C. J. Daley
The Haunting of William Thorn
This did not work for me and I really wanted it to.
I hate having a negative review, and I might actually have DNF’d (which I never really do) but Angry Robot supplied a copy—so let’s start with some positive. Some of the writing, especially the truly haunting scenes, were written quite well. I’d actually notice myself falling into the cadence and getting with the flow. There is one particular scene involving a turned over portrait that I actually stopped reading to reread the entire section. It was unique, paced really well, and chilling.
For the most part, the rest of my experience was not so good. For me, I said yes to an ARC based off the beautiful cover and title. I love a great cover and a haunting. But I actually think the style is a little misleading. The cover with its portraits to me looks dark fantasy-esque, with their almost anime style jawlines. And that is not the vibe of the book at all.
Now, as a writer, I have pulled the trigger on releasing an ARC too early…and early reviewers called me out on it. But I also self release, and I can only assume this was read through by 1 or more AR person. The book is almost rife with errors. Not just the tiny things, like a ‘t’ making the word ‘it’ instead of the correct ‘is’. The things you can ignore. There were sentences, paragraphs, even some pages that didn’t really make sense. Character reactions seemed out of place, and there was more than one spot that was just randomly in first person? The book is broken into sections to mark William’s week at Hanbury Manor, but the chapters run on, and in more than one spot there’s mentioning of sleep and morning, but the section break comes later…making the day sections not make sense. I don’t say this to drag it, because editing is hard, but this almost felt overly rushed, if not bordering careless.
For me, the real problem lies with William Thorn. He is grieving, suicidal, struggling through something unbelievably hard. And he was unimaginably insufferable. Every time he spoke, every choice he made—how he flip flopped—grated on me for hundreds of pages. The book’s blurb promises a split timeline, and I would say that it is not. The book opens in the past, but the rest of the book is present day, with William sometimes reading journal entries from the past. These entries are short, never quite deep enough, and don’t really offer much in the way of ‘the past’. The book, if you can believe it, also tries to function as a forced proximity romance, but the proximity does not make sense, and it surely wasn’t romantic. Especially after a third act revelation that would have been earth shattering, and yet it’s so quickly thrown away. The ending did work for me, but it was a little too late.
I’m sure this will work for some, just wasn’t for me.
This did not work for me and I really wanted it to.
I hate having a negative review, and I might actually have DNF’d (which I never really do) but Angry Robot supplied a copy—so let’s start with some positive. Some of the writing, especially the truly haunting scenes, were written quite well. I’d actually notice myself falling into the cadence and getting with the flow. There is one particular scene involving a turned over portrait that I actually stopped reading to reread the entire section. It was unique, paced really well, and chilling.
For the most part, the rest of my experience was not so good. For me, I said yes to an ARC based off the beautiful cover and title. I love a great cover and a haunting. But I actually think the style is a little misleading. The cover with its portraits to me looks dark fantasy-esque, with their almost anime style jawlines. And that is not the vibe of the book at all.
Now, as a writer, I have pulled the trigger on releasing an ARC too early…and early reviewers called me out on it. But I also self release, and I can only assume this was read through by 1 or more AR person. The book is almost rife with errors. Not just the tiny things, like a ‘t’ making the word ‘it’ instead of the correct ‘is’. The things you can ignore. There were sentences, paragraphs, even some pages that didn’t really make sense. Character reactions seemed out of place, and there was more than one spot that was just randomly in first person? The book is broken into sections to mark William’s week at Hanbury Manor, but the chapters run on, and in more than one spot there’s mentioning of sleep and morning, but the section break comes later…making the day sections not make sense. I don’t say this to drag it, because editing is hard, but this almost felt overly rushed, if not bordering careless.
For me, the real problem lies with William Thorn. He is grieving, suicidal, struggling through something unbelievably hard. And he was unimaginably insufferable. Every time he spoke, every choice he made—how he flip flopped—grated on me for hundreds of pages. The book’s blurb promises a split timeline, and I would say that it is not. The book opens in the past, but the rest of the book is present day, with William sometimes reading journal entries from the past. These entries are short, never quite deep enough, and don’t really offer much in the way of ‘the past’. The book, if you can believe it, also tries to function as a forced proximity romance, but the proximity does not make sense, and it surely wasn’t romantic. Especially after a third act revelation that would have been earth shattering, and yet it’s so quickly thrown away. The ending did work for me, but it was a little too late.
I’m sure this will work for some, just wasn’t for me.