Title: Winterwood
Author: Shea Ernshaw
Type: Fiction
Genre: YA, Fantasy
Publisher: Simon Pulse (Simon & Schuster)
Date published: November 5, 2019

A physical copy of this book was kindly provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Be careful of the dark, dark wood…

Especially the woods surrounding the town of Fir Haven. Some say these woods are magical. Haunted, even.

Rumored to be a witch, only Nora Walker knows the truth. She and the Walker women before her have always shared a special connection with the woods. And it’s this special connection that leads Nora to Oliver Huntsman—the same boy who disappeared from the Camp for Wayward Boys weeks ago—and in the middle of the worst snowstorm in years. He should be dead, but here he is alive, and left in the woods with no memory of the time he’d been missing.

But Nora can feel an uneasy shift in the woods at Oliver’s presence. And it’s not too long after that Nora realizes she has no choice but to unearth the truth behind how the boy she has come to care so deeply about survived his time in the forest, and what led him there in the first place. What Nora doesn’t know, though, is that Oliver has secrets of his own—secrets he’ll do anything to keep buried, because as it turns out, he wasn’t the only one to have gone missing on that fateful night all those weeks ago.

For as long as there have been fairy tales, we have been warned to fear what lies within the dark, dark woods and in Winterwood, New York Times bestselling author Shea Ernshaw, shows us why.

⤖ My Review ⬻

Those of you who read my raving review for Shea Ernshaw’s first book, The Wicked Deep, will not be surprised to hear that I was very excited for Winterwood to come out! I had hopes that it would be just as atmospheric and addictive as The Wicked Deep, and I was not disappointed. The atmosphere in Winterwood was decidedly different, but the setting felt just as remote/isolated and unstable/volatile as the first book (although this time around we’re stuck in the mountain rather than in a coastal town.

I would say that the feeling of isolation was actually a bit more poignant in Winterwood because a storm literally trapped everyone on the mountain. I also wanted to take some time to talk about the ominous wood itself. I really liked how Ernshaw depicted it, and I ended up seeing the wood as being its own character by the end of the story. There were also some twists and surprises in Winterwood that I also fount enjoyable! I didn’t feel very invested in the characters themselves but found that I was more drawn to their relationships with each other (which is also fine). This was a good book to read while huddled under the covers, with a snowstorm raging outside.

⤖ About the Author ⬻

Shea Ernshaw is the New York Times Bestselling author of THE WICKED DEEP and WINTERWOOD. She is a 2019 Oregon Book Award winner and her debut novel, The Wicked Deep, was an Indie Next Pick. She often writes late, late, late into the night, enjoys dark woods, scary stories and moonlight on lakes. You can connect with her on her website: www.sheaernshaw.com, on Twitter, and on Instagram.

⤖ Purchase the Book ⬻

⤖ Let’s Chat ⬻

THANK YOU FOR READING MY REVIEW! HAVE YOU READ THIS BOOK? WHAT DID YOU THINK? AND IF YOU HAVEN’T READ IT YET, DO YOU WANT TO, OR NOT? HOW COME? LET ME KNOW YOUR THOUGHTS IN THE COMMENTS!