As a long-time browser of r/NoSleep and fan of Dathan’s work, when I learned that Bad Man was being released, I was so excited. To learn that he was coming out with his first ever full-length novel—and his first new work in way too long—had me rushing to request this one, and I was beyond excited when I was approved for an ARC. That said, the end result left me with some very mixed thoughts about the execution of this story.

"He’s not coming home. It was the only echo that seemed to get louder over time, and Ben couldn’t deny that it had changed him, worn him down."

First, let me say that if you find yourself particularly susceptible to stories about child abduction, proceed with caution on this one. As a mother to a two-year-old, I rarely pick up books about kidnappings because they tend to wreak havoc on my emotional wellbeing, but since it was Dathan writing this one, I decided to give it a chance. While I never felt like I needed to DNF it, there were a few times where I had to put down my e-reader and do something else for a while, and I definitely shed a few tears (and cuddled my kiddo a lot in between chapters). The best execution of the entire storyline is the grief, and it is just written out so flawlessly that you can’t help but feel your heart break right alongside Ben’s.

"The sound was what Ben noticed the most. There was so much less to hear now, but Ben still listened."

The rest of the book’s various facets left me feeling ambivalent, frankly. It seemed as though every individual aspect to the storytelling just took things a little too far: the atmosphere was magnificently immersive until it became too repetitive, the red herrings were a whirlwind until they became too unreliable, and the unreliability of Ben’s narrative was a tremendous source of suspense until it began to feel like plot holes. More than anything, the slow burn of the story’s buildup was perfect for creating a nauseating sense of dread, until it reached a length at which I found myself simply ready for it to hurry up and end. Each of these complaints boil down to one thing: if this book had been 50-100 pages shorter, I bet it would have been a perfect 5-star read for me.

"Every person has a day that transforms trust into a choice, when he learns that people lie for reasons all their own."

All of that aside, it was obviously still an enjoyable read; that 3-star rating is more of a 3.5, and there were a lot of lesser aspects that I thought were great touches of detail. Ben is disabled and overweight, and while there is a bit of fat-shaming and ableism in regards to both of these things, I enjoyed the complexity it lent to his overall struggles and the back story he eventually came around to giving, explaining how he received his injury, and what that lack of mobility did to the rest of his daily life experiences.

"I’ll never leave you, Ben’s heart sobbed. Tell him. Tell him that I’ll stay with him forever. Even if that means neither of us can never ever leave, I’ll stay."

Was Bad Man a perfect read? No. It’s lengthy, it misses opportunities left and right, and to be totally fair, the ending left me with a sense of dissatisfaction that I haven’t been able to shake in the days since I finished reading it. Regardless, Dathan has a knack for plot lines and creepy settings, and my slightly lackluster response to this story will absolutely not slow me down when it comes time to reach for his next release, whenever that may be.

Content warnings for child abduction, abuse, fat shaming, ableism, substance addiction, racism, brief slur usage

All quotes come from an advance copy and may not match the final release. Thank you so much to Doubleday Books for providing me with this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Two brothers who are best friends. One day, one of the brothers goes missing. The surviving brother searches for the missing brother, but find their town deep into mystery and intrigue. It's not "IT" but...it could be.

Dathan Auerbach has written an atmospheric novel that gets to the heart of a missing person. The silence between updates. The fear of death. The 'sightings'. This is a book about a small town and the monsters that live there and inside of people.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Despite my best efforts, after making it nearly halfway through this book I just could not bring myself to go on and had to DNF. I kept hoping SOMETHING would happen to keep me engaged and it didn't. It shouldn't take nearly 200 pages for a book to reel me in, and from what I can tell, this one was never going to. I certainly cannot speak for everyone and would never say "do not buy this book!" Because everyone is different and what I found to be boring and quite repetitive, someone else may find intriguing. But for me, it definitely felt like way too much of the same thing with the very occasional "spooky" aspect tossed in as an attempt to keep the reader wanting more. For me it was a failure and I doubt I'll be giving this book a second chance in the future.

This was just not good. I got about 40 pages in, and that's all I could stand. The writing is juvenile, and I don't feel like that was because the characters are young, I think that's just the way Auerbach writes. It reads like someone trying really, really hard to emulate a classic of the horror genre.

