Wake the Bones
by Elizabeth Kilcoyne
Published July 12, 2022
★★★★☆
Laurel returns to her home and farm after dropping out of college, dreaming in earnest to live a quiet life with her taxidermy trade and tobacco harvesting; however, returning home awakens the past as she is haunted by her mother's death- literally and figuratively.
Nature comes alive and grotesque sights of blood, bone and sinew stalk Laurel and her friends. Magic ignites within her, and she must learn how to combat the ghosts before everything she knows and loves is doomed.
This atmospheric and grotesque debut novel is bound to make your skin crawl - and it's so worth it! I'm honestly not sure what I expected when I requested this on NetGalley, but I was pleasantly surprised as I started thumbing through the pages.
The writing of this book is so descriptive and masterfully done. There were times when I could feel what the characters were feeling; the smell of must and rot from the woods the sticky feeling of congealed blood on your fingertips, the monochrome wash of nature in the night.
The characters were all very different and fleshed out. Laurel, the main character, is a curator of odd hobbies - mainly taxidermy. The scene is set with her collecting and cleaning bones, along with her innate sense of connection to that past lives of the bones she handles. I think her fixation on death is a reflection of her own grief and loneliness, after losing her mother as an infant and only having her uncle to raise her and being a social outcast due to demonic rumours surrounding her mother's death
Other characters include Isaac, her close friend. Garrett, Isaac's forbidden love interest. Ricky, her love interest. Jay, her skeptical uncle. Each has different impacts on the story, but mainly they act as a source of comfort, protection and fear as they help Laurel deal with the "devil". The only other female character is Christine, a weird and underused, as she is pivotal for Laurel to start understanding her inner power.
This book deals with a lot of tough topics, including death, grief, loneliness, alcoholism, queer identities in the deep south and mental illness. The imagery attached to each is artistic and well done. Twisted into magical realism, it brought an inanimate condition to life in the shadows of the woods, making it more of a representation of overcoming another being rather than overcoming something inside oneself.
This is such a great introduction to Young Adult horror. Though horror always has grotesque elements to it, this is written in such a way that the subject matter is palpable, but not so severe to give younger readers nightmares. Intimate interactions are all kept above board and fairly decent, which makes it better for youth.
Content Warnings provided by the Author:
Some of the thematic material in Wake the Bones involves mental and physical abuse, violence, and suicide. Additionally, the book includes dental trauma, guns, postpartum depression, drug usage, animal death, and blood. Specific content warning for abuse by an alcoholic parent.
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