When you talk about elderly do-gooders sticking their noses where they don't belong and sussing out nefarious killers and ne'er-do-wells, you have to admit that Jane Marple is about as OG as they get.

It's been a bit since I've read a Miss Marple—almost seven years now—so I can be forgiven for failing to remember just how much I adore her. There is something about her fluffy mannerisms and her piercing insight into human nature that makes for a thoroughly delightful combination. In fact, even though Poirot is the most famous Agatha Christie detective, I suspect many of us secretly like Miss Marple a lot more, myself included.

Because Miss Marple is an amateur sleuth and not an official one, her stories feel a lot more organic compared to Poirot's. The mysteries unfold naturally around her, and we get to know all the players in the course of the narrative without them having to be hauled in for interviews one by one in a repetitive fashion. As such, her stories align much more with the flow of contemporary books, making them come across less dated and more timeless.

Speaking of modern, this one in particular reminds me a lot of neighborhood thrillers, just without the wacky twists and psychological melodrama you'd expect from more contemporary offerings. And just like its modern counterpart, every character in here has something to hide, and the lies and secrets pile up pretty quickly.

Agatha Christie writes with no frills. There is a simplicity and directness to her writing that belies the complex mystery underneath. After all, if everything appears straightforward, where possibly could the clues hide? And yet, she gets me good every time. No one does misdirection and red herrings quite like her, and no matter how I prepare myself, I keep falling into her traps.

Needless to say, I had lots of fun with this one and that's not just for an old book. The characters were interesting, the dialogue zippy and droll, and the situations sly winks to the predictability and folly of human nature. Agatha Christie might have written Miss Marple to be the keen observer of people, but underneath, it's really the author who is so.

Now obviously, if you've read Agatha Christie, then you don't need me over here making recommendations on books you already know. But if you haven't read her yet and you're a fan of neighborhood thrillers, let me submit this one for your consideration. It's a classic for a reason, and then you'll know what the fuss is all about.

"It is a mystery to me how anyone ever gets any nourishment in this place. They must eat their meals standing up by the window so as to be sure of not missing anything."

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

What is it all the kids say nowadays? No notes, so good! Just kidding though, cause I have lots of notes.

So this is Alex Finlay doing what he does best. Everything I love about his thrillers is here—the characters, the mystery, the writing, not to mention the sheer intensity. I was drawn in from the very first page, and from there on out, I was holding my breath and turning the pages as fast as I could until I reached the very end.

To follow two characters as they try to figure out their own individual mysteries is an intriguing setup. Jules survived the May Day Killer, but is he coming back for her? And Quinn, fresh out of juvi, must find out who murdered his mother. Their two storylines weave back and forth, drawing closer and closer in the way that mysteries must, until everything ultimately collides into a satisfying conclusion.

We really get to know Jules and Quinn throughout this story. Some thrillers can come across a bit random because the characters feel interchangeable, but not here. Here, the dual points of view serve to sear these characters into our minds, and their growth and triumph is at the heart of this story's appeal.

When it comes to thrillers, I feel like I'm always complaining about how there's so much filler. Often, for large swaths of the narrative, nothing is happening, yet we follow character after character as they wallow and ruminate and jump at the shadows. So it's quite a breath of fresh air to get one where every chapter, every scene brings something urgent to the table.

A large reason for this is due to the book's unusual structure. Its timeline takes place exclusively on May 1st, year after year. We start in 1992, and then we jump to the same day the following year, and on it goes. And because there is so much time in between not covered, so much left unsaid within the pages, it necessitates a tighter narrative that strips away all the fluff and filler, automatically amping up the tension and making it unputdownable.

My only quibble is that the mystery component—and maybe it's more my fault than the story's—is too obvious. Normally when I read a mystery, I may start to get an inkling of what's going on, and by the end, I've gotten some things right and some things wrong. But in this case, I called it all and I did it with a large portion of the story still left. It doesn't take away substantially from my enjoyment of the whole thing, but I did wish for a eureka moment that never really materialized, at least for me.

Quibble aside, I had a lot of fun with this one. I loved Alex Finlay's first two books, heard his next few were a bit middling so I skipped, and here we are now. If you haven't read any Alex Finlay, you can't start with a better one. And if you've been holding off like I have, well, come on over cause he's back.

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

Advertised as both a mystery and a romance, This Story Might Save Your Life somehow managed to fail me on both counts. The mystery was mediocre, the romance was icky, and the fervent adulation this book's been receiving has me scratching my head in confusion.