I got an arc copy of this, which makes me feel super guilty for not finishing it, but Bad Man was a real dud. I don't have time for books like this in my life. I'm sure the author put a lot of hard work into this, but it was absolutely not for me.

Set in North Florida during the late 1980s, this story penned by Dathan Auerbach (100Vultures of Reddit fame) will scare the absolute mess out of you. A seemingly malevolent sentience possesses the grocery store where Ben lost his brother. When Ben takes on a third shift stocking position and resumes his hunt for his brother, the store begins to hunt him. Part mystery, part horror, this atmospheric horror will make you just as paranoid as Ben. The creepy notes (HI BEN) will stay with you. I stayed up entirely too late to finish this and had to sleep with the light on. The ending is pure madness. HIGHLY recommended for fans of stalker stories, character-driven plots, and creepypasta lovers.

Thank you to NetGalley and Doubleday books for an advanced read in exchange for this review.

Ben's brother, Eric, disappeared when he looked away for a second while at the grocery store. He was never found. Five years later, Ben is now working at that same store. Everything feels creepy, and he feels like the store is trying to tell him something. He's determined to find out.

Okay, I have mixed feelings about this one. It's a good setup for a story. Ben is a likeable character. However, it lacks suspense. It needs that to carry the story. I felt bored at times. The author does a great job of establishing the setting and characters, but the plot drags on and on. I really wished I liked it better.

First off I would like to say this cover is stunning! It's super creepy and I wanted to read this before i even read the synopsis! In the prologue I was super excited because I got a Stephen King vibe... That's where it ended for me... I read the first 200 pages and nothing happened... Literally the first half is of the main character Ben just stalking shelves at the grocery store and i little bit of him hanging flyers around town... BORING! This book did not need to be 400 pages... It should have been a short story with 200 pages tops! Around the 300 page mark, still not much has happied. A few times I thought "okay this is it! This is where it's going to get really good and I can breeze right thought the last bit of pages"... this was not the case just went you think its going to pick up it cuts to a different almost pointless scene. I think think I would have liked this book if it was at least 200 pages shorter. The ending is good and there's a creepy story within the story that i loved, but the book as a whole was not for me. There is too much fillers and almost no suspense throughout the 400 page book!

Everything about this book gave me reason to love it, except for one small problem -- I needed more information to truly feel the terror.

Bad Man is about a family tragedy and the effect it has on one person in particular--Ben, the older brother of Eric, who disappeared five years prior. Ben is now 20 and miserable, stuck in a small town with no particular direction, his father and stepmother mostly sleepwalking through a life they can't really afford anymore and a nightmare that will probably never end. Ben ends up getting a job stocking shelves at the very supermarket that Eric disappeared from, and that's where things begin to unravel even further.

Auerbach has created a tightly wound story that kept up the tension throughout, and kept me interested in knowing how this would all play out. There are some great red herrings, some absolutely gutting family drama, and an overall excellent command of the particular tautness that a horror-thriller needs. And on the thriller end, I think it works beautifully. But on the horror end, it was lacking, just a bit. There needed to be more--more about Blackwater, more about Beverly (and Blackwater), and more about the bad man. Sure, there were snippets from the bad man--a line or two of what read like internal dialogue, every few chapters. That was effective, in that it set up something sinister. But it never gave us the pay off. And for me, as a longtime horror reader, that made what could have been a great book into merely a good one. I will be curious to see where Auerbach goes next--Penpal was a sparse and scary novella. Bad Man offers more meat but lacks bone-cracking marrow. I'm hoping he digs deep and gives us that next.

Always on the hunt for something creepy, I took one look at the blurb for Bad Man and knew I had to read it. I suppose it did deliver on the creepy, but those parts were few and far between, mixed in with confusing conversations that went nowhere, lots of details about working nights in a grocery store, and a ton of confusion. More than once, I found myself rereading passages to see if I missed something, anything to show me where that passage was leading. In most cases, I didn't find that elusive something. There is some suspense surrounding the grocery store and some of the characters, but suspense only works if the story holds the reader's interest. This one didn't. To put it bluntly, I was bored out of my mind for most of this book. Ben's twisted dreams did provide some moments of possible creepiness, at least until he woke up. Ben is the epitome of unreliable, but again, that only works if his tale is interesting. Being the glutton for punishment that I am, I kept reading, hoping for something exciting to happen. The ending did pick up and was certainly weird, but I wouldn't necessarily say it was scary enough to classify it as horror. What I ended up with was a five-star blurb and promising story with a one-star delivery and several hours of reading time that I can never get back.

