Susan Dennard's The Luminaries is the beginning of a brand new contemporary fantasy series set in a place called Hemlock Falls. Hemlock Falls isn’t like other towns. It’s not on a map, cell phones don’t work there, and you might find a ghost-deer grazing at midnight. It’s also inhabited by the Luminaries, an ancient order charged with guarding the nearby forest. Each night, when nightmares rise, only the Luminaries stand between humanity and these monsters bent on devastation—one clan for each night of the week.

The main character in this book is Winnie Wednesday who is just turning 16. 4 years ago, her father was charged with being one of the hated witches called Diana's which in turn destroyed her mothers role as lead hunter, and made the family outcasts. He hasn't been seen since. Winnie is about ready to change that choice by participating in 3 levels of hunter training. If she passes, her family might be able to regain their reputation. Since nobody is supposed to support her or help her family, Winnie has been training by herself for 4 years to pass the Hunter trials.

She knows that there is no rule against an outcast participating as long as they follow the rules. Not even her Aunt Rachel, who is now lead hunter for the Wednesday clan, can stop her. In this world, there are things called living nightmares, and it is up to the Luminaries aka Hunters to track them down and eliminate them. It's a hard job, but someone has to do it, and that someone may one day be Winnie if she survives. Things don't go as planned for Winnie on her first night after being told to go home. Winnie encounters a new, unknown monster that slaughters a banshee and everyone assumes Winnie did the slaughtering.

She doesn’t correct them. But she does reach out to certain people still friends to find out what the new threat is. Winnie finally accepts help from Jay Friday, the boy from the smallest group of Luminaries and the best hunter in Hemlock Falls. When Winnie encounters the same mysterious threat on her second trial which requires you to remain over night alone and without help, things seem to be turning for Winnie and her family. But the question remains, why does it seem that both a werewolf, and something dangerous always seems to be around whenever she's on the hunt?

The thing I must address is how people turn on a dime when Winnie shows them the error of their ways by successfully completing each part of the trial. People who used to scorn her, or pick on her, or ignore her, now want to be friends with her including a couple rookie hunters. I can't address the issue with Winnie's father because there's a whole lot that has to be revealed, and I hate spoilers. I do know that nothing is going to stop Winnie from finding the truth. Not her Aunt Rachel. Not her former lead hunter mother, and especially not her brother.

I am not one to start a series, and then abandoned it, especially one of Susan Dennard's books, so yes, I will be looking forward to the sequel releasing to find out what happens next.

I missed when Susan Dennard’s choose-your-own-adventure version of this book blew up on Twitter, so I’m glad I was able to go into this blind and still get all of the impact of the story. It was great to finally get to meet the characters from that adventure and to get to see the world.
I really liked this book. It held my attention really well, the pacing was very fast and steady. The characters were very strong and well developed. I thought the world-building was the most outstanding aspect to The Luminaries. I could really feel all of the effort and planning that Dennard put in to building up this setting. It felt very unique to me, although I admittedly don’t read much urbane fantasy.
I also really loved the ending. Plot-wise I would say that was the strongest part. It really left me craving more and I can’t wait for the sequel.
The Luminaries was a really fun read for me, and is a perfect fall read.

This book really was a struggle to finish. I would've given up on it long ago, but I do try to finish the ARCs that I get in order to give them an honest review.

First off, the book kept introducing characters that seemingly never popped up again. It was honestly hard to keep track of who was who and why they were mentioned. I get that there were some high school characters and the author wanted to emphasize that Winnie was bullied and ostracized, but at the end of the book, I couldn't name a single person without looking back--not even her brother. There were just too many people.

There was also a lot of divisions within the "houses" that made it even more confusing. The Fridays had a crappy house and the Mondays had good ones? Tuesdays were all science based? Maybe? It felt like there was an attempt at worldbuilding by introducing the families, but again, it just made it hard to keep track of who was who and why this was even mentioned.

