I thought this book was interesting, but could not find my footing nor was I really engaged. Perhaps it's just a consequence of the time, but I have to DNF this one all the same. Nevertheless, thanks for allowing me to read in advance — I really love the cover!

This is the second book by Caite Dolan-Leach I've read. I really enjoyed Dead Letters and liked the format and subject. The premise of this book is very interesting. A group of young twenty-somethings decide to start their own commune. Though they know virtually nothing about living off the grid and living off the land. Of course things can and do go wrong. While I found the book ok, I didn't like it as much as Dead Letters.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an advanced copy of We Went to the Woods by Caite Dolan-Leach. The premise of this book was super interesting and exciting to me. I love to read and learn about cults and communes and intentional living collectives. This had a lot of potential to be a good story. The characters were great and the setting was painted beautifully, however, the build up was so incredibly slow. Pages were wasted with musing of the main character and hardly any time was spent on some of the major plot points. Mysteries were left unsolved by the end and I wanted to hear so much more about the failings of the Collective community. The big ending seemed to come out of nowhere because we didn't get enough information leading up to it about what was really happening beneath the surface of the community. The ending wrapped up very quickly and I would've liked my narrator's musing to be at that point, when there was actually something to muse upon.

Regarding natural surroundings as restorative spaces isn’t new, and neither is seeking out the solitude of the woods as an intentional escape. In Henry David Thoreau’s Walden, he explains: “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.”

It’s this deliberate living that the ensemble cast of Caite Dolan-Leach’s novel, We Went to the Woods, uses as their model for what they call the Great Experiment. Mackenzie Johnston, or Mack, moves back home to Ithaca, New York, after leaving a graduate program in anthropology. When she meets Louise Stein-Jackson, the young women hit it off, and Louise quickly invites Mack into her group of friends — Chloe, Jack, and Beau. Before long, the newly established group of five moves to a plot of land owned by Louise’s family and sets up their homestead for the experiment: a main cabin with a wood stove and storage for preserved vegetables, small single-room cabins for sleeping, a water source. Louise, the de facto leader, dismisses the idea of setting up rules like Thoreau purported to and instead stresses the goal of controlling what they eat and how this food is made.

It’s clear why a person would want to retreat to a restorative setting, especially a space that would allow more control over their impact on the environment. At the wedding in the woods, though, we quickly considered all that we would have to give up to do so: jobs, friends close-by, neighborhoods, grocery stores, even walking everywhere we needed to go each day. After the celebrations ended, we drove back to our homes and our lives in the city, happily sun-soaked but ready to return. Dolan-Leach’s novel, We Went Into the Woods, hinges on this question on the other side of this group’s decision: What would make a person want to leave society in the first place?

Dolan-Leach allows the reader insight into Mack’s reasoning right away. Mack, the narrator, describes her return home as shameful — but she withholds almost all of the details. This omission propels the first sections of the book, but by the time Mack has joined this group of friends and moved to the Homestead, it’s easy to lose this thread just long enough for Mack’s reflections to be a welcome reminder to pay closer attention.

It’s through Mack’s narration, then, that we learn about the other characters. She falls into the close-knit cluster of friends deeply and quickly, refreshed by their intellectual conversations and their dynamic as a group: “I was hungry for conversation, for people who played parts and over-imbibed and told stories and knew one another too well.” In the beginning, this conversation is rife with allusions to Ancient Greek texts and American Transcendental ideologies, as well as debates about morality and responsibility in the age of modern technology and global warming. As sexual attraction and disagreement raise tensions at the Homestead, Mack’s recounting focuses less on this intellectual content and more on how these people interact with each other and, perhaps most importantly, interact with her.

Dolan-Leach begins the first line of the novel with Mack’s confession: “I’m the wrong one to tell our story.” But if Mack is an astute observer and an outsider invested in these people and their Great Experiment, she seems like the ideal group member to tell this story. This confession frames the suspenseful novel and adds another layer to its driving question — you can’t help but keep reading to figure out why Mack has reason to leave not only society, but also this new intentional community, this Great Experiment that brought her into the woods.

meh ! not for me.

Nothing worth noting is happening in this book, just spoiled young people starting a communal farm.
Survivor on steroids with all the human connections and struggles of community living.

Always a challenge to not love a book. Somehow it feels like a direct and personal judgement of the writer but sometimes its just the wrong reader for the story.

Thank you to the publisher Random House and the author Caite Dolan-Leach for the ARC in exchange of my honest review

A group of young, disenchanted college students move to upstate New York to set up a commune. They know little about how to live off the grid or the land, hop from bed to bed, and keep secrets from each other. What could go wrong? I really wanted to like this book. I really wanted to like Mack, Beau, Jack, Louisa, and Chloe, but they came off as arrogant, unrealistic, and often ridiculous. I know a lot of people this age, and while they may have ideals, they aren't this clueless and pompous. This book just falls flat and comes across as implausible. Not my cup of tea.

Not the book for me. I found the story slow taking a long time to reveal anything. The characters were well planned and the storyline could have been good. Not sure where this went wrong for me or what could have been different but it just wasn't my thing.

This book was sadly not for me. It took me about 4 months to get through 20% of the book. Most times I sat down to read I would either put this down to watch tv, or read something else. I absolutely hate when I cannot finish a book, but this turned me into a completely unmotivated reader. The second I decided to not continue this one, I picked up a different book and read to 20% in one sitting. I did not finish so I don't feel comfortable giving a rating - so rather than leaving blank (since I need to rate) I will do a middle rating of 3.

