I loved the Strain series, so I expected to enjoy this. It was meh. Part of the problem for me was I didn’t like Hugo Blackwood. The other part was that I listened to the audiobook on the NetGalley app and it kept stopping after almost every chapter. (I don’t know why it happened. I tried updating everything with no results.) It kept me frustrated, when I was already frustrated with one of the characters. The narrator was enjoyable.

This book was quite amazing! I have to say at the beginning it didn’t completely grab my attention. It was interesting but I wasn’t as invested in the story as I usually like to be. That being said, once it jumped back to the first timeline story I was able to really get into it. Personally I find it hard when a novel jumps between times or stories at the very beginning. Mainly because I’m still getting to know the characters so it’s hard to follow. But within about 50 pages I fell in love. Thank you NetGally for the audiobook arc (and Alexa for the physical arc) I thoroughly enjoyed the writing style and character development. This was the first novel I’ve read by Guillermo Del Toro, I cant wait to find and read more of his novels!

Wow. That was a whole lot of meh.

This was pretty dull, pretty unscary, and pretty unmemorable. I expected a lot more, considering the name on the cover. My mistake since I was sorely disappointed. The characters were blah and generic. I've pretty much forgotten the main character already, even though I finished it a few hours ago. I also felt kind of icky reading this because of the amount of times the graves of slaves were used as a place for dark magic to happen.

I received this ARC through NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I began this novel with high expectations. Del Toro is a prolific director known for more than one fantastical story. The promise of a horror novel with his name attached to it was exciting.

The novel was fast-paced, rotating between three connects storylines/timelines. Unfortunately, the primary story was the least interesting of the three. Agent Odessa’s story began with strength and suspense, but quickly fizzled to something too familiar. Despite the supernatural elements and introduction of plenty of varied characters, the story felt tired. Everything that occurred was expected, and nothing was surprising passed the first chapter.

The alternate storylines, one set in the 1960s and one set in the 1500/1600s felt more original. If the authors had focused one of these storylines instead, I truly feel the novel would have had a far greater impact and more room for originality.

In addition, I found there to be some strange politics and implications involved in regards to the use of Black slave ghosts as pawns. I don't feel that the authors ever made a productive or informative commentary on the use/abuse of the memory of slaves, so this repeated inclusion felt gratuitous and uncomfortable.

Thank you NetGalley and Hachette for a copy of the audiobook ARC of The Hollow Ones by Chuck Hogan and Guillermo del Torro. The story follows an FBI agent looking for answers as to why her partner went suddenly crazy while int he middle of investigating a shooting. The exposition for the strange occurrences reach back into the past (way back to the 1500s and forward) for snippets that feed the modern day story. The story follows many thriller, horror and FBI tropes, including its action packed pace. The story; however, is compelling and earns a four-star review from me as a result of the narration.

This crime thriller mixed with supernatural elements was a great story.  The plot kept you engaged, however the audiobook version was a little difficult to follow.  Overall I enjoyed the crime solving aspect of this book and initially felt he supernatural side felt far fetched until I embraced it for what it was and really started to enjoy the plot of The Hollow Ones.

The Hollow Ones moves fast.  Immediately pulling you into an FBI investigation.  Partners following up on a political crime scandal suddenly find themselves following their suspect as he goes on a rampage.  Nothing in his past lead them to believe he would become a spree killer.  When it is all said and done, Odessa is suspended and her partner is dead.  She starts to see that other, similar crimes are happening all over.  She soon learns that they happened before.

That seems like enough to work with, but we meet Solomon.  Another FBI agent from another time on another case.  When Odessa is cleaning out his office, she comes across his files.  That's where she learns about Mr. Blackwood.  And that's when it gets pretty interesting.  

The narrator did well to give the listener the experience of different characters with different voices.  There were a few times when the voices just didn't work and I was brought out of the story briefly, but it rarely happened.  I would love the see Mr. Blackwood again.

This was another good story by del Torro and Hogan. This is the first time I've really given an audiobook a go, and narrator did an excellent job. However, the playback was jumping all over the place so I know I missed a lot of chapters. I will be purchasing a copy of the book once it's out so I can read the whole thing.

New release from Guillermo del Toro, author of The Strain and director of Pan's Labyrinth.  It was creepy but not necessarily horror. It's more of a ghost story involving the FBI and the supernatural. It's much like an X-File except the female lead is definitely no Dana Scully. She is portrayed as extremely defensive and closed minded with daddy issues. The male lead, Hugo Blackwood was the interesting character and the story revolves around 3 time periods involving him. The narration by Brittany Pressley was well done.  3 stars.    

Thank you to NetGalley and Hatchette Audio for the audiobook

The Hollow Ones by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan is a beautiful book. Thank you Netgalley for the audiobook. I know that people don't often associate a horror/thriller/supernatural book as beautiful, but the way one is drawn in to the characters and storyline are beautiful. I found I listened to half the book in one day, simple because I had to know what happened to Odessa, Solomon and Blackwood. This is definitely a read that I recommend highly. The book just flies by and so did my day. Yet another great book by del Toro.