Let's take this one at a time. First, the mystery. Talk about much ado over nothing. You'd think with two people missing, there'll be juicy tidbits and surprising twists galore. But instead, we're literally sifting through clues like "xyz" and "ayyy" and acting like they're the smoking gun—I'm not even kidding. And this Benny guy, for a podcaster, can't even converse. His way of figuring things out was to badger everyone he knows and put his foot in his mouth over and over again.

The writing was very much in the way of a lot of domestic thrillers, aiming to be as opaque as possible in order to ratchet up the tension. So instead of just spitting it out, we get a lot of references to "the incident" and "you-know-who" just to add to the murkiness. But the thing is, having a story that is artificially ambiguous isn't the same as having an actually suspenseful mystery, and my brain was not fooled.

Then we get to the culmination, and I had a bit of a shocker, though not from surprise or delight. Let's just say, when you're reading a mystery, you never ever want the resolution to be a deus ex machina. And then, to really cement the lunacy, the wrap up proceeded to spell out in long, confusing, tortuous detail the entire ridiculous series of events that led to Joy's disappearance.

Now, onto the romance. I don't have a problem in general with infidelity in a story. In fact, I enjoy reading about it because I think real life is messy and complicated. But I do have a problem when emotional infidelity is presented as some sort of great love story, and that's what happened here. Joy and Benny were both married to other people, and they met and married those people after they met and fell in love with each other. So what exactly was their excuse other than sheer stupidity?

There was also the additional hook of a podcast, which Joy and Benny helm to the tune of millions of dollars and listeners. Yet, every time we peek at their content, it was nothing more than inane chatter and insipid flirting. I cringed so hard.

Usually, when I read a book that's not for me, I can still see why others would enjoy it. But in this case, I'm just baffled. What do you all see that I'm not seeing? Every component in here was so middling and uninspired, it makes every other book I've read in the genre look skillful by comparison. So yeah, I'm going to be here puzzling over this for quite a while.

I stare at the Batchelder-tile fireplace, the one Joy mistakenly called a “bachelor” fireplace until Xander corrected her in his singsongy accent.

P.S. Looking back, I should've stopped when I came to this line. Because with a straight face, it implies that not only are there three people in the world who know and care what a Batchelder-tile fireplace is without working in fireplace restoration, but they're all somehow in relationships with each other. And that's exactly the level of ridiculousness this story operates under.

Readaroo Rating: 2 stars

It's hard to deny that Five is conceptually interesting. But unfortunately, its execution ended up feeling more gimmicky than anything else.

We follow five characters as they converge upon the training station. In a few minutes, one of them will die. Who will it be? The omniscient narrator guides the reader along until we get to that pivotal moment and all is revealed.

Let's start with the characters. When you have a story like this with an ensemble cast, where five lives intersect and change over a brief period of time, it all comes down to the characters. And the ones in here are not really what I expected. They each come with a shtick—the narcissist, the addict, the psychopath, the child psychopath, and the one that only interacts with dead people. If that all sounds a bit over the top, well, it really was.

Instead of being well-rounded individuals with some flaws, the five people in here were all taken to the extreme. Whatever their problem is, it defines every bit of who they are. There is no subtlety, there is no humanity. And when everyone is so exaggerated, it can be hard to connect and empathize with them.

Did I care what happened to these characters? No. Was I curious who would die? Not really. Because to lose one unlikable character is pretty much the same as losing another, so it was all one big shrug for me.

The other major issue is the writing. I'm sorry to say, but I found it kind of obnoxious, especially the longer it went on. The author very much chose to lean into the omniscience of the narrator, to the point that they actually came across as an insufferable know-it-all.

Review everyone’s positions. Consider what they might do next. Consider what you know that they do not, and will not, until it happens, until the train that is headed toward them is unable to stop in time.

I understand this is trying to break the fourth wall, but result was just unappealing. Instead of showing the reader and letting us figure things out for themselves, we are told what to think and how to feel every step of the way.

Life and death happen regardless of what you think, or guess, or put in your online review, or dream of, or work for, or choose, or want. Or deserve.

Yikes! This sort of grating, repetitive, and overexplanatory prose was everywhere, breaking into pivotal scenes and dispensing platitudes like they might actually be rare nuggets of wisdom.

I get it. This was supposed to be some sort of revolutionary, never before seen style of prose and storytelling. But maybe, just maybe, there is a reason no one in the past has attempted this type of narrative. And it's because instead of coming across as compelling, it's just off-putting.

