Don't Let the Forest In

Where do I begin with this book?

Don't Let The Forest In follows Andrew and Thomas, who along with Andrew's twin sister Dove, make up a group friendship. However, this school year is different. Dove is not speaking to Andrew or Thomas after a big argument the previous year, Thomas is lying to Andrew, and Andrew himself is coming apart of the seams. Andrew plays our narrator, often unreliable and skewed but exactly as I would expect a teenage boy to be. His love for Thomas is unhealthy, reckless, and brash. But at the same time innocent and made of that awestruck naivete one would expect.

“But his ribs were a cage for monsters and they cut their teeth on his bones.”

With rich, delicious prose and violent, downright horrifying imagery, CG Drews paints a story that is simultaneously beautiful, heartbreaking, and unsettling. The story winds us through dark forests, darker fairy tales, and the unrestrained and codependent love so often seen in youth. The twists and turns in the plot keep you guessing until the last few chapters, and the ending left me numb and staring at my reader in disbelief.

“Life didn't fit against his skin and it never had and sometimes everything was just too much.”

This hit my craving for horror perfectly, and is a dark fantasy fairy tale at heart, both grim and beautiful. The cast is diverse and portrays mental illness so well, as well as asexuality which is so rare in fiction. At some points, the reader has to suspend belief a bit, but let's be honest, most horror and dark fantasy are similar in that way. Overall, this has been one of my favorite books this year, and I am so eager to see what else CG Drews puts out.

“... maybe you could love someone so much you ruined them, and then you ruined yourself.”

Didn't know how to review it, decided to sleep on it, still not really sure, mainly just "holy shit"

I understand this might be a bit young for some people (I mean, it IS the drama & pining of teenagers, after all), but I dropped out of high school in my first year due to excessive bullying/struggling with my mental health. So I guess even at 31, I like to live vicariously through books about the school-day experiences that I never got to have. 🫠

It deals with a pretty long list of heavy/triggering subjects (bullying, grief, eating disorders, self-harm, anxiety, mental health, panic attacks, homophobia, etc.) & there's a lot of gore & body horror.