Reviews with content warning for Self harm - El dios de los bosques

Not normally into mysteries but I really liked this one, although it was in a way quite sad. Told from many different perspectives, maybe one too many haha. The author did a good job of jumping time constantly while still keeping us in the plot.

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candymecha's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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gwenswoons's review against another edition

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dark sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This is very good, but I did not enjoy it. I think somehow the literary thriller thing veered into something so slow that it often felt preachy and pedantic, endless, often incredibly pretentious somehow. The writing is good: the setting is definitely captivating and vivid; the characters are compelling, even as they are basically all pretty awful. I guess for me a cast of totally awful characters (whether in books or TV shows) never feels satisfying — so I may simply not be the reader for this. But I will say that this book felt interminable to me, almost from the beginning (I definitely should have DNFed, but it’s gotten so much praise from people I trust that I expected it to turn around into something miraculous! It did not, for me). The pace is so unbelievably slow, the timelines and POVs so sprawling — these are things (even a slow pace!) that I actually usually love in a book, but that felt like such a drag here, I think because the motivations of every person aroused so little sympathy and investment. Certainly others may not feel this way.

I will say that I somehow loved the ending, and found it so beautiful, with such a light touch — odd after this book that felt so heavy-handed to me. It was absolutely not worth it for me but I somehow was still quite enchanted by it even as I was so ready to be done. So the writing is definitely remarkable in some way, even though for me this is not going to be a writer I return to again.

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atalea's review against another edition

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dark mysterious sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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bookishmagpie's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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gen_wolfhailstorm's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Thank you to Netgalley, publishers and author for an e-arc. All opinions remain 100% genuine.

Despite it taking me a while to read, due to mainly issues with the Netgalley shelf app and then commitments to book tours, I absolutely adored this novel.

This was a fantastic mystery, with so many twists and complexities that kept me guessing.

We followed quite a few perspectives (children at the camp, those missing, the rich people on the hill, the workers for them, the police force) and every point of view added an extra layer of retrospect and depth to the telling of the story.

The back drop being at a summer camp, with tensions between those that run it and know the land, and those that own it and reap the rewards really took the story itself further and I enjoyed seeing how relationships (good and bad) developed due to those tensions.

The atmosphere building from the relationships and the surrounding woodland perfectly heightened and grew taunt as the story progressed.

The writing style and use of time, going back and fourth, and stemming from the investigation from the original missing child case of the first Van Laar child was incredibly told. I was hooked from the start all the way to the end.

I will definitely be keeping an eye out for this author in the future.

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