Good plot, poor execution.

I have not read the author’s other works but I have heard incredible things. The premise was interesting, but the story itself seemed to just drag along. I struggled to get fully engrossed, and unfortunately it just wasn’t for me.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and Penguin Young Reader’s group for the opportunity to read and review this title.

Twelve years ago, Avril’s mother drowned at Whisper Cove theater, just off the rocky Connecticut coastline. It was ruled an accident, but Avril’s never been totally convinced. Local legend claims that the women in the waves—ghosts from old whaling stories—called her mother into the ocean with their whispering. Because, as they say at Whisper Cove, what the sea wants, the sea will have.

While Avril doesn’t believe in ghosts, she knows there are lots of different ways for places, and people, to be haunted. She’s spent the past twelve years trying to make sense of the strange bits and pieces she does remember from the night she lost her mother. Stars falling into the sea. A blinding light. A tight grip on her wrist. The odd sensation of flying. Now, at seventeen, she’s returning to Whisper Cove for the first time, and she might finally unravel the mystery of what really happened.

As Avril becomes more involved with camp director Willa and her mysterious son Cole, Whisper Cove reveals itself to her. Distances seem to shift in the strange fog. Echos of long-past moments bounce off the marsh. And Avril keeps meeting herself—and her dead mother—late at night, at the edge of the ocean.

The truth Avril seeks is ready to be discovered. But it will come at a terrible cost

A theater summer camp for a setting paired with relatable characters and lots of twists and turns made this one a fun read! I felt like the romance was a little too insta-love for me, but that's probably only because I'm not a fan of that trope.
The secrets, danger, and mysteriousness I am here for, however! We follow Avril, who attends the camp... but it just so happens to be the place where her mother died, which is the real reason she attends. While at camp. Arvil grows as an actress all while trying to find out more information regarding her mom's death, which her father lacks to provide her with. Avril makes more friends and I liked how parts of her relationship with Cole seemed to mirror the relationship of Eden and Orion in the play they're putting on at camp. The ending was like oof! in your face, but it fits well with the pacing of the book.
All in all I enjoyed this fun YA thriller.

✨Book Review ✨

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

*I was provided this book free of charge by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*

It has been a long time that a book just made me *feel*. I felt everything. All of the emotions. I was engrossed every page. Wow.

There are so many emotions in my heart and head right now. Ginny Myers Sain is absolutely magical. I will admit I was skeptical of the supernatural aspect of this book when I was reading the summary because supernatural can only go so far before it becomes cheesy or starts to become fantasy and I could tell this mystery book wouldn’t read well if it went too deeply into the supernatural. Ginny handled the supernatural with such a light touch. This book read almost like a screenplay- I could so easily see this being adapted into a gorgeous, steamy, haunting, murderous mystery. It was so beautifully written! All of the characters are well developed, the setting is well defined, the conflict is strong, and the book kept me guessing. About 60% of the way through, I couldn’t stop texting my husband all my theories about what was going to happen. I’m pretty sure he thought I was crazy because he had no idea what I was talking about. For the record- only bits a pieces of my theories were accurate and I love that the book kept me guessing.

So I will 100% be purchasing the physical copy of this book when I get back from my business trip because it took my breath away. I was legitimately in tears at the end. Thank you, NetGalley, for this opportunity and thank you, Ginny, for writing.

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A theater summer camp for a setting paired with relatable characters and lots of twists and turns made this one a fun read! I felt like the romance was a little too insta-love for me, but that's probably only because I'm not a fan of that trope.
The secrets, danger, and mysteriousness I am here for, however! We follow Avril, who attends the camp... but it just so happens to be the place where her mother died, which is the real reason she attends. While at camp. Arvil grows as an actress all while trying to find out more information regarding her mom's death, which her father lacks to provide her with. Avril makes more friends and I liked how parts of her relationship with Cole seemed to mirror the relationship of Eden and Orion in the play they're putting on at camp. The ending was like oof! in your face, but it fits well with the pacing of the book.
All in all I enjoyed this fun YA thriller.

I really wanted to love this one. It's a ya thriller about a girl going to a theater camp in Connnecticut. As a New Englander the setting was accurate and as a theater person it made sense. I just found myself having a hard time following the story at times and connecting with the characters. It did have a great level of spookyness though so I rode it through to the end.

