This took me by surprise. I thought it was going to be a jazz age 'jolly good' mystery, folk trapped by a snowstorm with bodies appearing here and there, but it goes off in an altogether weirder direction, involving a shapeshifting monster and a horrific psychoanalyst. Enjoyable, but different.

Hokey Pokey

Thanks to NetGalley and Head of Zeus for the arc.

Welcome to the Regant Hotel Nora Dickinson, a psychoanalyst, has booked into Birmingham's The Regent Hotel in February 1929.
She is observing and reporting on the movements of a famous opera singer.
However, when a storm forces the hotel to close its doors, Nora is forced to confront her secrets.
At times, there is mystery, suspense, and even horror. Imaginative and occasionally surprising, even shocking.The flashbacks were flawless, and the narrative unravelling was flawless. Of course, I would have loved to like someone in the book, and I was reminded once again why I despise psychoanalysis, but this was done with enthusiasm. If you liked "Let the Right One In," you should check out Hokey Pokey.

This was a great read with a terrible blurb! It doesn't give an accurate depiction of the majesty of this read and the complexities enclosed. I loved the setting and the characters and found it to be really engaging with brilliant world building.

If this wasn’t a review copy, I probably would have DNF’d this book, mostly because it was really slow to start with and took a while to pick up. It wasn’t a bad book at all, but I don’t think it was for me.

Nora Dickinson is sent by Leo to follow his wife Berenice from Zurich to Birmingham in February 1929. He believes she is having an affair but wants proof.

The scene is set but once snow causes phone lines to go down and transport stop running, strange things start happening at the hotel and people start disappearing.

Very good characters with twists 6th could not have expected. Not everyone is as they se3m and danger and death are on the loose. Really enjoyed.

I think it's important to start this review by saying this book was a lot darker than I was anticipating and I would have liked the blurb to have detailed this a little more. I think some readers may be surprised by the content as both the cover and blurb give a very different feel to the vibe of this book.

That being said, I did enjoy this book overall, though it's very different to my standard reads. It's an interesting psychological thriller with a very atmospheric feeling from the outset and will suit those who enjoy dark, supernatural stories. I didn't feel there was a huge amount of depth to the overall story and plotline, but this may have been because this genre feels a little out of my normal comfort zone.

A good read but be aware, the blurb gives little indication of this novels darkness!

Thank you to Netgalley, Kate Mascarenhas and the publishers for this advanced readers copy.

Its February 1929 and Psychoanalyst Nora Dickinson has checked into the The Regent Hotel in Birmingham.
She is following the movements of a famous Opera singer and reporting back to her husband.
However, when a storm causes the hotel to shut its door Nora finds herself battling with her secrets.

This is not the sort of book I would normally read - I wasn’t expecting it to stray firmly into supernatural vampire/ werewolf territory. A fault of the blurb on the book, I would say. But nonetheless I did enjoy it.

I fear any review is going to be quite spoiler-y for this book. We have a 1920s grand hotel cut off by snow, a famous opera singer being watched by a psychoanalyst with a mysterious remit and an even more mysterious past, disturbing recollections that may or not be fantasy…

From the cover I thought this could be a classic mystery, but it’s much more than that. Mystery, suspense, even horror at times. Imaginative and rather surprising, even shocking, at times.

If you read stories for the plot, for the twists and turns and human psychology, if you don't care about liking your main characters but rather prefer them to be interesting, if you enjoy your fantasy with an extra layer of darkness, then this is a book for you.
I was attracted by the cover, intrigued by the blurb and hocked by the end of the first page. This is a very neat book and I will definitely look at the other work from the author. That said, I really didn't like any of the characters, which is something that usually bothers me quite a bit and will make me stop reading. Writing style and great plotting become the center of the story when characters cannot be relied upon to keep you hocked, and this novel delivered. I wanted to see where it all lead, and why, and how, those atrocious people has been created.
The flashbacks were perfect and the unraveling of the plot was masterfully done. Of course I would have preferred to like someone in the book, and I was freshly reminded of why I hate psychoanalysis so much, but this was done with gusto. If you loved "Let the Right One in" do try Hokey Pokey.

I was excited to read this book because I really loved the last Kate Mascarenhas book I read and I was surprised and impressed by how different the whole feel of Hokey Pokey was to The Thief on the Winged Horse.

I don’t read very much horror, despite being a fan of speculative fiction in general (a grouping that includes horror, fantasy and sci fi, to my understanding); but I thoroughly enjoyed Hokey Pokey and the near paranoia it inspired while I was reading it. By about two-thirds of the way through the book I was convinced the hotel was crawling with murderous monsters, and the way things tied up satisfactorily without leaving loose ends or seeming overly convenient was impressive. Some of the twists were expected, but no less interesting or horrifying for that.

I liked the vintage feel of the setting and world, and the classic literature elements of being snowed in, relying on long-distance trains and expensive, not entirely reliable telephone service added nicely to the feeling of isolation and suspense. The cover nicely captures the vintage feel of movie posters, or perhaps more appropriately opera posters, although I wished the supernatural horror themes were represented too.

Nora is a fascinating main character, and I loved the way she did thoroughly unsympathetic things at times. The way sexism is examined through her relationships with the hotel staff, other guests, past lovers, her parents and especially Berenice is excellent. The representation of queer people in different time periods is always appreciated, though I do wish Berenice as a bisexual people didn’t also play into the negative stereotype of bisexual people being cheating nymphomaniacs.

