Mirrorland by Carole Johnstone is a tale of psychological suspense that will keep you guessing until the very end. The novel centers around the lives of two mirror twins, Cat and El who though once inseparable as children have now lived completely separate lives for the past 12 years. Cat returns home in the wake of El's disappearance and is immediately drawn into a whirlwind of childhood memories that threaten to upend Cat's recollection of the events of the past.

As children Cat and El developed an elaborate fantasy world called Mirrorland in which they would pretend play with their neighbor Ross and other make believe characters. The memories that call to Cat are creepy and chilling as it becomes readily apparent that not everything about Mirrorland is as it seems. Cat must come to terms with her feelings for Ross, El's husband, and solve the mystery of her sister's disappearance while sifting through her childhood memories that muddy the waters between reality and fantasy.
Though I found myself a bit confused at times with the abrupt jumps back and forth in time in the middle of a chapter, I think this was the author's method of contributing to the eerie sense of unreliability in Cat's narration of the story. I recommend this book for readers who enjoy thrillers and psychological suspense. Look for this title on April 20,2021 from your favorite bookseller. Thank you to Scribner Books and NetGalley for the early review copy in exchange for my honest review.

Mirrorland by Carole Johnstone

El and Cat are identical twins that found escape from a traumatic childhood by turning room in their house into make believe worlds. At some point they had a falling out and now El is missing. Cat must return to her childhood home to find out what happened to her sister.



I hate to say this but I’m conflicted by this book. The first 30% or so was pretty unreadable for me. It’s spent in El and Cat’s make believe world called Mirrorland, and very little of it makes sense. If you can make it past this to the point where Cat begins remembering her childhood the book does get better. If the portions devoted to Mirrorland had been condensed I think it would have been a better book because the actual story is good, as is the ending. Major twists that I didn’t see coming.

I stepped away to digest and then came back to this one. There are some fantasy elements that I wasn’t ready for, taking the story on a bunch of different twists and turns. Very dark, but strong debut!

"Mirrorland" opens with 12-year-old identical twins El and Cat found at the Granton docks in Edinburgh, in search of a pirate ship to join. Years pass and the two eventually become estranged after a falling out. Cat escapes to the US, while El marries their childhood friend, Ross, and remains in Edinburgh.

After El goes missing, Cat is forced to return to the place she'd never come back to and their childhood home. There, Cat finds herself falling back into memories of their childhood imaginary world, known as Mirrorland. Mirrorland is full of clowns, witches, pirates, elaborate adventure and imaginary friends. They turn to this fantasy place in an attempt to escape the violence, isolation and sadness of their own home life.

Cat is convinced her sister isn't dead and a series of elaborate clues and warnings only strengthens her beliefs. As she remembers more and more of her past, El finds herself faced with the question of what exactly happened to her sister and whether she herself is now in danger.

The premise of "Mirrorland" was intriguing, but it just wasn't for me in the end. I had to trudge through the fantasy" portions of the girl's childhood adventures. These sections were just too detailed and dragged on and on. My interest had waned by the time we finally reached the "thriller" portion to the point where I just didn't care. The twists were layered on top of each other that, by the climax of the novel, I simply didn't care.

I feel like the plot was good but the style of writing and the talk of pirates didn’t feel like a mystery or felt like a fantasy and I am not a fan of fantasy at all. Sorry I would rate it 2/5.

Wow, this book gives me Ruth Ware meets Stephen King vibes and I am here for it. Carole Johnstone really woke up one day and decided that this book was it and I am glad she did. This is the kind of book you don't want to read at night because you may have nightmares. Excellent.

Mirrorland is about identical twin sisters, El and Cat, who had a dramatic falling out over a decade ago but when El suddenly disappears without a trace, Cat returns to the place where she grew up to help El’s husband, Ross, and find her sister.

I have really mixed feelings about this book because while it was good enough that I finished it, the writing was very challenging... the first half I was so confused and then I actually enjoyed the second half when everything started to make sense. Most of this book is Cat in the house she grew up in and reliving all of the terrifying and magical memories she and her sister had in this very extensive world they imagined.