Readaroo Rating: 2 stars

After two books, I'm starting to get a feel for Marcus Kliewer. His stories never make much sense, there's a real dearth of anything resembling an explanation, but you sure do feel a compulsive need to turn the pages.

Before we begin, a confession. I'm not much of a horror girlie. I can count on two hands the number of books I've read in the genre. And when it comes to horror films, you can forget about it. I'm either cowering in the corner as the eerie music plays, or I'm hiding behind my hands while making my husband narrate the whole thing. So when I pick up a horror book, it's with much trepidation and a commitment to only read during the daylight hours. But you know what, I never have to worry with Marcus Kliewer, because his book just aren't that scary.

The Caretaker has an interesting enough premise. Macy needs money desperately, so she answers an ad for housesitting. For only three days of work, she can make nine thousand dollars. Sure, the house is isolated and it gives off weird vibes and she doesn't really know what her duties are. But how hard can it be? Well, you know what they say about something being too good to be true, so Macy's definitely in for a rough time.

I thought the initial chapters were fantastic. The introduction of the house and the Carnswels and the caretaker job were all steeped in creepy, mysterious vibes. There was this feeling that we were building up to something big, something that was going to knock my socks off.

But then we come to the actual meat of the story itself, which is the eponymous caretaker job. Turning lights on and off, catching rabbits, staying awake through the witching hour. For every task, there was Macy, almost getting it, but oh no, messing it up at the very last moment. And every time she messes up, she must await further, ever more kooky instructions in order to make it right. And lo and behold, she does not complete a single task correctly. And so the cycle repeats.

Sigh. Is turning lights on and off that scary or interesting? Unfortunately, no. What about chasing down rabbits, or hiding from people knocking on your door? Also, no. They feel more like chores that need to be done, and wacky ones at that. After a while, I felt the urge to laugh more than anything else, because how many random things can poor Macy be made to do for the sake of this story?

But no worries, folks, I hung on, cause surely there must be some amazing reveal or explanation that will make this choreful journey worthwhile. But alas, Marcus Kliewer, you got me good there. Cause not only did the strange chores take up pretty much the entire rest of the story, but you just ended things with no real explanation or wrap up.

I should've known. These are all the same issues I had with Kliewer's previous book. All this great buildup and nothing really comes of it. His books feel like they are more targeted towards the film medium. While this sort of open-endedness might work for movies, it doesn't really work for books, at least in my humble opinion.

I don't want to sell the story short. It has a compulsive readability that rivals the best of thrillers, and I certainly kept going until the very last page. But without any real explanation or ending, I just can't find satisfaction.

Horror, maybe more than any other genre, feels so diverse in reactions and opinions. What works for one reader may or may not work for another. So if you're at all curious about Kliewer, you should give him a try. Between his two books, I would say I enjoyed this one a little bit more than his debut. So my recommendation is to start here and see if Kliewer's brand of horror works for you.

Readaroo Rating: 3.5 stars

"We’re not going to leave the island… None of us will ever leave … It’s the end, you see—the end of everything…."

Even amongst the tableau of exceptional mysteries that Agatha Christie is known for, And Then There Were None stands out as something extraordinary. It is arguably Christie's most beloved piece of work, and for good reason.

Right from the start, this story feels unusual and steeped in atmosphere. Ten strangers are summoned to Soldier Island, but when they arrive, the host is missing. The guests look at each other with suspicion. Why are they here? What could be the purpose of such a gathering? Soon a storm arrives and cuts off all ability to leave the island. And they start dying, one by one.

Ah, a locked-room mystery. My word, is there anything better? When done right, it offers such delight and satisfaction, and this story is the quintessential example. No one can get off the island, no one can get on the island. So it must be one of the guests. But which one is it? And how are they doing it?

This is quite an intricate mystery, with many characters and moving parts. There's lots going on on the surface and also underneath, which we'll come to understand later. Christie herself even mentioned that this was a difficult one for her to write, requiring lots of careful planning to come to fruition. But all that meticulousness certainly paid off.

But don't let the intricacy scare you off. It doesn't negatively impact reading experience, it only enhances it. In fact, this is exactly Christie's signature style—simple and straightforward writing, confounding mystery with carefully placed red herrings, and when the reveal comes, there's always that clear and satisfying feeling of a perfect eureka moment.