The non-linear plot really helped to make this story what it was, and I especially enjoyed slowly learning about Nora’s parents and past. The creeping dread and fairytale feel of her childhood in the woods, contrasted with the stiff formality of her life as an adult practicing medicine was fantastic. I love a strong, haunting ending to a novel as well, and there are definitely some eerie things still happening, even with the happy (if gory) ending that wraps up most of the mystery elements.

Overall, Hokey Pokey was a fantastic read that I’d recommend to anyone who enjoys classic horror or ghost stories, or modern mysteries and haunting tales but with a novel setting. I think this book would be good for anyone who enjoys Anne Bishop’s World of the Others novels (Lake Silence, Wild Country and Crowbones); Charlie N Holmberg's The Will and the Wilds, VE Schwab’s Near Witch, or classics like Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot novels, or Dracula by Bram Stoker.

The story centres around: Nora Dickinson & Berenice Oxbow, I guess the book is some form of supernatural horror. For me I struggled to settle into the book although the characters were intriguing. The book just didn't work for me but it is well written and will appeal to those who like this genre.

Hokey Pokey is a very hard to review without spoilers book! It took me a while to get into the swing of it, as I honestly didn’t know what kind of book I was reading, or even what genre the book was, for the first half.

Hoke Pokey seems like a normal read, a bit quirky, until you turn the page and something utterly bizarre happens that completely throws you off.

However, this isn’t necessarily a complaint as once I realised I just need to go with the flow with it, I started thoroughly enjoying it!

A short but sweet review because I truly can’t talk much without giving it away, but if you like dark, creepy, and slightly disturbing reads, Hokey Pokey is for you.

I rated Hokey Pokey 3.5/5⭐️

Let's get this straight - this is not a cozy murder mystery, but a supernatural horror novel. Not for the faint of heart! There are ghosts, there are monsters. It is dark and disturbing and gory. I was glued for the first half, but then lost interest in the characters and the storyline at about the midway point. I was intrigued by the snowed-in 1920s hotel, the guests and staff, but when we returned to the protagonist's childhood (necessary as it was to visit) it didn't hold my attention and I just wanted to get back to current events at the hotel. However, I found the novel to be well-written and atmospheric and now I'm curious to read one of the author's favorites, The Psychology of Time Travel.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC in exchange for this honest review.

Honestly, I don't even know where to start with this one.

It was definitely not the book I was expecting to read when I requested this book. I expected a closed-room, Agatha Christie-like cosy crime book. This was not that. Far from it actually and I think the book would benefit from a change in publicity.

The writing became comfortable to me (a non-native speaker) after reading for a bit, but I definitely sometimes still got lost in the lengthy descriptions of places and people. The introduction of the book felt all together too long for me, as I almost gave up reading. In the end, the way the story is set up works really well, but while reading it made for a very confusing experience.

Again, I think this book would definitely benefit from a change in description. This book will definitely appeal to a lot of readers, but it was a miss for me.

I very much enjoyed this puzzle of a book. Right from the beginning there are signs that something isn’t quite what it seems in this story. The author set a strange, creepy and ominous atmosphere that had me questioning what was real and what was really happening. I found myself taking nothing at face value, instead highlighting and theorising about the text to an extent I normally don’t. I also appreciated the feminist undertones and the queer romance. This is definitely horror, but not the gory and scary variety (although there definitely is some of that too) rather it’s a psychological and intellectual type of horror. If you enjoy gothic horror stories with supernatural elements and puzzling mysteries you might enjoy this book too!

This book should’ve been brilliant. I’m still not sure why it wasn’t, but I just didn’t care one bit. Characters were listless and not interesting, the plot was feeble and after a very slow start the ending was thrust together very quickly with no real answers to many questions.

The synopsis for this reads as historical fiction and crime… but it’s actually supernatural / borderline horror which is quite misleading, as is the cover.

The writing style wasn’t for me either. Very short sentences that makes the flow choppy, but then towards the end there was very little description so it was hard to visualise it at all. Parts of this should have been horrific and they just fell flat - I’m quite squeamish but none of the violence or intended bloodlust left any impact whatsoever, which shows how lacking it was.

Some of it made no sense at all: one bite of human flesh and you’re suddenly a shape shifter? Seems unlikely to me - it felt very contrived.

I was so excited for this book and it sadly left me disappointed and irritated.

Well that was a roller coaster of a book. It started out as quite an ordinary sort of murder mystery and I was getting to the point of getting quite bored, wondering whether I was going to be ploughing through the last two thirds.

Then we fell off a cliff in Part 2 into somewhere extremely dark, dangerous and so much more engaging. I zipped through pretty much all of the rest of the book.

I understand we were scene setting in the first third and it was necessary but I wasn't engaged, which is partly why I knocked a star off. I was also a tiny bit disappointed in the end of the book which felt just a bit rushed.

Other than that I enjoyed the supernatural aspects and the character of Nora was very intriguing. I'd definitely recommend this book.

Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

This wasn't what I was expecting from reading the blurb, I was anticipating a thriller/murder mystery but what I got was a supernatural horror book (think shape shifters/vampires), which is great as I love that genre! but maybe the description could be clearer. This book is bizzare in the best way, I thought it was utterly unique and I fell in love with the characters, the prose was beautiful and I 100% want to read more by this author! Thankyou so much to netgalley for the eARC

Overall, Hokey Pokey was an interesting read. An engaging read about an event in the life of a psychoanalyst, Nora. This is during a snowstorm and she is stuck in a hotel.

The writing is nice, with some lovely descriptions. The cover of this book is also good.