Christa and her boyfriend along with a group of travelers are heading deep in the snow-covered Rocky Mountains to a lodge for a getaway.
As the wind and snow continues to hammer the area, their bus must stop when there is a tree blocking the road.

Stranded in the bitter cold, the travelers must find shelter and fast.
They find an abandoned cabin and take shelter hoping to wait out the storm.

From the beginning, the twists literally do. not. stop. coming. And when I say I couldn't put this book down, I COULDN'T PUT IT DOWN!!!

This is easily one of those books that has you on the edge of your seat and you can't help but read through one more chapter.

If you like mystery, thriller, horror, suspense or anything in between.... this is a must read! Like ASAP!

Darcey Coates is one of my favorite authors and I will always read what she writes. I absolutely loved this book! I can’t wait for the next one and the next one!!

Dead of winter is a modern homage to the classic locked room thriller. Eight people are trapped in a snow storm when their tour guide goes missing and turns up dead. What follows is a claustrophobic novel of suspense and whodunit. In classic closed circle mysteries, suspicion mounts on everyone and everyone can also become a victim at any time. What separates this from others in the genre is Coates background in horror. There is a touch of the tone of a horror novel here (readers will understand upon reading!)
Overall, a fun mystery and a great entry into the genre by an established horror author.

Thanks to publisher for the arc on NetGalley. in exchange for an honest review

Talk about an atmospheric book! The perfect book to start the colder season with! I devoured this book and wanted more!

Christa and her boyfriend are heading up to the Rocky Mountains on a tour bus with a small group of people. Forced to set up camp in an abandoned cabin due to a fierce snow storm.
All hell breaks loose when they realise one of them is a crazed killer who is picking them off one by one.
I love this author and her ability to have you on the edge of your seat.
The story flowed and the characters were well developed, what truly amazed me was how the author was able to link all the threads of the story together and bring a jaw dropping conclusion to the end of the story. Definitely one ending that I did not see coming.

Dead of Winter is another Coates book that left me speed reading and flipping pages throughout the night! Taut, eerie, keep-you-on-your-toes suspense paired with characters that made you feel as if you wanted to crawl into their brains to figure out where their heads were at.

This gave me such good locked room vibes and I was here for it. A trip to the Rockies for a group of friends only to get lost and found themselves at an abandoned cabin, yeah, sign me up. The story telling and the narrative were so well written that I had no idea who was the killer, and I LOVE that. It was refreshing to get into a thriller where I’m stuck on who it is.

An excellent whodunit thriller about friends who are on a getaway in the Rocky Mountains. They get lost but find an abandoned cabin and thats where things go south. What I loved most about this was that it was not predictable. I honestly didn’t know who the killer was until it was revealed. Excellent story. Perfect for a cold, winter day.

Hoo boy this one started off strong and was intense the ENTIRE way through. This one is a locked room thriller and it is a doozy. Our girl Christa is joining a tour group that is heading deep into the Rocky Mountains, and they are hit with a snowstorm on the way there, forcing them to take shelter in an abandoned hunting cabin. Folks, if that doesn’t get your spidey senses up already, then I don’t know what will, and we are barely past the introduction here. Night one someone goes missing, and as they set out to find them, they do the next day, well, they find their severed head. Umm, WHAT? And from there bodies are dropping like lightning, folks are scared, trust is gone, and everyone thinks they are the next victim.

This was heart pounding good, I could not stop reading and there is a twist at the end that I did NOT see coming, and it left me with my jaw dropped open. I mean this ending got me and boy did I love it. Overall this was fantastic, chilling, and so suspenseful that I had to do some deep breaths to relax once I finished. I’m not sure how this was my first read by this author but I need to go back and fix that now.

Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press for the digital copy to review.

A young woman, Christa, and her boyfriend Kieran are headed to a lodge for a romantic vacation. Their bus has to stop because of a downed tree, and while Christa and Kieran are stretching their legs nearby, Kieran becomes lost and Christa injured.

Christa is frantic that everyone help her look for Kieran, though most just want to take shelter in the cabin the tour guide found close by. Christa fruitlessly wanders for hours before returning exhausted and falls asleep. Then, the tour guide is found butchered outside. Gradually, various other strangers Christa is with are murdered by someone they feel is part of their tour group, and the tension and tempers ramps up.