It's not too often that I pause while reading a book to admire the writing. I mean, just the craft, the way the words are put together: I really enjoy the way Dathan Auerbach writes. The writing falls apart a bit as the book progresses -- you can almost feel the deadline looming, the way the transitions go from smoothly turned to unintendedly jarring -- but this is still a solidly written horror novel. Set in the 1980s in the Florida panhandle, Bad Man is the story of Ben, a young man who is a teenager when his little brother goes missing on a trip to the grocery store. Five years later, Ben's family is still barely coping with Eric's loss. Ben himself has hardly recovered from the twin disasters of his brother's disappearance and an earlier car crash that seriously weakened his leg. Desperate for work, Ben accepts a position as stock boy at the same grocery store where he last saw Eric. Spending long nights there, often alone, has him starting to believe that the place holds sinister secrets, and that if only he can uncover them, he'll be able to discover once and for all what really happened to his brother.

Bad Man is a terrific exploration of guilt and longing and memory in small-town America, far removed from bucolic romanticism and nostalgia. I would have liked more of an explanation of the particulars of Eric's abduction: I assume he was lured away but the details otherwise are elided a little too much for me. I want to know why his abductor did it ("crazy" is not a good enough reason for a book that isn't afraid to dive deeply into Ben's psyche,) and more about Blackwater and the blond kid. And, I dunno, I didn't really like the ending. I can sorta get over what happens to Ben, but I think it could have been linked back to the beginning better. I also didn't really get the point of the interludes, which I imagine are a story told by <font color="#ffffff">the blond kid to Eric</font>. Again, I felt like it was something that could have been linked back more tightly to the main narrative.

Overall, however, I quite enjoyed the way this book dealt with the horrors of child abduction and its lingering aftereffects on everyone involved. Going back to the subject of craft, there were so many set pieces that begged for a visual adaptation that I'm kinda hoping this makes its way to a screen somehow. I don't usually like horror movies, but I'd definitely consider watching that one.

A decent setup leads to a disappointing read. When a three-year-old vanishes at a Florida supermarket, his older brother becomes obsessed with finding out what happened. Years later, he takes a job at the scene of the vanishing and soon discovers a strangeness about the store. This book didn't hold my interest and at some point I started rooting for the evil grocery store to take him too. Thumbs down. Read something better.

3.5/5 stars.

I was so excited to get an ARC of this book as it was one of my most anticipated horror books of 2018.
We follow Ben and his unending quest to find his missing younger brother Eric who vanished five years prior in their local supermarket. Now, being older and needing work, his only place where he has a chance of employment is in the very place where his brother went missing: the supermarket.

The premise alone had me jumping and willing October to come faster.

Dathan Auerbach does such a great job in the development of Ben. We see his vulnerability as he keeps up hope that his brother is still alive. His intense loyalty and love for his brother as he stops at nothing to keep Eric’s name relevant to his neighbors and everyone in his town. We see the complex emotions that Ben and his family have towards one another: the blame, the guilt, the resentment. As well as the complex emotion of doubt and paranoia that sprouts in Ben’s brain as his searching leads him down a very winding road.

The atmosphere is what I liked the most about this book. The tension and suspense that was built up in this book is what I love from horror/thriller novels. I feel my heart speed up and I’m leery of turning the page because I’m scared of what may happen, but still turning the page regardless because my curiosity is that great. (Which tells you, I would not survive in a horror movie.)

However, as much as I liked Ben and the tension, the execution of this wonderful premise fell short for me. As stated before, Ben was developed so well, but I cannot say the same for the rest of the characters in this story. As well as there was too much happening that some parts of the book I was left really confused.
The big “plot twist” that occurs in the book was so anti-climactic and the ensuing scenes afterwards seemed so forced. There were scenes that were written that did not go anywhere. The intermittent pages from an unknown narrator were also not necessary, in my opinion. They didn’t explain nor further the story in any way. (Which could be said of some characters as well.)
The ending was the most disappointing to me. I don’t mind not having a happy ending, but a complete ending was needed for this and I don’t think we got it. We leave off exactly where the book started and i’m left with a lot of questions and a sigh of discontentment.
It also didn’t do justice to the issue that it was trying to wrap itself around: child vanishings/abductions and the side effects it causes (PTSD, mental health, etc.)