If you're more used to reading modern thrillers, mysteries like this can feel very different. The modern thriller prioritizes outlandish twists and psychological drama, whereas these Golden Age mysteries are all about the inherent puzzle within. In the spirit of fair play, the reader is given access to all the clues, and if you're clever enough, you might just armchair detect your way to the right answer before the book reveals it to you.

The first time I read this, I was left in awe. No no, I think that's too mild of a phrase. I was shaken to my core. I was thirteen at the time, and my homeroom teacher had a collection of Agatha Christie's on his shelf. I'd never read anything like them, and I inhaled the whole lot. So started my love affair with the mystery genre and the Queen of Crime. To this day, Agatha Christie remains one of my favorite authors, and I happily reach for her books again and again.

If you're a mystery reader and somehow this book has escaped your attention, it's absolutely worth adding to your list. It's impossible to understand the landscape of modern mysteries without having seen where they come from. In fact, I don't think it's too much of an exaggeration to say all the mysteries I've ever loved have probably taken every single one of their conceits from Christie's books. And this one in particular has inspired so many riffs, it would be a travesty to read those without having known the original.

Readaroo Rating: 5 stars!

Ugh, sorry to always be the contrarian. I see reader after reader calling this their favorite Sally Hepworth, but for me, Mad Mabel fell just a bit short of the author's best.

But first, let's set expectations. Sally Hepworth's books are always labeled as mystery/thrillers, but they are not. In fact, if you went into it thinking you're signing up for some big brouhaha with lots of twists and turns, you'd be sorely disappointed.

Hepworth writes domestic suspense with a heavy emphasis on the characters and their personal and interpersonal drama, and the suspense comes from the story's construction. In other words, there's nothing necessarily suspenseful going on in the plot itself, it's more the way Hepworth weaves the timelines and points of view that creates the tension. 

And maybe, when put like that, I can already see why I felt more lukewarm towards this book than some of her others. None of the things that usually grab me in a Sally Hepworth story did in this one. The characters, the drama, even the tension in here all felt a bit superficial and ho hum, like I've seen it all before.

Old person who's grouchy on the outside and sweet on the inside? Check. Old person and young child form a friendship? Check. Old person's heart finally thaws after said friendship? Check.

This is a dual timeline and I had trouble connecting with Mabel in both, which is difficult to forgive in a character-driven story. The series of bad things that happens to the young Mabel felt overdone, relying heavily on coincidences and piled on past the point of believability to maximize emotional turmoil. And the portrayal of old Mabel felt surprisingly shallow, laying it on thick with the aforementioned old-person grouchiness, but I had trouble finding the sweetness underneath.

Speaking of seeing it all before, there is a revelation towards the end of the book that I figured out almost immediately. [View spoiler below]

And so for all these reasons, it didn't feel like the story was propelling me forward so much as I was dragging it along. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't bad by any means; it just didn't grab me the same way Hepworth's books usually do.

Readaroo Rating: 3 stars

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[Spoiler} Like, come on, of course only Mabel could see Daphne! The Sixth Sense has seared this exact feint into the memory of every single person from now until the end of time. It was so masterfully done in the film and so strikingly memorable that no one could ever pull the same wool over our eyes again. M. Night Shyamalan is the first and only person to have succeeded at this sleight of hand, and Sally Hepworth unfortunately did not.

I like twists and turns as much as the next thriller-loving gal. I mean, who wouldn't want to be surprised and stunned and stupefied to within an inch of their life? But in order for the twists to deliver, they have to make sense within the story and its characters. And unfortunately, that didn't really happen here.

Initially, Anatomy of an Alibi seemed off to a good start. We are introduced to Camille and Aubrey, one trying to get out of her marriage and the other impersonating her to give her the alibi she needs to achieve her goal. But then as the story progressed and the twists started piling on, it became ever more convoluted and absurd, and before I knew it, I was tuning out.

The problem is that the story lacked believable and fleshed out characters to anchor all the mayhem. Everyone in here came across as flat and nondescript, there to further the plot along but not much else. When every character is bland and everything they do and say is generic, it's hard to get into the story.

And the sheer number of characters was bewildering. As more and more of them were introduced, I could feel my eyebrows migrating towards my hairline. By the time Aubrey's four roommates came into the picture, each of whom was clearly put there to serve a very specific purpose, I just couldn't take it seriously anymore.

I kept waiting for the moment when I would buy into the story and really care—about the characters, about the plotlines, about the twists—but it just never happened. I'm pretty sure if I had quit the story midway and never found out the conclusion, I wouldn't even have shrugged. When everything is random and all the characters interchangeable, what does it really matter what happens to one when it could've easily happened to another?

