A KNOCKOUT!

This story paints a vivid picture of motherhood, especially early motherhood where things are beautiful and <i>you should be grateful, she’s perfect</i> and also so damn hard and lonely and you start to question was this worth it and then, right on time, here comes to guilt for even thinking that.

We this all unfold in our MC, Flora. She loves her newborn baby girl, Iris, fiercely. No, love can’t even begin to explain it. The word love just isn’t enough for this situation. She can’t help but feel, however, that life has been… less than perfect since Iris showed up. Flora is having a difficult time breastfeeding, she’s barely sleeping, and being a mother isn’t at all what she imagined it would be. Add to that that her husband is on military deployment so Flora is acting as a single mother while he is away. Severely sleep deprived and losing her grip on reality, Flora is desperate for help which winds up on her doorstep in the form of her mother who she hasn’t seen or spoken to in four years. But her mother isn’t the only visitors from her past that are beginning to pop up. Flora begins to wonder why all of this is happening now…

Liked:
-Look at that cover!
-Short chapters are a god-send
-The twists had me literally yelling out loud: <b>WHAT?! are you kidding me!?</b> They were so good.
-The writing is perfect; building and revealing in exactly the right spots
-Living inside of our MC’s mind. Even if she was going a little insane, I couldn’t look away.

Disliked:
-We hear an <u>awful</u> lot about the protagonist’s breasts and nipples and milk in the first parts of the book. Arguably too much but I can overlook it since everything else was so good.

Overall, an insanely great debut that is definitely worth the read. Thank you Mulholland Books and NetGalley for the digital copy! Out 09/17/2024!

Thank you to NetGalley and Mulholland Books for an ARC of Dearest.

Wow! This was a wild one. If "The Push" and "The Exorcist" had a baby, it would be Dearest. I had a difficult time putting this one down and was always telling myself "one more chapter" because I had to see what would happen next. My biggest complaint would be that the ending felt a bit rushed and unfinished. I also think it would be difficult to enjoy this book or connect with it if you aren't a mother, since so much of the book focuses on the struggles new mothers face.

Overall, a good quick read! 4 stars.

Dearest was the mother-daughter horror story of my dreams. Vivid story telling that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up straight. Flora might just be my new favorite unreliable narrator. Nothing could have prepared me for where this story was heading and where it ended up.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Mulholland Books for this e-arc!

This book was bonkers y’all! If you’re a fan for some crazy happenings in the horror genre, I recommend you adding this to your TBR.

Okay, let’s talk about Dearest. First, look at that striking cover ya’ll. LOVED IT as soon as I saw it pop up.

Flora is home alone with her new baby girl, Iris. Her husband Conner is away on deployment. Flora really loves Iris, so much so that it starts to scare her. Motherhood is starting to get to her. She begins to see hallucinations and wild happenings begin to transform. Scared she will hurt Iris, she calls to her estranged mother for help.

With her mother to help with Iris, Flora gets a little relief. However, Flora will soon find out RELIEF is the LAST things she’s gonna get. We begin to spiral down a psychological thriller trope of messed up mother and daughter relationships….. to transform into supernatural horror. Things get wonky.

This was balls to the wall! I noticed another review compare it to Nat Cassidy’s Mary and I would concur. Some dark humor with some messed up sh** …… you just can’t look away. I will definitely be looking out for Jacquie Walters from here on out. Solid disturbing story I really enjoyed.

Thank you so much for the opportunity NetGalley, Jacquie Walters and Mulholland Books! Expected publication date September 17, 2024.
4 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Is it the baby blues or are you being stalked by a creature called the Night Hag which has plagued you since childhood? Is this a commentry on post partum depression and the difficulties new mothers face or a spooky supernatural tale of possession? Surprise it's both! With echoes of Mary by Nat Cassidy and Rosemary's Baby what starts out as a pretty creepy domestic themed horror quirky spirals into a nightmarish supernatural possession- esque? story, this was equal parts disturbing and witty, I was in a constant pendulum swing of feeling unease one moment and laughing the next, Walter's has an uncanny ability to write biting commentry on issues pertaining to post partum depression and motherhood, there really is a need to cry over spilt milk in Flora's case as she navigates being a new mother and all the complications that come with it, nursing being one of them, I love ambiguity in horror but I didn't realise the narrator was *possibly* unreliable (or is she?) untill past half way, I was SHOOK, this kept me on my toes and I thought the author done a fantastic job of meshing reality with the supernatural
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TW: postpartum depression/psychosis

This is a book about the horrors of early motherhood. Your life is no longer your own. You’re leaking all kinds of fluids. You’re not sleeping. You might be possessed…well, this character might be. (But if you experience the kinds of things that this character does after giving birth, please go to your OB and talk about it. Flora is having a singular experience- modern medicine can help us real people.)

As the story begins, Flora is a new mom settling in for a few weeks alone with her new baby between her dad and stepmom helping out and her husband coming home from being deployed. Things quickly start taking a turn. It’s so interesting how much mothers will be able to relate to this woman’s experience within a horror story. In my opinion, the portrayal of Flora’s feelings of isolation is one of the great successes of this book. So much so, that you could remove the horror/fantasy elements and still have a powerful and thoughtful account of a mother’s experience with postpartum depression or psychosis.

Thanks for the ARC, Mulholland Books! I raced through it in an afternoon.

I thought this was an interesting read. I did not expect where it was going. I was not absolutely in love with it, but it was interesting.