All in all, it was an average read. I appreciate it for the piece of entertainment that it is and for it’s ability to make me so empathetic towards Ben and his struggles/failures/victories.

I struggled and struggled with this one. I ended up not finishing it. It wasn't holding my attention, and it moves way too slow for me. This one just wasn't for me.

Well, that was disappointing.

This is an extremely creepy book. High, high creep factor. Five years ago, Ben's little brother Eric went missing from the town grocery store. He's been obsessed with finding him ever since, while his family falls apart around the loss of the little boy.

For some inexplicable reason, Ben takes a job at this Wal-Mart-esque store, as an overnight stocker. The work is easy, though it seems like nothing ever gets done with all the sitting and spying and breaking and entering. The boss knows who Ben is, and for some reason, really hates him for it.

There's something off in this store, with the people, with the manager, with the cardboard crusher. Everything is off, and it all has something to do with Eric's disappearance.

This book needs a heavy red pen and some scissors. Because it's clear the author is an excellent atmospheric writer, but there is far, far too much going on in this story. There is so much dragging the plot down, things that genuinely do not matter, such as Ben's body dysmorphia. I thought this would tie in with some unreliable narrator vibes, but there was no pay off on that.

Same with almost every red herring we get. It's incredibly hard to keep up with what's happening because there is so much crammed in here. I feel like we could've lost 150 pages and still kept the creep factor, and kept the plot moving so much faster.

I'm really disappointed. This had such potential. I need to read Auerbach's first book and see if I feel any different.

I found this book to be a little on the boring side for me. As you can see there are many different reviews ranging from 2 stars to 5. This is the genre I love and so I felt like I should have fallen right in but really couldn’t. Not until close to the end did it seem that the writer found his groove. The overal premise of the book was great. The characters seemed to be an issue that the writer struggled with and in turn made it hard for the reader. I felt like it was choppy in some places and smooth in others. However, with the different reviews you should read this one for yourself.

Thank you to netgalley as well as the author/publisher for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

2.5 stars ⭐️ out of 5

I first became familiar with Dathan Auerbach several years ago when he was known as /u/1000Vultures on Reddit. He wrote the serial-creepypasta series, Penpal, in the /r/nosleep subreddit. No Sleep’s subreddit has one rule: “Suspension of disbelief is key here. Everything is true here, even if it’s not.” In other words, it is a subreddit for authors to post their horror stories and readers/commenters had to go along with it. It’s a creepy good time.

Dathan Auerbach eventually published Penpal into a full length novel, and then once I heard he wrote Bad Man , I really wanted to read it. Luckily Doubleday Books reached out to me and offered me an ARC!

Bad Man begins with brothers, Ben and Eric, who are out having a normal day shopping for groceries. Ben suffers leg pain from an old injury, so he’s not having a good time shopping with his distracting three year-old brother, Eric. Then Eric disappears. Five years later, Ben ends up getting a job as a stocker in the same grocery store from which Eric vanished. Ben believes the answers to his brother’s disappearance lies within those grocery store walls.

Right away the writing style and spook-factor reminded me a bit of Stephen King. I was immediately pulled into the story as soon as Eric disappeared. Add in some suspicious coworkers, a terrible boss, and shady towns folk, and I was hooked. Not to mention the cops in town were horribly useless. Really this book had all the elements of a fantastic horror-crime story. I had a hard time putting this book down and there were so many twists. I was honestly guessing until the very end.

And even though it’s never specified, I believe the book takes place sometime in the 80’s or 90’s. An era without cell phones and digital cameras. I love books in these settings because it makes everything so much more complicated. You have no way to google police reports or snap a photo of a suspicious person on your phone. Ah, the good ol’ days.