Thank you to NetGalley and Scribner for the opportunity to read an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Small spoilers...
The whole book is like a fever dream, stuck in Cat’s head as she’s working through her past trauma and remembering the magical world she created with her sister in ‘Mirrorland’ to protect them from the horrific things happening in their life. It’s creepy and claustrophobic and really hurt my brain... clowns and pirates and witches and the tooth fairy and Bluebeard and Shawshank redemption

TW for incest, assault, and physical abuse

The best way I can describe reading this book is by comparing it to watching the movies Big Fish or The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus. It is bizarre, it is creepy, and it is wholly unpredictable. In fact, rating Mirrorland feels like an impossible task, because it's one of those books that you just have to be in the mood for. It's complicated, twisted, and quite frankly, very dark and disturbing. The magical realism is done quite well, I certainly couldn't guess most of it, but it felt like such a heavy read for me and lacked the redeeming moments I often like to have in my sad and darker books.

Narrator Cat is as unreliable as a funhouse mirror. She and her twin sister, El, created a world all their own as children. Now, returning as adult to help locate her missing sister, Cat must go back into her memories, back into Mirrorland and the darkness it once helped them hide from. It's difficult to like her as a character, because she's just not very nice and holds onto a lot of contempt from her childhood. However, as you begin to understand how the children were raised, what Mirrorland protected their minds from, and the truth about what really happened, it starts to click and you feel sympathy for her. The mix of reality and fantasy is written very well, Carole Johnstone created a unique thriller, so much so that I can think of no other book like it, but it is a slow read that, again, is quite heavy.

A psychological thriller through and through, Mirrorland has just the right amount of fantasy mixed into it to keep it interesting. The unique setting, unreliable narrator perspective, and development of the scenes is done very well. If you like your reads to be a bit confusing, a lot unsettling, and highly gripping, Mirrorland is for you.

I struggled a lot reading this book and was not a fan of the “fantasy” elements. It was too descriptive for me so I found myself skimming and going back to reread the last page I read often. I don’t think the book was “bad” - it just wasn’t for me.

I honestly almost gave up on this book several times. I was so confused on what was real and what was the make believe world. Pirates? Not really my thing, but ok. The second half was better and made things a little clearer regarding what happened during the twins' childhood and why Mirrorland existed. Overall, not a very satisfying read, but thank you NetGalley for the opportunity.

Mirrorland is a wonderfully crafted and unsettling story of twins who create a whimsical world full of magic and wonder in order to escape their dark and abusive childhoods.

Between the beautiful lyrical prose and the blur between fantasy and reality, this story really captivated me. It was such a wonderful and unique reading experience-Like a dark fairytale.
It was reminiscent of Pan's Labyrinth and Neil Gaiman.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Such a dark thriller. I enjoyed this book very much. Kept me interested until last page!

Thanks to publisher and NetGalley for this read!

Pub date:4/20/21

Highly Recommend! Mirrorland by Carole Johnstone is a "slow burn" that I greatly enjoyed. At the start, Cat is returning home to help search for her "Mirror twin" identical twin sister Elice. As the story unfurls you learn that the twins' childhood differed greatly to others in terms of a full floor of make believe ships, castles and foreign lands. It wasn't until 60 % of the book was read before the story took off like a rocket and you suddenly realize that many aspects of the twins' history are missing and as you fill in the blanks you are drawn deeper into an engaging twisty story..

My favorite books are those that you cannot guess the ending and of course the ending is believable. Mirrorland has this and so much more. Highly recommend if you like slow burns, suspense, mysteries and of course stories of the magic of twinness.

A book that lives up to its incredible blurbs? YES! I have been desperate for something with a pinch of originality, and Carole Johnstone seemingly heard my plea, and BABY, DID SHE EVER DELIVER! Alright, I'm going to try and temper my enthusiasm long enough to be coherent for this review. Cat and El are mirror image twins, sharing a bond that few others could comprehend. Together, they've created a richly imagined world called Mirrorland, a place where clowns, pirates, and prisoners roam. But as the two sisters grow, their relationship fractures, and what was once the closest bond, becomes a distant, unnavigable chasm. After 12 years pass without a word between them, and Cat is going about her life in sunny California, she learns her twin has gone missing. Cat must return to their childhood home in Scotland, where El now resides with her husband. But nothing has ever been straightforward at 36 Westeryk Road, and the disappearance of Cat's sister is no different. There's a dangerous game afoot, and the stakes couldn't be any higher.

This book is best when you know as little as possible about it going in, so I hope I haven't said too much. One thing you should know, this book is weird. That speaks to me, since I myself, have been strange all my life. Certain portions of the story may seem a bit nonsensical, but please just trust me when I say that everything will coalesce at the right time. Mirrorland is dark, and more than a little messed up, which is right up my alley. My only complaint is the story does seem to lag at the beginning, and sag a tad in the middle, but I found that to be a minor issue. If you are a lover of strange and macabre thrillers, don't let Mirrorland pass you by. Thank you to Scribner and Netgalley for the chance to review this advance copy.


