Thread of the Forgotten Soul immediately intrigued me with its eerie premise and haunting atmosphere. The story of a protagonist returning to an abandoned family estate, filled with whispers from the past, sounded like the kind of gothic mystery I’d enjoy.

However, by the second chapter, I noticed paragraphs being repeated, which made the reading experience confusing and frustrating. It felt like déjà vu—reading the same passages over and over made it seem like I wasn’t progressing, which took me out of the story. If not for that, I would have continued reading, as the premise had potential.

Ultimately, the repetition pulled me out of the experience, and I decided to DNF. That said, readers who love eerie, slow-burn supernatural stories may still find something to enjoy here.

This book was an ARC (Advanced Reader Copy) from NetGalley, and this review is being provided voluntarily. This book was a DNF (Did Not Finish).

Maruzzo's Thread of the Forgotten Soul is spellbinding and dark that is reminiscent of a very twisted retelling of The Miller's Daughter. When Nerisse's father goes missing she must return to the family estate and reckon with an unfinished tapestry - one that tells the story of her family and contains powerful secrets. Finishing the tapestry and uniting these tangled threads are key to understanding the past and finding a future for herself. Nerisse is not alone in this task, aided by a young man and the estate's caretaker as she searches for truth throughout the estate's sprawling grounds.

There is so much here that is promising but overall, this novel would benefit from heavy editing - scenes are frequently repeated in a fashion that is very disjointed and leaves the reader's head spinning. One character disappears from the narrative only to reappear under a different name. The character development is weak. I did enjoy the descriptive prose and was able to puzzle through the disjointed storytelling, though I found myself turning the page only to know how all of this resolves than out of enjoyment. I would certainly be eager to reread this at a later date with additional editing.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC.

Thread of the forgotten soul is ultimately a story about breaking free from the chains that bind us and growing from the lessons we learnt. The author focusses on themes of friendship interspersed with betrayal and finding the way forward when all seems lost.

I do feel that it could benefit from a bit of a tighter editing - the storyline and plot premise is intriguing and the characters have a lot of emotional development as the story progresses, but there were chunky areas of text that took me out of the read on occasion. This was more at the start of the novel; thereafter the writing became more descriptive and the imagery quite poetic at times.

The style of writing reminded me of old gothic fairytales, and whereas that is not usually to my taste, I can see how it would be an enjoyable read for those that like this style.

I must note first and foremost that I am writing this review after only reading the first chapter and have not finished the book. Why will become clear.
I was very excited for the concept of the book as I love any form of textile art and do it myself as well. However, this felt like an unedited, honestly unread first draft of a story:
- the different parts of the chapter were completely out of order (and not as a literary device jumping from point to point, but as if they were jumbled up)
- one paragraph started in the middle of a sentence
- in the middle of a chapter came a sentence a la "this concludes chapter 1 and in chapter 2 XY will happen"

Especially everything being all jumbled up made the first chapter hardly readable.