Avril’s mother drowned in an accident or so everyone thought. Avril and her mother were at this amphitheater when her mother was staying with the help of friends. Avril’s mother and father were having problems and she had left him. Then the accident happened. Avril went back to live with her father and when she got older she applied for the same summer camp where her mother drowned. She wanted to find out what really happened that summer. Every time Avril asked her dad what happened that summer he would just avoid the question and just say her mother killed herself.

When Avril and the other kids got to whisper Cove they met with Willa Carver as she went over all the rules of the summer amphitheater and when they would start work on which parts they were going to play in Willa Carver’s play. Avril went up to Willa one day at lunch and introduced herself and Willa immediately knew who she was and hugged her.

Avril and Cole got the leads in the play. Everyday for the next few weeks they memorized lines and rehearsed. As the time at whisper cove was coming to an end Avril was finally learning about what happened that summer. She found out that it was her mother all along that wrote the play and Willa had stolen it from her mother and she also found out that Willa had also killed her mother and shoved her over the cliff

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for this ARC in exchange for an honest review. I really enjoyed Ginny Myers Sain's book Dark and Shallow Lies, so I was very excited to read Secrets So Deep. However, I wasn't as engaged with this book's plot and characters at all. I found it very slow, pacing wise, and I started to skim pages to get to the action. The character also weren't fleshed out and sympathetic, in my opinion. I did enjoy Lex's character and felt she was the shining star in terms of character development, but other than her, I really didn't connect on any level with the characters. I did find the setting very atmospheric, and I love the theme of how to grieve and process trauma. I think that YA readers who love atmospheric mysteries will be pleased with this, and I will continue to recommend this author and her novels to my students.

Check out the aesthetic video I made for this book on TikTok & Instagram @katherinebichler. Here are the links:

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTRmfkcF3/

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CjDygN...

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
4/5 STARS

This is a YA mystery.

Avril attends a summer theater camp on the Long Island Sound with iconic playwright Willa Culver. The same place her mother drowned years ago. As secrets unfold, Avril questions whether her mother’s death was actually accidental.

Although predictable, this was a good spooky book for the beginning of fall. There were a few twists and turns along the way that kept me reading. I would recommend it to YA readers who like mystery/thrillers. I will check out Dark & Shallow Eyes from this author now.

Thank you to Penguin Teen for the advance reader copy! 🌊🖤

This eerie and atmospheric tale swept me away! It was gripping and compelling, cerebral and perplexing, perfectly paced, and a little unsettling and mildly mindboggling. 🙌🏻

Avril returns to Whisper Cove, Connecticut, a secluded and mysterious coastal town, where her mother died when she was a child to attend an exclusive theatre camp and to feel closer to her mother's memory. Between the enigmatic staff, her own muddled memories, and the ominous nature of the Cove, Avril sets out on a chilling path to discover what really happened to her mom all those years ago.

This book has so much feeling. It just comes off the page right into your heart. The star-crossed lovers and fated feel of the romance will leave you breathless and reeling, whole and broken. It’s tragic and beautiful and raw and real. The mystery is haunting and mystifying, cryptic and layered. The writing is moving and poignant. And the book just feels like fall!

If you want a simultaneously spooky and cozy YA thriller with some paranormal feels set in an enigmatic and mysterious coastal town, this needs to be your next read!

WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT:
👻 whispers x haunts
🎭 theatre kids x sleep away camp
💨 secrets x mysterious happenings
🍂 legends x superstitions
🗝 unlocking forgotten memories
📍 northeastern coastal town
🌊 the call of the sea
😲 eerie endings
🤍 YA romance that feels like more

Possible Content Warnings: drowning, death, murder, fascination with fire and water, self-harm, despair/trauma/PTSD