The plot fizzled weakly throughout most of the book. Winnie Wednesday, her mother, and her brother were ostracized by their commune of supernatural hunters because Winnie's father was caught being a spy for the renegade commune called Dianas. However, Winnie is determined that she will become a hunter and sneaks into the first task that all budding hunters have to do. She manages to survive and does so well that she's almost immediately welcome back into the fold.

Winnie has a secret though, it wasn't her that completed the task of killing a supernatural creature. Something else did. And she struggles with whether or not to tell people and risk being ostracized again. Meanwhile, there's more people introduced while she has to complete two other tasks to officially become a hunter.

Most of the book focuses on Winnie wavering back and forth on telling people about this unknown creature while also trying to get other people to believe her. There's the faintest hint of finding out more about her father's alleged betrayal. She completes the tasks. And then the book ends abruptly.

I didn't enjoy the book.

I did read the author's notes afterwards and learned that this book originally started as a Twitter challenge where followers took polls to determine what would happen in the book. This all made sense because the book really feels disjointed and awkward in several places. The pacing bumbles along until finally it jerks to the end.

"The Nightmare" sucked me in. The writing was beautiful and I couldn't want to dive into the rest of the story. I enjoyed learning of the monsters (we had all the originals and some fun new ones) and the build-up of the romance (which felt natural and not overdone).

We follow Winnie Wednesday as she completes the Luminary hunter trials and proves herself loyal - while trying to restore her family's good name after being shunned because her father is a witch and a traitor.

Overall, this was a fun read that will finish quickly and leave you wanting more. You will be left with questions ... but it is a series and I'm hoping we will eventually get the answers we are looking for.

*3.5*
I know that this book will be popular with kids in middle school to early high school, it's right up the alley I would have loved at that age for sure! A world where there are secret societies around the world that hunt nightmares to keep them secret from the average human beings is one I thoroughly enjoy. The characters she built were realistic and I'm so so glad that Dennard touched on some of the trauma Winnie had experienced in a way that felt real - it came through in some of her decisions throughout the book rather than just her inner monologue.

I'll admit some of the world-building felt a little weak at times and I would have loved more of it given that there's a lot of potential with this kind of setting. Also some of the similes and metaphors that Dennard used felt off at times? Like they quite didn't fit with the other prose that Dennard had used prior.

Overall though, it was a really fun book!

Thanks to the publishers and NetGalley!

The Luminaries is the first book in The Luminaries; it started as an experiment on twitter where the audience got to direct some of the choices the heroine made and then was converted into a novel. I think because of that, the direction of the story takes a few unexpected twists along the way and sometimes flows a little choppily but it does make for some fun discoveries.

This is an interesting world. There is a forest and along the border of the forest is the small specialized town of Hemlock Falls has different families/clans that are responsible for fighting off the monsters who rise in the night in that forest. Winnie Wednesday's family used to do that too until they became outcasts because of her father. Now she has one chance to save what is left of her family. She is going to have to sneak into the forest on her sixteenth birthday and try to pass the first of the trials to become a hunter. If she can do that, she can help to move her family out of being shunned and prove her loyalty to the clan. The only problem is Winnie is in over her head and if she can't get help she is only going to end up dead.

Jay Friday and Winnie used to be best friends but when her family was shunned he disappeared from her life. Now she needs his help if she is ever going to survive. Seems like Jay has some secrets of his own and while we didn't get to explore them much in this book I'm pretty sure I know what at least one of them is and hope we get to focus on that in the next book.

The shortcoming of this book is I think the worldbuilding wasn't built quite enough. The Luminaries fight the monsters in the forest that rise in the night because they are tied to a great spirit. There are witches who are bad, although I'm not quite sure why or if there could be good witches too. I really wanted to learn more of the Dianas (the bad guys in league with the forest spirits), what the Friday's true function is since they seem to be better fighters than all of the other clans and I really wanted to understand what the really big bad thing in the forest is that seems to warp the world around it.