3 for neutral, not for me. I tried and tried, but eventually decided to write the review even though I had not finished. Will update if able to enjoy at a later date!

So sorry, I wasn't able to read this before it was archived. I am looking forward to reading it, so I will buy it and replace this review with an actual review of the book soon!

Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC of We Went to the Woods by Caite Dolan-Leach in exchange for an honest review.
First - the good: This novel was beautifully written, with a fair amount of character development. I could feel the grittiness of the earth, the commune, the fragile relationships. I could feel the ease as well as the tension as they navigated through life on the Homestead.
Now - the bad: I could not wait for this novel to end. I just wanted it to be over! It took forever to get to the point, and to the climax of the story. I nearly did not finish this novel, but I felt that I had to since I was given an ARC. To me, the story just dragged on and on and on.
The story is about 5 millennials who are disillusioned with the world and the corporate impact on the environment. They are adamant about preserving the earth for future generations. They are all from well-to-do families, except for Mack (Mackenzie) who is a struggling former PhD candidate (anthropology) who had an unfortunate and embarrassing moment on reality television. Of course, I didn't think it was so bad that it warranted all the attention - plus it took a long time for that incident to be revealed. Plus, there is a seedy undertone to the entire commune experience that comes to light late in the book.
I feel as if this was not the book for me. I like more action, and I felt like I was watching paint dry. This just didn't do it for me.
#WeWenttotheWoods #CaiteDolanLeach #NetGalley

This one was not for me and a case of just not being the right reader for this one. It didn't catch my attention and I struggled to finish it. So I will keep this short.

Unfortunately, I could not bring myself to finish this book. I was very excited to read it based on the blurb. But once I started reading, it was very slow to start. The narrator clearly had an interesting back story being hinted at, but the hints were too broad. While I wasn't getting details on her past, I also wasn't moving forward into the meat of the story itself. I found myself bored and dreading reading until I stopped and moved on to another book.

I had really high hopes for this book and maybe I'll try it again someday and enjoy it more, but right now, it was a miss for me.

This book is what you would get if you took a 60's commune and inhabited with present-day millennials. Five individuals take to the woods for a more sustainable, simple lifestyle. But complications and secrets make that a challenge.

I had read the previous book by this author, which I did enjoy as well. She has an engaging writing style, and distinct voices for her characters. I will say that I didn't feel overly connected to any of the characters, but it didn't prevent me from enjoying the book

I would definitely read this author again.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me a copy of this for an unbiased review.

5 millenials go off into the woods in search of creating their own self sufficient community. As with every similar effort what could possibly go wrong? Something or everything.

We Went to the Woods is about five twenty-something friends living off the earth to take over control of their lives from how their food is grown to how they spend their days. Mac, Beau, Louisa, Jack and Chloe move into the "Homestead" with it's five basic, one-room cabins for sleeping and a larger main cabin with a kitchen and gathering room. They have no running water, no electric, and must grow everything they consume. They face a multitude of challenges including interpersonal relationships, weather, wild animal life, hard back-breaking work, and neighbors. Mac has decided to record their experiment for posterity and possibly for a future career path for herself. Everything goes well until feelings and relationships start to blur. How long can their experiment last before one of the group breaks?

I was drawn into this book at the beginning and enjoyed it throughly until the last two chapters. The well developed characters are interesting, charismatic, and entertaining. The problems they face and how they solve them are real and relatable. Towards the end, I wasn't sure where the book would go, and I was disappointed in the ending. It felt awkward and unauthentic, not the ending the characters deserved. But, overall this was an imaginative, well written read. (And if you ask why I gave it five stars even though I didn't like the ending, I don't feel like I have to agree with an ending for it to be an awesome book.)

Appreciate the advanced copy, but was unable to finish this book. It did not hold my interest. The first few chapters didn’t pull me in, and I was struggling to get through this one.

This novel is a commentary on society, its flaws, and an attempt to escape it altogether. Louise, Beau, Chloe, Jack Mack all decide to move to an abandoned farm in upstate New York. There, they exchange sexual favors with each other, creating a tension that is under the surface since no one talks about it. Mack is the narrator of the story, and she does a good job of describing the atmosphere of the farm but does not do a good job of describing the characters and their emotions. I envisioned the communes of the 60’s as I read this book and enjoyed the description of the raspberry harvest and the day they got the goat. But the book was very slow-paced, with little or no real action. I had to make myself continue to read it at times because it was so boring and not at all interesting to me since, although I grew up in the 60’s, I was not part of the counter-culture. This book is more of a commentary on a social experiment that goes bad, and the conclusion leaves something to be desired since I was kind of left saying, “Huh?” Readers of social commentary may enjoy this book, but it is not for everyone, and it was not for me.

Thank you netgalley for an ARC copy of this book. This was my first time reading a Caite Dolan-Leach book. This was a real great mystery book. A real page turner from the beginning to the end. I recommend that this should be on everyone's reading list.

A compelling read! I suspect a lot of the low-to-middling ratings of this book were caused by the description, which reads like that of a slow-burn psychological thriller. This is not that kind of book—it's a group character study set in the woods, with a collection of fairly privileged millennial protagonists at its center. I own a copy of Dolan-Leach's first novel, Dead Letters, which I have never quite been able to get through. Now, after rearranging my expectations and enjoying We Went to the Woods quite a bit, I plan to revisit Dead Letters to see if I get on with it a little better. Dolan-Leach's writing is lovely and atmospheric, and I look forward to seeing what she writes next.