Reviews with content warning for Body horror - From Below

This book has some brilliant character development, solid atmosphere and a cool premise. But it has a lot of flaws and I feel it holds itself back in many ways.

The biggest example of this is the side plot/backstory that is in between just about every other chapter. This backstory contains no interesting/sympathetic characters, breaks up the pacing and tension, and just feels rather boring to read. I get why the backstory was there, but I honestly just found it took me out of the story a lot.

My second major criticism is that a lot of the plot is driven forward by the characters doing stupid things. I don't want to get into spoilers, but there's so many ways the characters could have avoided dangerous situation easily. This is especially frustrating as otherwise, I quite enjoyed the characters.

I think this books biggest strength is it's character development moments. They felt interesting and impactful, while making you care more about what they are going through. Sadly, there are not a ton of these moments, and instead you get the annoying stuff I mentioned earlier. The entire spooky ship plotline felt way less interesting then the characters personal stories.

Overall, if you can get through the kind of boring backstory sections and dumb character decisions I think it's worth a read. I think conclusion was done well and felt satisfying. Once you get past the backstory sections every other chapter, the book really picks up some steam.

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rayedelvego's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

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drsa's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious sad tense

3.0

Lost a star rating because it was too long —could have lost at least 100 pages and been better.

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ravynlily's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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jujuthenerd's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark informative mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.25

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spaghettii's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-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

2.0

I like horror set in confined spaces and expeditions, so that part was fun. I do have a few things that pissed me off:
1.

why the actual fuck did Aidan go back for the ring?? And lie about his oxygen every dive?? Mans should not have been there. I think I might have preferred if he died, actually.

2. A lot of coincidental things saved a lot of people a lot of times,,,
3.

I don't love the cloth explanation, but I don't really know of one that I would have liked. I was wondering if they were hallucinating during the last couple dives or something like that.

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gilexia's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

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

5.0

Here we go with another highlight of 2024! I've already read Voices in the Snow by her and loved it. And yes, this book was that good too! I loved every page of it. The characters were so loveable and I really empathized with Aidan. He was my favorite character because I connected with him more than any other character in ALL the books I've read this year.

Also, the story was really cool. Great ideas, well executed. Compared to Voices in the Snow, it was a little quieter, less surprising twists, but it had such a creepy atmosphere the whole time. Also the narrative with the past and the present was really cool. Both timelines were special on their own, but they also worked really well together. Plus the ending was quite emotional for me. Really good ending.

Honestly, it's now one of my favorite books and it was just fun to read this book. Anytime again.

The moment Cove entered the water, the storm's lashing rain vanished as though someone had put it on mute. Bubbles raced past her as they fought to escape the folds of her suit and return to the surface. Her throat closed over, unwilling to let her breathe when the ocean flooded over her face, and her first breath of oxygen whistled as she forced it down.

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smokeandwires's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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