Something darker than the devil stalks the North Carolina woods in Wolf Worm, a new gothic masterpiece from New York Times bestselling author T. Kingfisher.
The year is 1899 and Sonia Wilson is a scientific illustrator without work, prospects, or hope. When the reclusive Dr. Halder offers her a position illustrating his vast collection of insects, Sonia jumps at the chance to move to his North Carolina manor house and put her talents to use. But soon enough she finds that there are darker things at work than the Carolina woods. What happened to her predecessor, Halder’s wife? Why are animals acting so strangely, and what is behind the peculiar local whispers about “blood thiefs?”
With the aid of the housekeeper and a local healer, Sonia discovers that Halder’s entomological studies have taken him down a dark road full of parasitic maggots that burrow into human flesh, and that his monstrous experiments may grow to encompass his newest illustrator as well.
Review:
This was…wow. My first from this author, but definitely not my last!
Read more horror was one of my reading goals this year, so when I got an ARC in the mail it seemed like fate! I really liked how the author set the scene for the story–I honestly felt like I was right there in the late 1800s rural south with the MC–and loved the wry sense of humor displayed throughout. The way Sonia would see something and immediately think about how she’d paint it was just so cool (author’s note revealed she is also an illustrator, so it was all genuine knowledge of color and technique, which upped the wow factor for me). Sonia on the whole was a great protagonist, if a little judgy at times.
But dear god, the BUGS…I could have happily lived my whole life without any in depth knowledge (or any visual description at all, EVER) of botflies and screw worms, thankyouverymuch. But I suppose that’s what makes it horror, right? Totally effective. And the details about what was happening in the shed made eating breakfast this morning so much harder than it should have been (yes, 100% my fault. No idea what I was thinking, deciding to read while eating especially given where things had been leading when I’d picked it up last).
Never having read anything by her before, I was genuinely concerned about how this was all going to end and how it would leave me feeling. Because OMG, things were rough there for quite some time.
Happy to report I absolutely loved the ending–no notes!–and will absolutely be reading more from her. Hopefully soon! Thank you so much to whomever it was at the publisher that decided to send this my way–it was a great read!
Rating: 4 1/2 stars / A
I voluntarily reviewed an Advance Reader Copy of this book.
She has a lot of good stuff! Try her other North Carolina horror – The Twisted One and The Hollow Places. Both have great characters. She also does fantasy, start with Swordheart.
Oh, I absolutely plan to! As soon as I have room in my schedule I’ll be checking Libby to see which one(s) they have available. Thanks so much for the recs! 🙂