And if I'm being honest, I wasn't wild about the writing either. I noticed it in First Lie Wins (Ashley Elston's adult debut), but the superior story there covered for that deficiency. Here, it was on full display. The author favors present tense, which can add a sense of immediacy to the tale, but with the downside that it can also make the writing feel simplistic and forced.

I went into this with high expectations. Ashley Elston's previous book was a standout thriller that delivered both a unique storyline and all the thrills. So to have this one fall short is particularly disappointing.

That all sounds super negative, but it wasn't that bad of a read. It certainly goes by fast enough if you're looking to wile away a few hours. But it prioritizes its twists over everything else, and at the end of the day, it's just hard to come away feeling satisfied with a story like that.

Readaroo Rating: 3 stars

I understand that thrillers are meant to be popcorn reads and so they're held to a different standard than other genres. But they still have to meet a certain bar, and The Overnight Guest just did not get there whatsoever.

Let's start with the characters. When it comes to thrillers, I’ve seen a lot of dumb characters, but Wylie has got to be the dumbest of them all. She makes one bad decision after another, and it's honestly painful to follow along as she blunders around. At one point, someone actually spelled out for her what really happened, and she still couldn’t put two and two together.

The rest of the characters were pretty much cardboard cutouts of typical thriller characters — scared victims, worried mothers, serious investigators, and shady would-be villains. No one really came alive, so it was hard for me to care what happened or whodunnit.

This story has so many separate storylines, and yet not one of them was compelling. The triple narrative threads, in theory a good idea that should have them converge into a single cohesive narrative, was in actuality just a vehicle for the story to jump around every few pages. Just as I'm getting into whatever the current storyline is, bam! I'm yanked out to somewhere else.

As the story moves along, it starts to rely on an ever growing list of coincidences and plot holes and just plain ridiculous developments to propel it forward. Each time something absurd happens, I'm amazed at both the gumption of the author and the gullibility of the reader that it's actually allowed to stand.

I feel like there's a turning point maybe two-thirds of the way through, and after that, it’s pretty clear what happened and also what’s going to happen. And then the rest of the story is devoted to spelling out in long form what's already obvious, to the dread of every reader on the verge of a slump, including me.

I’m honestly a little confused by the high ratings on this one. If you’ve read any thrillers at all, you’ll see what’s coming from a mile away. And unless cheering on foolish and slow-witted characters is your jam, I don't see what else this one has to offer.

Readaroo Rating: 2 stars

I'm normally a huge sucker for locked-room mysteries, but The Wasp Trap didn't quite do it for me.

Based on the sheer number of famous authors who blurbed for this book—Lisa Jewell, Ruth Ware, Alex Michaelides, Steve Cavanagh—you'd think this would be the best thing since sliced bread. So I settled in for what I assumed would be the mystery/thriller of the year, and let me tell you, the disappointment was real.

From almost the very first page, it felt like I was being sold a story instead of shown one. The characters in here, their interactions, the dialogue, all of it just wafted of inauthenticity. Real people don't behave like this, they don't talk like this, they wouldn't react like this. And so slow but surely, this slightly awkward and stilted representation sucked away any semblance of reality from the tale.

It is blatantly clear that every element in here exists solely to manipulate the story into revealing a predefined set of twists. And while I like a good twist as much as the next mystery-loving gal, the twists cannot be the only glue holding a story together.

It becomes a problem if the characters and the rest of the plot are relegated to such secondary nonimportance, I find it hard to even care. All the characters feel interchangeable, so what happens to one might as well be happening to another, for whatever is the difference? So much crazy stuff occurs in this story, yet my reaction to each and every single one is a shrug of indifference.

Even the premise in which this whole mystery is based upon—the dating app and the wasp test—did not ring true. There was no way such a generic app would've made anyone rich and the test is of such dubious moral and ethical ground, not to mention unsound science, it came across as a bunch of handwaving hocus pocus more than the gospel it was taken to be.

Also, I can't tell you how much I disliked our narrator Will. He is sniveling, meek, and paranoid, probably the most unappealing combination in a character ever. He spent the entire time (in both timelines) lusting after Sophie, expecting it to be reciprocated simply because he stared at her long enough. It honestly creeped me out. I really thought (spoiler: the twist was that Will was the psychopath, but alas, the test did not oblige).

I'll give this some stars for the twists, but as a whole, the story was pretty middling.

Readaroo Rating: 3 stars

Choo choo! Bet you won't be thinking about toy trains the same way after reading this.