Willa Culver it’s a play right who wrote the famous play Midnight Music and every year she runs a month-long Boot Camp for actors and actresses who at the end of the camp doer play. This is why Avril is in Connecticut her and 23 other hopefuls are there to take part in the actors Boot Camp but the only difference is Avril has been there before. Because unknown to the fellow campers Avril‘s mom was good friends with Willa and on a summer visit 15 years before her mom drowned in the water surrounding the camp. Her dad was devastated by the loss and refused to talk about it until Avril decided to go and find out for herself. Call Culver, Willis son Who is drawn to Avril more than the other actors there and while she is making new friends and new memories she is visited by old ones and the things she will find out at the King of Prussia shake the life she knew and the one she knows. She has visited by her mom‘s ghost and a ghost in her mom‘s past they say you should only asked questions that you really want the answers too and it’s just too bad Al didn’t know this before her trip. She will learn a lot but some of it she probably would have been better off not knowing. Bears a few things I had issue with first this is an actors camp for juniors in high school and yet alcohol is everywhere and they hang out on the beach or whatever they want whenever they want. The rules of very loose at this camp having said that I found the storyline interesting I did find Avril to be not so likable and although it looks like that is a new trend in box I don’t like it but having said that the story is interesting in the motion covers the crazier the plot gets. I would love to say I found this book amazing but on a scale from 1 to 5 I would give it a three it really was OK. I love paranormal mysteries but they were so many things in this book that caused me to roll my eyes And think that would never happen but I don’t want to name them out right because I don’t like giving things away in a review that’s not in the summary. I’m sure others would love this book I just did not. I received this book from NetGalleyShelf and the publisher but I am leaving this review voluntarily please forgive any mistakes as I am blind and dictate my review.

Avril Vincent goes back to Whisper Cove to try to make sense of her mother’s drowning 12 years ago. The Cove is eerie, creepy and full of ghosts. This was a very good book and I finished it in a day! Thanks NetGalley and Penguin Group for this ARC!

I loved Sain's debut novel Dark & Shallow Lies SO much that I could not wait to get my hands on this one! Needless to say, it did not disappoint and I highly recommend you all stop what you’re doing and pre-order this book now to be prepared for its release on September 27th, 2022!

The story follows 17-year-old Avril who lost her mom 12 years ago to what authorities deemed an accident. A fall from the top of a cliff that ended up drowning her and almost drowned Avril who fell as well.

Through the years though, Avril hasn’t been entirely convinced this to be the whole truth. Her dad refuses to tell Avril anything about that night and he has erased any sign her mother was ever alive from their house.

The saddest thing is, Avril doesn’t remember what happened that night at all even though she was found on the beach drowned and hanging onto her life by a thread. Since then, she can’t even remember the years before that night and remembers absolutely nothing of her mom.

Most recently though, Avril has been getting bits and pieces of what seem like memories even though they make absolutely no sense.

“Suddenly I’m overwhelmed by a familiar ache. It’s such a deep, constant part of me, that longing for my mother, but it still takes me by surprise when it hits fast and hard like this. It feels like being hit in the stomach with a baseball bat. It sucks the air from my lungs and leaves me gasping.”


Avril feels lost. She has no idea who she really is or where she comes from. To finally get the closure she so desperately needs, Avril applies to a prestigious summer theater camp and gets accepted. This is the place of her childhood. The place her mom adored. And the place it all happened that one fateful night. Despite her dad’s objections, Avril goes anyway. She feels that she has to.

He didn’t tell me not to apply, but he obviously didn’t understand. Maybe he would have if I’d told him why I wanted to come so bad. If I’d explained how disconnected I’ve always felt. That I just need to find some link to my mother who’s never been anything more than a ghost to me. Some hint of who she was. Some anchor. So maybe I’ll know who I am.”


With the well-known and loved camp owner, director, and her mom’s old best friend Willa Carver plus all the new friends Avril meets there, she feels lucky to be there and she immediately feels like her mom is by her side and that she may actually get the truth from that night. As soon as she arrives, this extreme feeling of nostalgia overtakes her and she knows secrets are lurking in the shadows of this beautiful island.

Then she meets Willa’s, son Cole. He immediately connects with Avril and feels lost the same way she does. Like he’s constantly running or right on the brink of the answers he’s been needing his whole life. They take on Avril’s search for answers together and quickly find comfort and love in each other. The real kind of love that overtakes everything they’ve ever known.

“I have never in my life kissed anyone like this, so deep that it’s like we’re the air in each other’s lungs. Like I’m trying to find a way under his skin.”


Through the days, but especially at night, Avril realizes nothing is as it seems here. As someone who doesn’t exactly believe in ghosts, but she feels she’s being haunted by something. She is being left gifts and sees things she shouldn’t be seeing and the creepiest part, the fog seems to swallow her whole and it changes the island every time it comes.

The fog leaves everyone feeling like they lost time. Like they are somewhere else in someone else’s world. The barn they were just standing in front of is now a home. The tables are gone. Nothing is right. It takes over your sense of sight and there seems to be no way through it but to just sit and wait it out and hope nothing comes through the fog to get you.

“The fog is already rolling in. It swirls around my feet. Alive and wet. Like a licking tongue. Or waves lapping over the sand.”