There is enough in this book to keep me really interested in the series. There are hints to bigger plots afoot and maybe the world Winnie has grown up in has a lot of little dirty secrets that she and a few friends can ferret out. You can tell there is going to be a nice slow burn romance possibly in the future but in the Luminaries there wasn't really enough time to focus on it as Winnie was more worried about trying to survive than kissing boys, which for me was a nice change. The forest was a character all by itself, I can't wait to learn more about the world, the forest and the people of Hemlock falls.

Looking for something with a Pacific Northwest vibe? Gloomy skies and mysterious guys in flannel? A fabulously moody mashup of Holly Black style heroine, Divergent style community where everyone has their role, and the forensic creepiness of the X-Files? Loads of monsters and a monster-slayer with an artists' heart? This might just be your book.

Susan Dennard's The Luminaries is somehow the perfect November book. The kind of book that's perfect for pulling out when the fog rolls in, knowing that you are safe and warm and dry inside, because the forest where Winnie Wednesday hangs out is not a safe place by any means.

Winnie really, really wants to become a Luminary - one of the monster slayers that help keep her community safe from the creatures that roam the forest. She's also hoping that managing to be a successful monster slayer will help reinstate her family in the community, after her father being cast out as a traitor. But in order to prove herself in the monster trials, she will have to a) slay a monster and b) figure out what's actually going on.

Winnie is a fabulous character. Loads of snark, loads of trying to figure out what the heck is going on, loads of ambition. Her relationship with her mom and brother is conveyed beautifully, as is her uncertainty about whether she can actually pull all of this off. And then there's Jay, her ex-best friend. Flannel-wearing, bass-playing, monster-slaying hot guy, who seems to be on board with helping her survive the trials. He's a mystery all on his own, let alone the growing suggestion that there's something very wrong in Hemlock Falls, and maybe not just in the forest.

This is a book that you will easily be able to pitch to fans of Twilight or Holly Black or Naomi Novik's Scholomance. I can hardly wait to find out what happens next, as this is obviously meant to be the first in a series.

This particular author has amazing concepts, but I tend to struggle with the writing style. The writing lags at times, and the beginning is dry as a result. However, the premise stays interesting enough that I could finish the book. We are immersed in the world relatively quickly, though the onslaught of characters was confusing until they were all introduced and the Luminary society was explained. While I could enjoy the story and plot, I do wish the writing didn't seem so flat.

This is my first book by this author, and wow, I was hooked right away! At first the part of having all the characters’ families be sorted by the days of the week was a little confusing/annoying, but I got it, and rolled with it into the story. I loved all the monster or nightmares as they were called. What would be so cool is if there were images within the final print copy somehow, pages from Winnie’s sketchbooks, etc. I mean they sounded creepy, but then when they were described in more detail as Winnie actually encountered each one in person, even creepier!

There was a lot of background history and mythology for this story, this world, these characters. The author did a good job of weaving it throughout the story without much of what I’d call an info dump. It fit into the settings and situations as they went along and only made them keep my attention even more. I read this in about one day, since I was home sick and could barely put it down!

But we’re left with a bit of a cliffhanger, and I don’t know how I can wait for the next book! There are a ton of questions we still need answered, and honestly not much was actually sorted by the end, except for a few answers about her dad and that she has taken the steps she needs to become a hunter.

Loved this one and will be eagerly awaiting the second book!

Pretty standard plot: special families protecting the world from "bad things" (in this case, nightmare spirits). Here the families are sorted by days of the week, and Winnie is a Wednesday but also an outcast due to her father's being a traitor. But there's hope, because Winnie is 16 and can enter the Hunter trials and maybe reverse her family's bad luck. Nothing surprising happens, including the hint of mystery surrounding Jay (a Friday, and Winnie's friend pre-outcast status). Still, probably a good series for readers who haven't tired of these tropes.

Thank you for the advanced copy of this book! I will be posting my review on social media, to include Instagram, Amazon, Goodreads, and Instagram!