The Hollow Ones was a fun and easy book to read, as in you knew what to expect, where the plot was generally headed and that there was a familiarity to it. It actually reminded me of the film Fallen which also features a body hopping demon.

I liked this book but it wasn’t doing anything new or mind-blowing, and as with The Strain which is also by Del Toro and Hogan it read like it was made for tv. I could imagine this book as the first few episodes of a show and to be honest I’d probably watch it. If this book sounds like something you’d like I’d recommend it, but if not you’re not missing out on too much if you give this a pass.

What an atrociously bad novel. 

This is my first book from del Toro and Hogan. I own THE STRAIN, and one of Hogan's thrillers, but if they're as mundane and cliched as this mess, I'll take a hard pass. I can only imagine this exists in the publishing world because del Toro's name is on it, because if this were from an unknown author, I'd hazard a guess and say it would've never made it out of the slush pile. 

I'm a big fan of del Toro as a director, but everything I love about his work is absent here, number one being any originality whatsoever.

I received this through NetGalley as one of their new audiobooks, and boy am I glad I didn't pay for it, or waste an Audible credit on it.

Fun read. Felt like a comic book or TV show/movie, in a good way. Like a mix of Hellboy and King's The Outsider. Also reminded me of the film Fallen. Demonic/mystical/immortal villain must be stopped by regular people. Tough FBI agent partnered with delightful ancient British ghost type character? Whats not to love.

It’s a pretty solid down the rabbit hole of the occult via a police officer that witnesses something horrific and uncanny. I don’t think there’s anything here that’ll blow your mind if you’ve read something like this before, but the plot is fresh enough to combat the overused framework.

Have you seen Fallen or read The Dresden Files? You’ll even passingly next familiar with the story. It does have a few sidewinders that differentiate it, such as jumping between past and present. In the past, a black FBI officer investigated strange things happening, in the future a woman investigates something, and the two converge.

The plot clips along nicely, the characters are pretty engaging, though sometimes it feels like the authors can’t decide if they’re going for commercial fiction or not, in terms of structure and prose. I’m not sure if it’s handling of racial issues as a white man in Canada, but it seems to already have led to polarizing reviews. One of the investigations is a white man who has been lynched. The intent is a kind of sick perversion but whether or not it’s serviceable you the aims of the story is debatable.

That being said. I found it to be fun and satisfying. It won’t blow you away but it’s not meant to. This is a setup for a series as well. So if you haven’t read or watched movies like this before it might be more substantial and you might get more investment, for which you’ll be rewarded in the future, presumably.

Shout out to NetGalley for the advanced copy. Love that they have audiobooks now. And by the way, the narration for the audiobook is fantastic.

The Hollow Ones is an uncomfortable mashup of many, better, thrillers. Admittedly, I may have expected too much from the director of so many of my favorite films.

New FBI Agent Odessa volunteers for desk duty after shooting her own partner in a justifiable homicide. In the course of her work, she meets occult detective Hugo Blackwood.

Again, my main problem with the book was its blatant copying from other plots. I also thought Odessa was rather blah. The most non-politically correct portion was the cringe-worthy lynching of a white man. Though this was probably written well before the current BLM protests, it’s still not a good idea. 

Overall, for the book itself, 3 stars. However, I do want to call out the audiobook’s narrator, Brittany Pressley. She makes the book seem profound with her excellent reading voice. In fact, she alone raises The Hollow One’s rating by one star to 4 stars.

Thanks to Grand Central Publishing, Hachette Audio and NetGalley for a copy in exchange for my honest review.

I absolutely loved The Hollow Ones! Ron Perlman as a narrator?? YES PLEASE! It's a perfect blend of thriller, horror, and suspense. I love the characters, and having different timelines. It was so  is deliciously dark and twisted and a wonderful balance of thriller, horror, suspense and action. SO GOOD

I’ll be honest, I needed The Hollow Ones as soon as I found out that it was by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan because The Strain Trilogy is one of my all-time favorite series. That being said, I definitely thought The Hollow Ones lacked the magic of The Strain Trilogy, but it was still very enjoyable nonetheless!

Before I even get into the review of this one, I want to make it clear that Brittany Pressley absolutely nails the narration for this one. She definitely enhanced my experience of this one.

This story opens up with a bang. FBI agent Odessa Hardwicke is called to a gruesome crime scene with her partner Walt Leppo. When Odessa watches her partner attempt to murder one of the victims, she has no choice but to fire. Odessa recalls some strange changes that happened right after she shot her partner, but it must’ve been her senses playing tricks on her.

I loved the whole police procedural set up that we started with. It was very much high stakes, and I was very much invested in the whole supernatural storyline. However, that came to a crashing halt in the second portion of the book when we meet Hugo Blackwood. I still can’t really wrap my head around his character because he’s purposefully mysterious and obtuse…but to the point that I felt like it detracted from the story line.