When it comes to thrillers, I'm always on the lookout for a few things—a premise with a good hook, execution that really brings the story to life, characters with tons of depth, and the sort of immersiveness that'll turn hundreds of pages into a one-sit read. And this book had it all, my friends.

Annie has been through a tough year. Between losing her husband to a car accident and suffering a career tragedy, she could really use a change of pace. So when the opportunity comes up to move to a small town outside the city for the summer with her son Charlie, she jumps at it. Charlie soon finds a train set in the locked shed out back, and lo and behold, odd things start happening.

First of all, I have to mention how comforting and nostalgic the vibes in here were. The story takes place in the early 2000s, before smart phones and screens were ubiquitous, so kids and adults hung out with each other and played with their physical toys (imagine that). You add in the bikes and jigsaw puzzles and of course the eponymous train sets, and surely every reader would be transported to that time.

From the very first moment I opened this book, I was immediately and decidedly sucked into the tale. Some books, it feels like you have to work so hard for a long time just to get to the point where you can feel like you're into it, but no such hard work needed here. I slipped seamlessly into this world and was thoroughly riveted.

When you compare the style of this book to a lot of modern thrillers, the two honestly feel so different, they might as well be completely separate genres. Modern thrillers tend to favor short chapters, with characters acting as crazy as possible, and an endless parade of outlandish twists and turns, all in the hopes of bamboozling you into a dopamine daze so you won't notice the lack of good writing and a good story. Thankfully, we don't have any of that here.

The attention to character development and longer chapters means I have time to really sink my teeth into this dark and entertaining story. This is a dual point of view and timeline, but it doesn't feel we're being yanked back and forth because each portion has many pages and chapters to breathe and develop before we have to switch our focus to another.

On the whole, I'm not a huge horror reader, but when I want horror, this is exactly the type I enjoy. It's dark, but not so scary that it will keep me up at night peering into every shadow and corner. The darkness merely adds to the entertainment of the whole thing, making it feel even more delightful and unputdownable.

I totally recommend this if you're in the mood for some (dare I say) cozy and old school horror/thriller, kind of in the vibe of Stephen King from back in the day. And bonus points if you're craving some early 2000s nostalgia and you're reading this during the spooky season.

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

You are the first delivery of human pioneers to Mars. There is no going back. . . . You must continue.

Let me first pause and take a deep breath, because what the heck did I just read? I'm always looking for that perfect Mars exploration story—you know, the one where astronauts land on the red planet and strange things start to happen—and wow, did this deliver. I feel like I've been walloped, again and again, and I loved every second of it.

I was drawn to this book initially because the blurb mentioned locked-room mystery set on Mars, and of course, I tripped all over myself trying to get my grabby hands on it. But to call this a mystery is to sell the story short. It is that, but also so much more.

We slip seamlessly into the mind of Dana Gold as she comes out of deep sleep, one of three astronauts aboard the vessel that's about to deliver them onto Mars. Bots have been sent ahead to build the habitat that will be their forever home and to welcome them onto this desolate planet. But they've lost communications with the bots, and that's only the beginning of their troubles.

This tale grabbed me immediately. The science fiction component is so interesting and unique. The worldbuilding isn't centered around technology, but rather, there's a lot of humanity woven into it. The bots are made by humans and are therefore in our likeness, even if their makers didn't intend for that to happen. And so the evolution and the interaction of the bots is a fascinating and crucial focal point of the story.

But if you're not usually a reader of science fiction, don't let the setting scare you away. The backdrop of Mars is simply the starting point from which this story can take off. It isn't about Mars or space or robots. It's about humans and what we would do when pushed to the limit.

The horror element comes on slowly. We see Gold's thoughts and emotions as things start to go wrong. The horror isn't in the physical, but rather the psychological. There is a lot of exploration about where horror comes from, if it is within us humans and we manifest it in ourselves and the things we build, or if it comes from outside sources, both the known and the unknown. It gave me the chills, and I found it to be absolutely fascinating.

Because this is a novella, there is an economy to the writing that makes every moment count. We don't get mired in unnecessary explanations, we don't get stuck in overly emotional ruminations. We go from scene to scene, each one so propulsive, so tautly suspended, it felt like I was holding my breath the whole time.

I honestly haven't been this excited about a sci-fi and horror blend in a long time. The only thing is, after reading this, I'm definitely giving up my dreams of becoming an astronaut and ever going to Mars.

Readaroo Rating: 5 stars!