This was overall a pretty interesting read. I loved the concept of the world and the nightmares they had to fight. I felt like the world building could have gone a little bit more complex. I want to know more about the nightmares and why they attack.
I thought the characters were developed well enough for a first book. We got hints at their backstories and how they all connect with each other. I can’t wait to learn more about them in future books. I also was very intrigued by the dynamics of the hunters.
I’ll say this definitely felt on the younger end of YA. It’s pretty easy to get into the world and the book is well paced. I was drawn into the story. I also liked that main story in this one is wrapped up but there is enough hints of what’s to come and things left unanswered that I’m definitely interested in continuing the series.

It doesn’t matter that I’ve never dreamed of hunting monsters or risked my life to kill one: Winnie Wednesday is a very relatable character. She’s an outcast in her community of Luminaries, and as such, she’s either treated like she’s invisible or bullied and teased.

Her family’s status is a big part of Winnie’s motivation, although she likely would have aspired to the role of hunter even if they weren’t outcasts. She comes from a long line of renowned hunters, including her mother (before they became outcasts) and her grandmother. Her aunt is currently lead hunter.

Anyone who’s ever felt on the outside, who’s been bullied, can connect with Winnie through that. And when Winnie takes the first trial, she ends up in a desperate situation, living a lie.

Plenty of readers will relate to letting people believe a lie or embellishing a story if it makes them more popular.

What Winnie doesn’t count on is the guilt, and how this impacts her growth. This is one of the strongest elements of this book. Winnie is as complex as any person you know. She longs for acceptance, and she wanted status. When she passes the first trial, she gets it, and more. Her anger boils to the surface. She starts questioning the way her world works, and whether it’s right. Winnie’s world becomes more complex as she wrestles with her feelings and struggles to chart a course for her future.

While this book does a great job of delving into Winnie’s growth, it definitely doesn’t skimp on the action. There’s plenty, through the trials and the training.

For those that love monsters, there are plenty here, as well as some interesting spins on mythical creatures.

Even things that don’t seem like major plot points come into play later in the story, and the author expertly crafts this tale, trusting readers to pick up on the details.

Yes, this is a YA coming of age story. However, there are plenty of adult themes, such as wrestling with the structure of your society, with politics and policies, and with conspiracies.

The Luminaries sets up one clear focal point for Winnie: to pass the trials and become a hunter. However, it leaves breadcrumbs trailing through. It’s clear the question of how Winnie’s family became outcasts and who framed her dad will be central to book 2. We also still don’t know who the werewolf is, or what the Whisperer is, exactly. This doesn’t feel like a cheat because The Luminaries completes the focal arc for book 1, and like reality, everything doesn’t wrap up neatly at the end. But this is a good thing for readers because we can anticipate spending more time in Winnie’s world, exploring these and other mysteries.

Don’t miss this one. It’s a gripping story, from start to finish. 5/5 stars.

Thank you so much Macmillan-Tor/Forge for sending me an eARC!

This book was definitely my favorite read of October! Even though I was a little underwhelmed by it, it was still a good read!

First of all, The Luminaries tells the tale of Winnie Wednesday's path to earning her family redemption after her father betrays the Luminaries. The Luminaries are a global secret society of monster hunters who are responsible for nightly purgings of regions affected by "spirits" that manifest Nightmares. She participates in the three trials to become a Luminary in the book. The reason why I was a little underwhelmed by the story was that it follows the synopsis to a tee; there was nothing extra or surprising in the story. Except for the ending. But I even had a hunch about that, though that didn't make me need the sequel to this story any less.

The main issue I had with this story was that everything, from the worldbuilding to the characters, was undeveloped. While the worldbuilding was much more developed than the 2-dimensional characters, it was still lacking in detail. However, it was still a perfect read for spooky season! I also appreciated Winnie's character in the fact she was very much flawed and ignorant, as well as the number of supernatural creatures Dennard incorporated into the story.

Overall, a good spooky read but a tad underdeveloped!

I really enjoyed this book and it definitely made me want to start Suzanne’s Witchland series! Winnie is a very brave girl who wants to help her family regain the respect of their fellow citizens after her father ended up being a traitor. While doing that, she needs to face a dangerous creature no one seems to be aware of. Her tribe has the duty of killing nightmares, which are monsters that lurk into the forest during night. Apart from the action that is very thrilling, I was especially impressed by the way the author describes Winnie’s family situation. They have been cast aside without further glances only to be greeted again when it becomes convenient. I loved how Winnie remains firm with her old friends, she doesn’t forget but she is also ready to start anew. And I’m super ready to see what happens next!

