Synopsis
Regent Academy has a long and storied history in Winslow, Vermont, as does the forest that surrounds it. The school is known for molding teens into leaders, but its history is far more nefarious.
Seventeen-year-old Douglas Jones wants nothing to do with Regent's king-making; he’s just trying to survive. But then a student is murdered and, for some reason, by the next day no one remembers him having ever existed, except for Douglas and the groundskeeper's son, Everett Everley. In his determination to uncover the truth, Douglas awakens a horror hidden within the forest, unearthing secrets that have been buried for centuries. A vengeful creature wants blood as payment for a debt more than 300 years in the making—or it will swallow all of Winslow in darkness.
And for the first time in his life, Douglas might have a chance to grasp the one thing he’s always felt was power. But if he’s not careful, he will find out that power has a tendency to corrupt absolutely everything.
Review
The Forest Demands Its Due is everything I wanted in an eerie forest story. 10/10 on the horror elements. Both the gore and creepy atmosphere are perfectly executed.
If the rest of the book delivered like the spooky forest, this book could have been amazing. The romance fell flat for me. It just seemed very superficial and awkward, but that could be because it is YA.
The other thing that threw it for me was the magic system. It didn't feel fleshed out and really just served as a plot convenience when things got hard.
I recommend this book if you're looking for well-executed nature horror.
Thank you, Quill Tree Books and LibraryThing, for a copy of this book!
Dates read: Jan 13, 2024 - Jan 15, 2024