I will say this took a little while for me to get into but when I did, I couldn’t stop reading. I had to know what in the hell was going on on this island. It was creepy and odd and everyone there seemed to be hiding something or knew what happened to Avril’s mom but just wouldn’t say it. I felt wary of Avril trusting anyone there and was yelling at the book the entire time in but a good way.

The shock that came…I expected. But I still couldn’t believe it. I thought I had it all figured out but I surely did not.

This story is a coming-of-age book about grief, love, and friendship. It really gets inside the teenage mind and how all of them feel more deeply than you’d expect. How they go through some of the hardest times and manage to pull through. How it takes one single event to truly shape who they become.

I really enjoyed this book and Myers’ has a beautiful, poetic way with her words that really granted the five dropping stars from me. The way she portrayed the setting made you feel like you were really there and could feel the fog coming in or the panic Avril went through. It was mesmerizing.

Ginny Myers Sain is becoming one of my “auto-buy authors” and I can’t wait until her third book comes out!

Special thanks to NetGalley, Ginny Myers Sain, and Penguin Group/Razorbill for sharing this digital ARC with me in exchange for my honest opinion. Being this was an early ARC, this review is based on uncorrected text which did not sway my thoughts either way.

Don’t forget to pick this one up on September 27th, I promise it’s the perfect spooky Halloween time read!

I really enjoyed “Dark and Shallow Lies, the story was atmospheric and deep, almost like you were being pulled into the pages and were part of the story. So I was very excited to receive an eARC of the new book by Ginny Myers Sain, which leads me to my review of “Secrets So Deep.” Sadly, I was not as taken in with this novel. First, the characters were one dimensional and fell flat. I could not picture myself in the location at all. In addition, I found the pacing slow, nothing like her previous novel.

Some things just either didn’t make sense or we’re not expounded upon; such as Avril’s passing out over and over, wouldn’t or shouldn’t that be noticed or questioned? It just seemed like no one cared or was ok with the episodes? The only character that was redeemable was Lex! If I could of had a friend like her while growing up, wow! The one solid of the story was the theme of being able to discover who you really are, and how to navigate trauma and grief.

This author is one I am happy I discovered. I cannot wait until she produces more work. I won’t say I wouldn’t recommend this book, but in my opinion “Dark and Shallow Lies” is the book to start with.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Avril’s mother drowned 12 years ago, off the coast of Connecticut, and was ruled an accident. But Avril doesn’t believe that, but rather the legends that surround Whisper Cove. While she doesn’t believe in ghosts, she’s spent the last 12 years trying to piece together what really happened. As she becomes more involved the more secrets that should stay buried come to light.

I really liked the storyline and characters that Ginny wrote. I loved the atmosphere of the creepy cove and the fog that settles there. I love fog, in of itself, because it makes for such a somber yet spooky feeling. I liked the complexity of they story itself as it builds and develops. The mystery and thriller behind the story had me engulfed. Ginny just has a natural way of somehow getting under your skin, but not in a super creepy way.

SECRETS SO DEEP starts off a little slow and took me a minute to get into, but by the end of it it had my heart racing. One thing I loved about Sain's previous book, DARK AND SHALLOW LIES, was the how the author was able to create such a unique atmosphere for the book and its setting. Reading SECRETS SO DEEP took me back to acting classes and summer camp and it just had this encompassing quality to it. I love the spooky feeling of Whisper Cove Theater, and all of the secrets and lies of the past and present meld quite nicely together to give this book a paranormal edge to it. As Avril learns more and more about the mother she never knew and herself, I got more invested in the overarching mystery surrounding her death. Ghosts of the past haunt the present and the true monsters are not the ones you expect. SECRETS SO DEEP with all of its twists keeps you guessing until the conclusion. I also love how Sain embraces the found family trope in this one, especially with Avril and her friends. So overall, I thought SOD was a solid mystery from Sain and still cements me as a fan of hers.

This atmospheric novel was took me places. This was like a fever dream and I loved it.

Avril is spending the summer at Whisper Cove theater, the place her mother died years ago. She is there to participate in theater and learn from the greats, but to also find some answers. The death was ruled an accident but Avril needs to know more.

She makes some new friends in the other attendees and is pulled into the magical orbit of the theater owner, Willa, her later mother’s best friend. Feeling an incredibly strong pull to Whisper Cove and the strangeness that surrounds the place, Avril and Willa’s son Cole spend time trying to uncover the secrets of her mother’s death.