A few things that ultimately led to a three star rating are minor. I felt like the book was too much of a slow-burn for my tastes. It felt like things really didn’t start to pick up until I passed the 60% point. Also several scenes were a bit too over descriptive for me (for example there was an entire page about fixing a cabinet, and several pages describing a baler.) I know lots of readers enjoy descriptive scenes for the world building, so I think this writing style just wasn’t for me. As for the ending, I was left feeling unsatisfied.

With my minor qualms aside, I truly thought the horror elements were strong. There were so many scary parts! Auerbach really knows how to reel us in with his creepy-campfire storytelling while still weaving in themes of brotherhood, love, and hope.

I suggest you read Bad Man with the lights off to get those extra creepy vibes.

Bad Man by Dathan Auerbach poses the question, how far are we willing to go when everyone else gives up hope? This is the question Ben ask himself while searching for his little brother, Eric, who was lost in a grocery store at the tender age of three.

Ben and Eric have your typical brother dynamic, Ben constantly entertaining Eric with hide-and-seek and a banter that never ceases. Ben takes Eric on their weekly errand of grocery shopping from a list his step-mother Deidra has provided him. Full of energy and wild at the promise of candy if he behaves, Eric can barely control himself in the store. Having gotten a handful to control, Ben pulls Eric’s arm, bringing them closer together and threatening to not give Eric the candy. At check-out, they have just made it to their turn at the checkout when Eric has to pee. The man behind them offers to take Eric to the restroom, but Ben politely declines. “It’s no problem,” the man asks again. Ben takes Eric to the bathroom, as Eric is buttoning his pants, his favorite stuffed rhino, Stampie, tumbles into the toilet. Ben tells Eric not to move from the corner as he cleans Stampie up as much as possible. He turns around, ready to present Stampie back to Eric, but he’s not there. This is the moment Ben’s world changes forever.

Five years later, the detective in charge of the case, Detective Duchaine hasn’t had anything to report in some time. Meanwhile, Ben has never stopped looking. There’s not a door he hasn’t knocked on and continuously surveys the neighborhood for new families that may not have heard about Eric. In an effort to ease the financial burden, since Deidra doesn’t work, and the only source of income is his father’s delivery route, Ben applies to every place in town. His only break is at the grocery store in town that Eric went missing.

It’s here that Ben begins to become engrossed even further for the quest to find his brother. He feels so close. He begins to slowly discover clues, like his new-friend Marty says he saw Eric six month ago, but the Missing Persons number has no record of this call. The appearance of Stampie in the Lost & Found, having been lost of the day that his life was turned upside down. His boss, Bill Palmer threatens to fire him once he realizes exactly who Ben is.

It’s at the grocery store that Ben can feel is the heart of all of this. That answers are there, just waiting for his discovery. Nothing can alter his preset and his search accepts no boundaries, no authority to hinder his agenda. Despite all of his efforts, he doesn’t see what is so blatantly in front of him.

I want to extend a special thank you to Doubleday Books and NetGalley for granting me the Advance Reader’s Copy. I also want to thank Dathen Auerbach for crafting a story that takes you on an adventure of mystery, deceit, and a head-game that will have your imagination reeling.

First I want to thank netgalley and the author for an advanced copy of this book for my kindle. This book started out really well but started dragging towards the middle and the end really disappointed me!! I enjoyed the depth of the characters and you could feel the pain coming from Ben. The story was about how Ben is living with the guilt of losing his brother while at the grocery store he can’t help but feel it’s his fault since he was babysitting him. So after so many years he decides to get a job at the grocery store that his brother disappeared from. I felt this book was in slow motion. Took me a little bit to finish and the ending was so disappointing for me since the story dragged. Bad man just wasn’t for me

2.5 stars.
I was really intrigued by the blurb for this story however, the story itself was really underwhelming. Ben is living with the guilt of losing his little brother while at the grocery store. He can't help but feel like it's his fault. He is desperately searching for answers, so he gets job at the store where the abduction took place. This is where things should have picked up but it just dragged. There was no intense climax or hook. The rest of story just kinda took place in slow motion. Also the ending for me was very unsatisfying after reading such a sluggish story line.

Bad Man is quite a page turner and introduced me to a new author I will keep an eye on for future books! The pace was fast and the story intricate, even if the ending wasn't totally satisfying. I am a character driven reader, and I felt this was the author's strongest point, creating fleshed out, 'real' characters. Recommended!