Once upon a time, Andrew had cut out his heart and given it to this boy, and he was very sure Thomas had no idea that Andrew would do anything for him. Protect him. Lie for him. Kill for him.

High school senior Andrew Perrault finds refuge in the twisted fairytales that he writes for the only person who can ground him to reality—Thomas Rye, the boy with perpetually ink-stained hands and hair like autumn leaves. And with his twin sister, Dove, inexplicably keeping him at a cold distance upon their return to Wickwood Academy, Andrew finds himself leaning on his friend even more.

But something strange is going on with Thomas. His abusive parents have mysteriously vanished, and he arrives at school with blood on his sleeve. Thomas won’t say a word about it, and shuts down whenever Andrew tries to ask him questions. Stranger still, Thomas is haunted by something, and he seems to have lost interest in his artwork—whimsically macabre sketches of the monsters from Andrew’s wicked stories.

Desperate to figure out what’s wrong with his friend, Andrew follows Thomas into the off-limits forest one night and catches him fighting a nightmarish monster—Thomas’s drawings have come to life and are killing anyone close to him. To make sure no one else dies, the boys battle the monsters every night. But as their obsession with each other grows stronger, so do the monsters, and Andrew begins to fear that the only way to stop the creatures might be to destroy their creator…

Don’t Let The Forest In
C G Drews
October 29, 2024

It is entirely possible that I requested this book for the cover and I would just like to give a shoutout to the artist because the cover is lovely.

I admittedly did not finish Don’t Let The Forest In. I was intriqued by the intenseness of it. A boy who isn’t just in love with his friend but completely obsessed with him?

How else do you justify the back copy of “Andrew would do anything for him. Protect him. Lie for him. Kill for him.”

I just wasn’t prepared for how much of a turn off that would be to start in. There were actually quite a lot of turns off for me and ultimately I would just have to say that this story wasn’t for me.

The story actually starts before the book does, which felt like I was robbed of a scene. Andrew, a writer, gives Thomas, an artist, a story about a boy who loves his best friend with just enough details for Andrew to claim it’s not about them.

Then Thomas’s phone breaks over summer break and they have no contact until they return to their boarding school.

As it’s 2024, the idea that anyone, let alone a teen on Summer break in a possibly abusive home, would not be in contact with anyone raised some flags for me. Was I really supposed to believe he didn’t log into his email? Instagram? Twitter? Nothing? He just let his phone die and dropped off the grid?

Andrew then claims to be worried because of how Thomas’s parents are but he obviously wasn’t that worried since just accepted it all happening.

Then they return to school (which is the start of the book) and Andrew notices a scab on Thomas’s chin and blood on his sleeve.

And he wonders if his best friend, his obvious love interest, killed his own parents.

And that’s where I stopped reading.

I keep having this issue with horror lately where the leap these characters take is taller than the Empire State Building. I feel like, in an effort to get to the horror part of the story, that writers are leaving out key building points.