This was a fun read and perfect for the younger side of young adult. The setting has this beautiful almost surreal vibes that edged a little towards a gothic feel. The lore, history, and characters in this book felt fleshed out, especially Winnie who is awkward as all get out. I truly appreciate how authentic Winnie felt. So many times I’ve read books the MC being a perfect “killer” from the start and it was refreshing to see Winnie as a awkward teen who is still on the road to being that perfect hunter.

There is a subtle complexity to this book in the dynamics between the Nightmare and Hunters, the Hunters hierarchy, and the relationship between Winnie’s family and the community at large. This helped add a depth to the story that submersed me deeper in this world and made me feel a part of it.

It’s a perfect quick read and gave me a little bit of all the elements I look for in a book. I highly recommend this!

Excellent story!

This book was good! I enjoyed the idea, and I thought that the writing was good, and the characters were interesting. However, And I know this agrees with quite a lot of other reviews, I feel like there wasn't much of a plot, and there were A LOT of loose ends at the end of that. The whisperer, and the werewolf, Jay, Erica, all of this felt very open ended. The only answers we got were the trials, but even then Winnie didnt get her outcast status removed, it was "almost removed". I will be reading the next book just to find out where it goes, but I certainly hope things are actually tied up, and that we find out what happened with her dad, which felt like the most miniscule of side quests but was actually important. Very confusing, but good premise, fast read and enjoyable

This was so good! So much different than Dennards previous books but still so engaging and interesting.

I loved the themes of forgiveness and found family that are present in this. I love the characters and their dynamics with each other. I loved the lore and the "magical" creatures and forest.

I cannot wait to read more from this series and see if any of my theories are correct because that ending left many questions! Also, I cannot wait to hear about these creatures more and hopefully in book 2 we get some Diana rep because that would be interesting to see.

One of my pleasant memories of the pandemic was participating in the “Sooz Your Own Adventure” aka the book whose plot was determined by a daily Twitter poll. So when I heard the author would be releasing a novel version of it, I had some hesitation. After all, Twitter hive mind led to some occasional, uh, interesting choices, as well as lots of #ughJay hilarity. But this book is mostly completely rewritten, not to mention it’s only part of the story.

After her dad was revealed as a traitor to the Luminaries, Winnie and her family were banished from the order. The Luminaries are responsible for dealing with the creatures, called nightmares, that appear in the forest every night. Considering that nearly everyone in Hemlock Falls was involved in the secretive group, that made for a lonely past four years. Her only hope is to take the first of the Hunter Trials on her sixteenth birthday and convince them to take her back. But the forest is nothing like she remembers it and neither are the Luminaries. When Winnie sees evidence of strange things happening in the forest, no one believes her, except for Jay, the town bad boy and her former best friend. With a new nightmare lurking in the forest and little help, can Winnie survive the Trials?

Some of the world building as definite promise. The hunters are divided into families, each taking the name (and corresponding hunting night) of a day of the week. Each family specializes in certain things, whether that’s training the next generation of hunters, developing new gear, or managing the bureaucracy. While the Luminaries are focused on containing the spirit in the forest by ridding it of nightmares every night, another group, the Dianas, seek to use its power for their own ends. The Dianas were the weakest part of the world-building for me, as it’s never quite explained why they’re so evil. The “never quite explained” bit is unfortunately true of the rest of the world-building, though. How do they manage to keep their towns so secret? How do they manage family trees when literally everyone has one of seven last names? Why is the position of Lead Hunter so important?

“She belongs in the forest. She belongs as a Luminary. She belongs as a hunter.”