I have a love/hate relationship with Odessa and this boils down to her denial of the supernatural even when she is faced with the supernatural. I understand always wanting concrete evidence and explanations for everything but at some points I did feel that this was to her detriment when it came to this specific case.

One of the characters that I really loved in this story was Earl. We were privileged to read both his present and past timelines. It was refreshing reading about a Black man as an FBI agent in the 1960s and the racial implications of that. He had run ins with racist local jurisdictions and the KKK. I felt that his POV breathed life into this story.

My biggest criticism of this book was Blackwood. The first half of the book did a fantastic job of straddling the whole police procedural and supernatural realm, but once Blackwood got involved, I think the waters were muddied too much for my taste.

One last thing that is in true del Toro and Hogan fashion in that they do not hold back from the gruesome scenes. There are definitely some incredibly graphic murder scenes in this one, so just keep this in mind.

Thank you to Hachette Audio for providing an ALC through NetGalley. This did not influence my review. All opinions are my own.

This is my first Guillermo del Toro (and Chuck Hogan) book; I have quite enjoyed del Toro's movies so I was pleased when The Hollow Ones popped up in my NetGalley. I am uncertain if there has been some heavy editing of this book between February and now, but based on reviews I read, which were written in Feb., one of the main characters is named John Silence. However, in the audio version that I just finished reading / listening to, this character's name is Hugo Blackwood. Also, this same review alleges that [John Silence] is a knockoff of Pendergast from the Pendergast Series written by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. I cannot speak to this allegation since I have no familiarity with the Pendergast books.

I'm giving The Hollow Ones 3 stars because for me, it's hovering between 3.0 and 3.5 stars. Nevertheless, I liked it. In a previous (and very recent) review of mine, written for The Shadows by Alex North, I briefly commented on the seeming influx of books based on females in law enforcement with daddy issues. This is not to imply that the strained relationship between Odessa Hardwicke and her father isn't for legitimate reasons; it's just a blanket statement pertaining to the hot topic of female cops / detectives / agents dealing with complex and complicated paternal relationships.

I would not consider this book horror but supernatural. Overall, the narration was well done, and the writing itself was favorable. I especially like when my fiction contains a little bit of fact. Come to find out, Dr. John Dee isn't an entirely fictional character.

If someone is easily triggered by violence, I would not recommend this book. If one is easily intrigued, however, by how events from various centuries can tie in to the present, then this book is for you. The Hollow Ones is a stellar example of how what we (as in mankind) do, believe in, act upon, etc. at one point in time can bubble up and spill over at a much later date. The Hollow Ones is what I would consider a healthy mix of reality and supernatural. I am pleased that The Hollow Ones explains the supernatural entities and how they came to be; I find myself really peeved when a book incorporates these concepts but expects readers to believe that POOF, this just kind of appeared and stuff just kind of started happening.

I would definitely read another Guillermo del Toro book.

I read the book and then turned around and listened to the audio, thank you NetGalley for having the audio books now, it's so very good to hear a book. I don't know but to me it's even better. But you have to be listening, not half way ya know? 
This book was my kind of book, evil vs good. It also went back to the 1960's but it didn't stay there. Just got a good background. It's a couple of FBI agents, one female and one male,  She is young and he is older from the past, they are the good guys and then you have the evil guy who can jump into people and take over their bodies to do whatever he wants. Very evil and I have you hooked already right? Yes! Get to reading!! You will love it!!

I had no idea what to expect from The Hollow Ones, but I thoroughly enjoyed this supernatural thriller. I've been reading so many books where they lead you to think it's something supernatural, only to be explained  away towards the end, so for me, this was a seriously refreshing read (or in my case, listen). 

There are a few "main" characters and the narrator, Brittany Pressley, did an outstanding job with voices and accents to differentiate all the characters. Every single character came to life through her and I was in awe! I had to look twice to be sure I hadn't misread that there was only the one narrator. She 100% pulled me into this story. This story also has  non-linear timeline (1500's, 1962, and present day), and Pressley did a superb job of keeping me straight on when and where I was in this story. 

Quick summary: When FBI agent Odessa Hardwicke and her partner, Walt Leppo, get the news of an ongoing incident, they head to the home of disgraced politician Cary Peters,  only to find him in the midst of a killing spree.  Leppo manages to take a knife from Peters, but then the FBI agent inexplicably attacks Peters’s surviving child, giving partner Odessa no choice but to shoot him.  Odessa is traumatized and placed on restricted duty which leads  her to meet  a retired agent who suggests Odessa writes to Hugo Blackwood for help understanding what she saw after killing her partner. 

I loved the pacing of the story, and the more I learned of Blackwood, the more I liked him. I also liked the references to occultist John Dee. 

I think The Hollow Ones is a great choice for those who like fantasy horror and/or supernatural thrillers.


Many thanks to Netgalley and Hachette Audio for the advanced Listening Copy and the opportunity to share my thoughts.