I have 5 reviews in the August 2025 issue of Booklist. I am breaking them up into 2 posts. Yesterday I had the three starred reviews of three very different books (novel, stories, nonfiction). Today I have 2 more reviews from this issue, both are by up and coming writers who you MUST keep your eye on.
But first, a reminder that these posts are my draft reviews with added appeal info including my three words.
Her Wicked RootsBy Tanya Pell
Aug. 2025. 352p. Gallery, $29 (9781668087299); e-book (9781668087312).
REVIEW. First published August 2025 (Booklist).
Cordelia (Cordi) is on the run from the city orphanage, on her way into the country, to the last place her older brother was living before his letters abruptly stopped, in Pell’s original, creepy and queer retelling of Hawthorne's, “Rappaccini’s Daughter.” When Cordi arrives, everyone denies having known her brother. Desperate for answers, Cordi gets a job at Edenfield, home of botanist Lady Evangeline, a lush but disconcerting estate, a place she knows her brother visited. The all female staff pray to the “garden,” while the Lady’s mysterious daughters, Primrose and Briar, seemingly full of life, are kept locked away, the servants who tend to them forced to wear masks and gloves. Readers follow Cordi as she unravels layers of poisonous secrets, searches for her brother, and falls in love with Briar. Will Edenfield be the place where Cordi can finally thrive or will she be called to the garden? For fans of Tripping Arcadia by Mayquist or Mexican Gothic by Moreno-Garcia, featuring a Gone Girl-esque twist that will plant this story’s wicked roots deep into readers' souls.
Three Words That Describe This Book: retelling, botanical horror, Gothic
Further Appeal: This one was a solid 4 out of 5 until I got to the ending and then it shot up to a 4.5.
I have so many spoiler notes on the ending that I WILL NOT SHARE here. You will have to read it. I did settle on that line in the review about a "Gone Girl-esque twist." I actually told Pell about this review and that line when I saw her at StokerCon and she totally agreed. I was worried it was too spoilery but she thought it was perfect!
As I said above this is a queer Retelling of Rappaccini’s Daughter by Hawthorne. Whil you don't need to know the details of that original to enjoy this story, I did want to share the basics of that story here. It is about Giacomo Rappaccini, a medical researcher in Padua who grows a garden of poisonous plants. He brings up his daughter to tend the plants, and she becomes resistant to the poisons, but in the process she herself becomes poisonous to others.
Botanical horror is hot! I need to let you all know this if you do not. Keep an eye on this subgenre. Plants can be very deadly and a variety of authors use that underlying dread and danger to tell a great story. But this is more than the poisonous plants and the daughters Lady Evangeline created to be poisonous as well. The horror here also comes from the traditional Gothic story with a great modern ending.
For this book we are in England, Victorian times (when the original Hawthorne was written). Cordelia is an orphan on the run from the city where she has lived in the home her whole life. She is trying to find her brother who went away and was sending letters....until they stopped.
She ends up in the town where he last lived but the family he worked for won't admit he was there. She finds the grand, lush, and secretive estate-- Edenfield where clues have led her to find that her brother might have worked at. She asks for work and they take her on.
Well, as you can imagine this grand, secretive house, that everyone in town is scared of is....well creepy is the nicest thing you can say. Again, no spoilers because this is a retelling of Rappaccini’s Daughter-- so we know the botanical horrors-- that the Lady is into poisons and we are not surprised when Cordi (her nickname) is asked to mask and glove up to help[ tend to the Lady's daughters-- for you see-- they have been made poisonous by their mother.
There are chants and prayers to the garden-- which they thank for giving them "all." Cordi is new and not privy to all the rules and backstory so the reader must investigate with her. She may have had a rough life before Edenfield, but she is still very naive as she never lived outside the walls of an orphanage.
Men are forbidden, and straight out hated, by Lady Evangeline and the other female workers. The townsfolk stay far away. It is very creepy. But also beautiful and lush. The story unfolds like a myth in many ways and a thriller in others. Cordi's unreliableness is because of lack of info but is she being taken advantage of? How evil is Lady Evangeline? Is she just a protective mother and a brilliant scientist? Where is her brother? Cordi keeps finding clues that he was there at one point.
Even if you don't know the original story this is a retelling for, the book is solid. That is a key factor when assessing a retelling. It has to stand on its own but also add something to the original. This absolutely does.