Part of that could be explained by Winnie’s character. At times, Winnie read a lot younger to me than sixteen. Of course, she’s suffered without any friends for the past four years, watching her family fall further into poverty while her mother works herself to exhaustion. But the Wednesday line prides itself on loyalty and Winnie never seems to question her family’s banishment, instead rebuking herself for not realizing her dad was a Diana. She trains by herself in secret and refuses to accept any future for herself that doesn’t involve her being a hunter. Of course she accepts the Luminaries’ worldview without any questions as she’s never known anything else!

“So what if last night didn’t go according to plan? So what if everyone was right and she hadn’t been ready for the forest? She still got what she wanted and what her family needed. There’s no reason not to keep going.”


It’s only when she passes the first trial that her thinking starts to change. After four years of shunning, the rest of the Luminaries suddenly act like the intervening four years never happened. She’s welcomed back into hunter training, the kids who were bullying her a few days ago now act like her best friends and her mom and brother get job promotions. It’s exactly what she wanted to happen, but the whiplash is too much for Winnie. Why does she have to risk her life – because Winnie does nearly die, several times – before they decide her dad’s actions don’t matter anymore? How could her supposed best friends have turned their backs on her four years ago? Why is she so unhappy even though she everything she thought she wanted?

“It is disconcerting that he can be so extremely well-proportioned while also being, ugh, Jay.”


After she’s welcomed back, Winnie also starts connecting (or reconnecting) with some of the Luminaries. Some of the other prospective hunters reach out to her, but there’s still a distinct chilliness between her and one of her former best friends, Erica, that leaves Winnie hurt and confused. But the biggest chunk of time is spent with her other former best friend, Jay – who’s also her former crush. There’s the barest start of a romantic relationship, along with a lot of anger and confusion, because he falls somewhere on the enemy to friend spectrum but she still trusts him, even though it’s obvious Jay’s keeping secrets of his own.

The plot was fine as well. What it says in the blurb? That’s exactly what you get, Winnie trying to make it through the three hunter trials. It felt like there was a lot of choreographing of future plot points. I’m not sure whether that’s because I knew the original plot (so I have a general idea of where this version might be headed) or if it really was that predictable. Some things were so blatantly obvious that I was banging my head against the wall going “ugh, Winnie”. All that – and the fact that it’s told in third-person present tense – could be forgiven because I honestly enjoyed the majority of the story, except for this last point. The ending was ridiculously abrupt, like I kept trying to turn the page on my ereader in confusion. In a way, it makes logical sense where the book ends, but the structure of the book and the pacing left me hanging. Most (almost all) of the subplots are unresolved, including one introduced near the end of the book. It felt unfinished in a way that really rubbed me wrong.

“You either trust the forest or you don’t, Winnie.”


Overall, 3.5 nostalgic stars. Without that nostalgia, this would be more solidly a three thanks to that ending. Either way, I know I’ll read the next book just because I want some resolution to, uh, any of the plot points.

I received an advance review copy of this book from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

2,5/5
At first, I was intrigued by the concept of living nightmares roaming the forest of a small town and there being an ancient order that protects the town and the rest of the world from these monsters. The premise is interesting, but the execution of it was very reminiscent of paranormal fantasy YA books back in the early 2010s. The Luminaries follows quite the typical fantasy plot, which didn't diverge much from what the book description says, of the main character being an outcast and then needing to go through 3 trials in order to prove her worth. There's nothing wrong with this, but I didn't find anything brand-new that kept my attention within the predictable plot.

The writing is fantastic though, however, the 3rd person present tense threw me off - it was hard for me to read, but I'm putting that down to personal preference. There is a lot of fun supernatural lore that we learn of the different monsters, but lacked in the overall world building of the history of the Luminaries order. Winnie Wednesday was a delight to read about, being that outcast, awkward, and intelligent. She works hard to redeem her family's name after her father is shunned for supposedly practicing witchcraft.

With hints of a romance for Winnie, that didn't take centre stage, which isn't required in this book. But the way I could predict exactly what would happen wasn't a fun reading experience compared to other "predictable" books I've recently read. I felt there was a special spark that was missing from this book that would've made The Luminaries shine brighter for me, but unfortunately, it fell flat.