This was spooky and dreamlike. I had my assumptions of the end pretty early on but it didn’t take anything away from the feeling I felt while reading this book through.

This author does a wonderful job of fully immersing you into the story. It’s all encompassing and such an experience.

Content Warning: drowning, mention of suicide, arson, hallucinations,

Ginny Meyers Sain has such a way with words, and she has the ability to draw you in within the first chapter with her beautiful, atmospheric prose. This is such an atmosphere-driven story, but it has to be to get the full effect of what Avril is living through during her time at acting camp. Avril returns to Whisper Cove where her mother died twelve years prior, to try to figure out what truly happened that night. All she remembers are the stars falling from the sky, a blinding light, a tight grip on her wrist, and the sense of flying. As she get closer to famous playwright, Willa Culver, and her mysterious son Cole, Avril learns that what the sea wants, the sea gets and it might just be after her.

The characters were interesting. I liked Avril and Cole’s relationship. They understood each other and helped support each other through their struggles. Their chemistry in the play was also great. Lex and Jude were adorable. I felt like Val was an ok character but she didn’t really serve a purpose to the story. A few of the characters didn’t really have much development throughout the story which was kind of sad since it’s a 400 page book.

The mystery aspect was interesting and it kept me guessing the majority of the time. It was hard to figure out what was happening in real time and what was in Avril’s head though. It made it harder to understand some scenes. I was also able to guess the twists well enough in advance so they weren’t that exciting for me once they were revealed.

I do want to to mention that the ending was very abrupt. I actually dropped .5 of a star rating because of it. It felt very rushed after the final twist and I felt like we didn’t get enough closure. And then the epilogue was just dumb in my opinion. I originally thought I was missing part of the book because of how abruptly it ended but nope. It was all there.

I would recommend this to someone who is new to atmospheric reads and to YA. I did like the majority of the book but I’m also hesitant to recommend it because it feels unfinished. But that’s just my opinion.

I read this immediately after reading this author’s other book Dark and Shallow Lies, and honestly I didn’t realize it was by the same author because the issues I found with the first book were a bit more well disguised in this one. However, many of them were still present. The love interest in both books makes me question whether he is a real character or not. In DSL, it is a bit more difficult to figure out because no one else knows he exists, but though the character in this book is somewhat more tied to reality, he still acts a bit ghostlike. He appears randomly from the fog, roams around the beach in the middle of the night, doesn’t eat, doesn’t sleep, and makes cryptic statements for the entire book. The romance is very instalove, with the characters having always been drawn to each other for some reason that’s never explained. Just because I was friends with someone when I was five doesn’t mean I’ll immediately fall in love with them if we meet as adults. The red herring characters were slightly better than in DSL, which was nice, but there were still way too many of them. Another thing that bothered me throughout was how everything the MC did and everything that happened to her during the acting practice was chalked up to great acting and no real comments were made about the most random things happening. The MC would literally pass out on stage during every other scene because she’s having flashbacks or something, or she’ll burst out sobbing or just have a full blown hallucination during the rehearsal but no one says anything?? She starts sleepwalking and literally finds herself in the ocean on multiple occasions without knowing how she got there and doesn’t tell anyone about it, and is literally seeing things that shouldn’t be there but apparently no one else sees them until suddenly her friends also see them and she finds out that the caretaker can also see them so at that point I’m just confused about the mechanics of this plot point that was used for atmosphere building but never really explained.
Overall it was still a fun read and I didn’t hate it, but it could’ve been better.

Thank you to penguin teen for the e-ARC!

Secrets so Deep is a mystery set at a drama camp - a wonderfully atmospheric setting, perfect for this mystery to unfold. The story centers around Avril, who attends the camp... but it just so happens to be the place where her mother died, which is the real reason she attends. Avril friends herself surrounded by strange occurrences, memories, and ghosts, laying out a paranormal mystery tale that will keep you turning pages.

Avril has strange, foggy memories of the night her mother drowned off the coast of Connecticut twelve years ago. Now she’s returning to the exclusive Whisper Cove theater camp for the first time since that terrible night, and it might finally be the moment that her mother’s secrets resurface.

This is the absolute perfect blend of mystery, teen drama (lol), and ghosts! I was completely immersed in Whisper Cove and Avril's memories from the very beginning. The characters were full of surprises, and as a former theatre teen myself, I absolutely loved the theatrical elements of the story. A thrilling ride from start to finish!