Publishes on 4/20/21

I should've known when the blurb said Room that this book wasn't for me, but I continued on anyway. While the concept as described in the blurb felt interesting, this didn't work for me and I DNFed it incredibly early - at less than 20%.

Want a twisty read with some thrill? Here is your book. This is like a roller-coaster ride. When you think it's over, it isn't! Oh no, this book has lots in store for you until the very end. This is one of those books you WILL go back and reread because you want to take it all in and make sure you missed nothing!

I have <em>very</em> mixed feelings about this book. Twin sisters El and Cat grow up very sheltered with their Mother and Grandfather. They invent a world called <em> Mirrorland</em> because they never leave the home and Mirrorland becomes their escape ... Years later, when El goes missing and is presumed dead, Cat returns to Scotland and to the home they once lived in. Even with maps in the front of the book, the Mirrorland descriptions were confusing and monotonous. Perhaps it is because I do not really enjoy the fantasy genre, but this part of the book, for me, was BRUTAL!

When the story got past most of the Mirrorland world, the story got much better. It definitely could have been much shorter ... and much less of the fantasy craziness. The fantasy elements did serve a purpose in the story, but it took too long to get there. The first half of the book literally gave me a headache because it just seemed to ramble on with no direction. The second half was much better.

This review was also published on Goodreads.

This was such a dark, disturbing mystery that literally had me captivated from the first page.

If you're a fan of domestic thrillers and are not afraid of some chilling depictions, this is the one for you.

Thank you for the e-galley!

Cat has lived in Los Angeles for over a decade. She has no issues with staying away from her childhood home and the terrible memories that were left there, even if that means she can’t see her twin sister. While children, they invented Mirrorland, a creation pulled from many of their favorite stories. In Mirrorland, they were able to fight off the terrors that haunted them in the real world. After El goes missing during a boating trip, Cat must return to the home that tormented her in her youth. As Cat begins to live in their old house, she finds clues that seem to have been left behind by her sister. Is El dead or playing a terrible joke? What dark secrets will Cat remember about the childhood she left behind?

Mirrorland is a psychological thriller that on the surface appears to be a page-turner but in reality doesn’t pull through. Johnstone’s overall storyline was good and the twists added needed distractions, but the characters were flat and overall I was easily distracted while reading. I’m glad I finished the book because everything came together in the end, but if it had been a long read, I don’t know if I would have stuck it out to the end. This would be a good read if your TBR pile is getting low.

I don’t request a lot of ARCs from publishers because I have reading whims that take me in different directions than what I had intended. This happens a lot. Once in a while NetGalley has offered me books without having to go through the request process, and Mirrorland by Carole Johnstone (Amazon) must have been one of them. Thank you to NetGalley and Scribner for this ARC so I could offer my honest opinion of the book.

Triggers warnings: Emotional and physical abuse of adults and children. Lots of it.

I don’t normally read psychological thriller or magical realism and Mirrorland was a combination of both mixed in with a bit of a horror story. Whoa! What a rough start. The book’s world building was a bit much for me, There was so much magical realism at the beginning, which I understand was necessary, but I wondered what I had gotten myself in to. After all, Stephen King wrote a positive review and I used to love reading King’s work when I was younger. Luckily, about a 1/3 of the way in, things started to pick up and I wasn’t as confused about the world.

There were parts of this story that were really suspenseful involving El’s disappearance, but the whole Mirrorland other world elements were too fantastical for me. The less I read about Mirrorland, the more I liked the rest of the story. Estranged identical twins, one disappears and the other sister comes home to find her, and the childhood friend who loved both sisters but married one, a creepy Gothic house that the girls escaped when they were twelve, only to have one of the sisters buy the house when she grew up and set it up almost exactly like it was when they were growing up. That’s some twisted thinking.

Mirrorland had multiple endings. There were several times when I was just so happy to have the story be done, because there was a satisfying conclusion, only to find out that there was more to the story. This happened several times. At first I thought “Enough already” but still felt compelled to go on. Having finished it, I can see how/why the story was plotted that way. It makes sense. And even though I don’t normally read psychological thrillers, I totally saw the ending coming a mile away. Maybe that’s from picking apart Nancy Drew mysteries, but it seemed fairly obvious to me. I knew the who, what, where and why, but not the how.

Mirrorland goes on sale April 20, 2021.