Hurry, hurry, the monster's in the woods, and it's coming for you.
A huge thank you to Berkley Press and NetGalley for my copy of this book. Lost Boy is one of my favorite books I've discovered since I started blogging. So I was very excited to jump into another book by Christina Henry. That being said, there are trigger warnings after this paragraph. I'm going to do my best to avoid spoilers, but there will be mention of kidnapping and domestic abuse.
Let me start off by saying I really liked this book. I was all geared up for a creature feature and trapped on a snowy moment. And, I got both in spades. This book had the icky factor with the creature's cave and the trees. I love how the woods would go silent as the creature approached, and the roar you could feel in our bones. Actually, I have a question about that sound it makes, to digress for half a second. Does the audiobook have the sound in it? I would love to know exactly how it sounds. Like a cross between a Wampa and a sasquatch? I'm just curious. Either way all of that played in so at the end of the book I was getting nervous for our characters. Like mumbling to myself "don't go in there" and "run fast".
I also really liked that we don't find out what the creature is. I mean I hate it because I'm a sucker for any kind of cryptid, but the creature isn't the real monster of this story. So I was okay with the fact we never got a good glimpse at it. Too busy running!
Here's what the trigger warnings come into play. Why I read the synopsis of Near the Bone maybe I was too wrapped up in the creature feature to notice, by the domestic violence aspect of the story sort of caught me by surprise. This wasn't a turn-off for me because while those moments were uncomfortable, they weren't used gratuitously. It's hard to explain without giving too much of the plot away, but the violence made a twisted bit of sense when you realize the kind of bad man William was.
HOWEVER! Yes, there is a, however. I feel like Berkley Press should have done better at warning people about this aspect of Near the Bone. This part of the book plays a big part in our main character's, Mattie, journey. It is also very trigging for a lot of people, and I feel like the publisher, Goodreads, and NetGalley should have been better at these triggers. Because within the first chapter you see what kind of door prize William is. This is actually the reason this book isn't a five-star read for me. The line, "bad things happen when William's mad", wasn't really enough warning for me. Because not a bad man, he's a waste of space. So the lack of warnings from the three mentioned platforms knocks off a star for me.
But, to jump back into the positives. One of my favorite characters that Christina Henry writes are villains. This is my third book by Henry, and William almost edges out Pan from Lost Boys. Almost. While William has absolutely no redeeming qualities, Henry writes him so well he's so easy to hate. From the first chapter, you want something bad to happen because it couldn't happen to a better person. I also really like the plot around William and he connects to Maddie. While Maddie has no memory of how she met William, as the reader you start to peace that mystery together rather quickly. Or, you do if you have seen more than one season of Criminal Minds.
I love the good character that is so vile and written so well, you hate even the way they breathe.
Now Maddie, our main character, took me a second to really like. She would get the moments where I was really starting to like her, and she was finding her inner strength and I was rooting for her. Then Samantha happened, and while I understand where this character stems from, I wanted to throttle these characters. And, maybe that was the point. At first, Samantha seems like she's giving Mattie the strength to leave William, to find a way out. But, as the story progresses and tragedy happens, Samantha gets annoying, and I got no greater than joy than Maddie finding a backbone and silencing that part of her mind. And, while Maddie is an unreliable narrator, I really liked that we got the story through her eyes. To see her find herself again despite all the terrible things that are happening around her.
I'm just gonna say it, I hated all three of the cryptid hunters. Probably Griffin more than any of the others, but all three were terrible. But, really Griffin took the cake. I understand that he saw women hurt and wanted to help, but no means no my dude. If you would have just listened to Maddie you wouldn't have -Hello Spoiler Alert- ended handing from a tree by your insides. Now, I do like the purpose of these three, and that's to sort of help Maddie grow into herself. To have another reason to fight and not give up. She has to protect these fools. But, honestly, I felt no way about any of them. They were those characters you meet at the story of a horror movie and you instantly know bad things around going to happen to them.
The ending was really good for Near the Bone as well. It had the old-school horror movie end where they find safety, but you don't know if they actually survived. There was no prologue. No three years later. For me, with these kinds of books, is one of my favorite kind of ending. Could be a good ending or that creature could have followed them down the mountain and ate them and the ranger. Who knows?!
All in all, I really liked this book and will be adding it to my shelves since I read the e-ARC of this. It was everything I wanted from a book written by Christina Henry, and I can't wait to see what Henry will write next!
