me reading and I really wanted to like it. But there was something missing…basically the whole plot. The characters were interesting. The small town feel was effective. The developing relationship between Ethan and Jamie was a little too convenient but worked. You just wanted more out of the multiverse. Actually, I wanted something related to the multiverse. The book was set up to have a sequel but this one felt like the introduction where you just don’t know what’s happening. The whole book felt like exposition but I still don’t know where Ethan and Jamie go.

Thank you NetGalley for the eARC.

Nothing really grabbed me, and constant minor inconsistencies in the plot made for a halting reading experience. Then at the most climactic moment, the POV switched away from the main character, and the main plot ended up being related as a flashback, which destroyed all the tension.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC!

When I came across this book I thought the premise of the story was super interesting: A fantasy story focused on moving between different realms/realities. That sounds super fun! Sadly, besides the initially interesting sounding plot (and the promise of queer romance) the book falls flat in pretty much everything it tries to do.

- The romance was rushed and underdeveloped, there was just no chemistry between the leads. They meet, they fall in love in 30 pages? and that's it.
- The story is frankly inexistent. Having read the entire book I still can't say what was the plot. The author failed in coming up with a plot and whatever plot there "was" failed to instill any kind of sense of urgency or danger. I couldn't tell you what was so bad about the thing that the characters were worried about because nothing happened previously either to make us worry or to signify change or an advancing status.
- The narration is super repetitive, filled with telling instead of showing and filled with phrases like "nothing would be the same again", "things were about to change", etc. Not lying, every chapter has like five or ten of this phrases. It gets tyring really fast.
- New characters that serve no purpose appear from nothing all the time? I don't need you to bring a new named character just so they can ask a random question and never appear again.
- Some characters kept certain events secret but sometimes other characters would pop up and talk about the secret without on page explanation of why they know about the secret or when were they told about it. And this happened more than once.
- Whenever the character is supposed to practice his powers the only practice was
"You have to do this"
*character does it first try, without sweating. One line of description*
"Good, you did excellent, keep practicing"

I could seriously go on and on but I'm gonna stop here.
The book doesn't even feel like a first draft, more like a fanfiction. It needs a LOT of editing. Worse, it demands the author sits and takes more time to plot the book, the plot, the relationship between the characters, the mysteries. Everything.

I really wanted to like 'Between the Lines' by Zachary Steele. I love scifi & genre-blurring themes, and I'm always on the lookout for more LGBTQI+ representation in literature.

Unfortunately the writing doesn't seem to have benefitted from being reviewed by a really confident editor. There are tons of occasions where the author drops clunky terms like "he felt nothing would be the same again" or "something told him" or "felt things were about to get more complicated" or "feeling something important had just happened". So very 'tell, don't show'. It pulls you out of the story. Unless you're going with one of the characters having some sort of clairvoyant abilities, it just ends up awkward when it's so pervasive. There are lots of ways to create a sense of tension, unease, dread, etc without resorting to this type of phrasing.

Repetition in phrases in general is pretty rampant here; like another reviewer mentioned, you can't go more than a couple paragraphs without “couldn’t help but” and "something told him".

I think younger (middle grade) readers might enjoy this, but it comes across as 'younger' than YA based on the repetition and simplicity.

I think this book was self-published, as the 'publisher' is listed as Steele Design Studio; this could explain the lack of editing?

Many thanks to the publisher & NetGalley for allowing access to the eARC for my unbiased review.

Between the Lines has a very intriguing premise and the story is interesting. I loved the idea of multiple dimensions and a realmwalker main character.

I feel like this book had all the right components to be a book I would love, but for me those pieces didn't quite come together. Some of the book felt repetitive to me in ways that didn't advance the story in ways I would have liked. I do think this book has an audience out there, but maybe it wasn't quite me.

I did enjoy the main character and seeing things from his perspective as well as his mom, I felt like that piece was unique and added dimension to the story. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC of this book.

If I never read some form of "He had a feeling..." "He couldn't help feeling..." "Couldn't shake the feeling that something was going to happen..." again for the rest of my life I will die a happy man.

Unfortunately, this was not the book for me. It was all there on paper to be something I could enjoy, but the sum of its parts just was not an enjoyable experience. The world building wasn't strong enough, the narration and writing felt a little too clunky, and barely any time was spent on developing the characters before they started kissing and falling in love.

The bones of a good story are there and the concept is interesting, it just didn't work for me. It's just my opinion though, and I always say that everyone should form their own before writing something off completely.

I was able to get an ARC for Between the lines; it is a sci fi, mystery, MM, small town romance novel that had an interesting premise. I really wanted to like this more than I did but the writing was very clunky. I lost count out how many times a character would state “..couldn’t shake the feeling something was about to change..” or “…things are about to get more complicated..” this happened so frequently it got rather annoying. I have no issues with an insta love but these MC had very little chemistry and I was far more interested in the side character. The overall world/background to realm walkers is glossed over; there was no build up or suspense. I read this through completion with a genuine interest in how this would turn out, but feel there is more fine tuning to be done.

Thanks Netgalley and Steele Design Studio for this ARC and honest review.

Short, sweet, and mysterious, Between the Lines is a story about two boys who can walk between realms.

The pacing is quite fast, which worked in the book’s favor. It definitely felt more novella length, but I didn’t mind it too much.

The characters are realistic and charming. Their relationships are complex yet intriguing, and the found family vibes can be found in the background.

Tailored towards younger audiences, but still a decent read for fans of sci-fi from all ages.

I unfortunately had a real tough time with the pacing and narration of this book. Each scene felt like an incomplete puzzle, pieces missing. The writing swapped from point to point with almost no fluid transition. It felt like everything I read needed MORE. This left the reading process feeling really clunky.

Between The Lines By Zachary Steele is a genre-bending sci-fi mystery set in a picturesque town where nothing is as it seems, danger lurks behind every corner and secrets unravel around Ethan Morris, a seventeen-year-old Realmwalker who can travel between dimensions.

Multiversal mystery. Interdimensional travel. LGBTQIA+ small town romance. All very much my cup of tea. The concept was intriguing, but overall, I found the world-building a little too jejune for my tastes. I never absolutely need clever and unique world-building to enjoy a story. I'm entirely satisfied when super compelling characters take precedence, but it's an either/or situation, and unfortunately, I was disheartened by the fact that I thought the characters were one-dimensional. I simply lost count of the amount of times the protagonist stated that he "couldn't shake the feeling something significant had just occurred," or that he "knew nothing would be normal again," thus, making writing the clunky. The dialogue felt stilted in parts, so it had the unfortunate tendency to pull me out of the narrative.
I struggled to fully invest in the romance. The relationship between Ethan and Jamie blossomed so quickly, without much chemistry or build-up, which was disappointing.

Thank you, NetGalley and Steele Design Studio, for giving me the opportunity to read this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Really enjoyed this one!

It’s a short story very fast paced and easy to follow. I loved the small town stars hollow vibes mixed with the syfy aspects

The characters and plot development moved along nicely and definitely leaves you wanting more

this was a strong start to the Realmwalker and thought the feel worked in the genre. I really enjoyed getting to know the characters and their world. It had a strong plot going on and was engaged with what was happening. It left me wanting to read more in this world and was glad I got to read this.