The word wicked in the title is well placed here. Actually, the title itself is pretty great after you finish the book. This one packs a nice surprise and I am excited to read more from Pell in the future.
Readalikes: I mention a botanical, queer horror title and Mexican Gothic above. I have read both. This is a great Gothic in the mold that came after SMG's subgenre redefining work. Anyone who likes her reimagining of the Gothic, bit also keeps the story in its time and place but giving the female protagonist a bit more agency and not making it "all in her head." And titles that have actual supernatural monsters alongside the human ones.
Specifically, I thought of Midnight Rooms by Coles when I read this. It has the same traditional Gothic meets consensual sex storyline and both a built on a family secret and our protagonist not having all the info about the real secret.
More botanical horror that readers might enjoy can be found here or here.
Galloway’s Gospel
By Sam Rebelein
Sept. 2025. 384p. Morrow, $30 (9780063423954); e-book (9780063423992).
REVIEW. First published August 2025 (Booklist).Rebelein’s (Edenville) third book in his Renfield County mythos (connected but can be read in any order) sets loose imaginative humour and unrelenting dread on a cult themed horror novel. Told in 2 timelines, narrated by 2 Rachels– Galloway and Durwood– readers know from the terror-inducing opening that something very dangerous has escaped through a previously collapsed tunnel. Teenager Galloway, bored in her history 2009 class, makes doodles about a lost American colony where a pig eats her teacher’s arm and poops out flowers. In 2019, Durwood, a member of the X-Files-esque Renfield County Guard, is trying to solve the mystery of what happened ten years ago when Galloway and her disciples sowed a path of death and destruction before sealing themselves off from the rest of the world. As the two timelines collide, Rebelein organically morphs the attention grabbing, comic aspects of the story into a nuanced, compelling, and thought-provoking tale of terror that will linger with readers. For fans of Kiste’s The Haunting of Velkwood and Khaw’s The Library at Hellebore.
Three Words That Describe This Book: cults, connected world, X Files vibes
This is the story of 2 Rachels. Rachel Galloway in 2009 and Rachel Durwood in 2019. Their last names are used to keep them apart.
Galloway is a bored HS student whose doodles about a made up lost colony become a prophecy and create a cult that before they sealed themselves off form the rest of the world (physically) caused a lot of death in Burnskidde (a town at the edge of Renfield County). The cult involved her doodles coming to life-- pigs that when someone sacrifices a piece of themselves poop out a plant of whatever that person wants or bats that eat "bad flesh" and turn it into animals for example. The believers survived a fog that killed many and have been living and surviving through their pigs, bats, and more.
In 2019, Durwood who works for the Renfield County Guard is drawn into the cult after one of her fellow Guard members goes in and tries to escape but is killed. He leaves enough notes for Durwood to make it through the recently opened tunnel that connects the two worlds.
As the two timelines collide, Rebelein brings the 2 stories together organically. The "bonkers" parts from 2009 start to make sense in the world he has created. As readers go through it is less bonkers and more thought-provoking-- which was clearly his point. Grab your attention at the start and make you read to see how he is going to put it all together. Really it is a very imaginative and original story.
The investigative, X Files parts, in Durwood's timeline will draw new readers to Renfield County for sure.
There are tethers to Edenville and The Poorly Made here. Meaning all three books are tethered to each other but the great part here is, you can read them in any order. Rebelein gives you the lore you need for each book to make it makes sense. It is there and seamlessly incorporated into the story.
Previously I have said that Rebelein's Renfield County books are reminiscent of Lovecraft Country and Josh Malerman's Goblin universe. But what I like about Rebelein's stories is that while everything is in a shared world and each story build on the overall world, each book is unique. So while Edenville was more Cosmic Horror, and The Poorly Made stories were more Folk Horror-- building the history and lore of the place over a longer time frame and also entrenching some of the monsters of the mythos into the land itself-- this one is a horror novel about cults with serious X Files vibes. I thought of completely different readalikes.
That is very good and says a lot about Rebelein as a writer-- that he can connect everything effortlessly and they are all unique. It also means each book will bring in new readers.
Readalikes: I had a whole list but I had to settle on two for the review. Those two together give you a full sense of everything in this book. Also just above I mentioned Lovecraft Country and Josh Malerman's Goblin universe. Also, another book I just reviewed in Booklist-- 8114 by Hull works very well here too.
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