Darcy Coates' gory riff on Agatha Christie's "And Then There Were None" was such a disappointment. From its frequently irritating main character, to the extremely easy-to-figure-out identity of the murder, this book never came together for me. The first moment I fell out of the narrative: Christa is wandering around, injured, not dressed all that well to handle a blizzard, has no real understanding of how to navigate a forest, and she DOESN'T get lost and succumb to hypothermia?!? Or fall off a slope or something far more believable than returning to the cabin cold and tired? Nope.

I also never cared about the other characters, much less Christa's emotions as the situation fell apart. And when the murderer was revealed, I was totally underwhelmed, having long known who it was.

Thank you to Netgalley and to Poisoned Pen Press for this ARC in exchange for my review.

I have already read this book twice and recommended it to everyone I know . Darcy Coates never disappoints with spooky stories that draw you in and captivate you . Revenge is a dead shot best served cold in this unique story.

This one was so fun! More of a thriller than Darcy Coates usually writes, but still gory and kept my attention. I think that there were some predictable aspects of this but that did not impact my enjoyment. I do think it got a little repetitive in some moments which is my main complaint about Dead of Winter. I do appreciate how certain things that happened impacted the entire story and didn't magically fix itself like I feel like books typically do. Not my favorite from this author but still would recommend and will continue to read anything Darcy Coates writes!

I absolutely LOVED this . I could not put this book down . Crazy thing is I guessed the ending but the plot twist was amazing . I loved how all the pieces of the stores fell into place . Definitely a 5 star read

Well this was certainly a thrill ride! The heads literally start rolling from the beginning and the gruesome suspense continues to the end. There were times that this felt one-note because the murders were all so similar, but it was still an intense story. If you’re a fan of survival thrillers, you’ll definitely want to read this. Despite being set in the mountains during a snow storm, this is a perfect read for spooky season.

I have heard so many good things about Darcy Coates. This however was so underwhelming, I was expected to be shivering and scared the whole time. This game me a little more graphic one by one but Ruth Ware. Which I hated. I have no opinions on any of the characters because I was so disinterested. This felt more thriller than horror.

I will read Darcy Coates again though I want her to make me terrified.

Dead Of Winter
Darcy Coates @darcybooks
Genre: Horror/Thriller/Mystery
Page Count: 341

A remote cabin in the snowy wilderness thriller that will teach you to trust no one. There are eight strangers. One killer. Nowhere left to run.

"Technically, the statistics on that are ugly on a regular day: the average person is likely to cross paths with three to ten murderers in their lifetime, including not-insignificant odds of having one inside their broad social group."

O-EMM-FREAKING-G Darcy delivered. This is SOOO unlike the paranormal gothic vibes Im used to seeing from Coates and I absolutely loved every danm minute of it. From start to finish. EVERY SINGLE SENTENCE.

Isolated location with a snowy setting, say less. I'm here for it. Jam packed with characters you will love, loathe and despise. Atmospheric descriptions that had my fingers frozen with frostbite. Gorey scenes that just gave you the ick. And OMG the intensity of it all. There was no way I wasn't on the edge of my seat the entire time.

Hands down one of my favorite Coates books I have read so far

Huge thank you to @netgalley and @poisonedpenpress
for the advanced readers copy in exchange for my honost thoughts and opinions. 🖤

The premise for this one had me excited however the execution fell a little flat for me. There were parts of the story I did enjoy such as everyone being a suspect, the gruesome killings and the atmospheric setting however I did also feel the story was a bit too out there and unbelievable. This was my first book by this author and I would be interested to read more.

Christa is part of a tour group on their way to a resort in the Rocky Mountains, but when a brutal winter storm interferes, the group has to take refuge in a remote cabin -- and then things get even worse.

This had me on the edge of my seat, doing whatever the kindle version of furiously flipping pages is called (frenzied poking?) -- anyway, there were a zillion well-executed red herrings, nonstop tension, and some truly gruesome moments (a head! in a tree!) - loved it!

Somehow this was my first Darcy Coates book (?) I definitely need to hit up her backlist -- and will be the first in line to read whatever she writes next. What a treat!

This was such a fun story filled with the familiar tropes you see in the one by one style of story.
If you've read a Darcy before you know she is the best at setting up atmosphere and this was no different than any other book of hers. From the start of the book I felt the chilly vibes. I was on the edge of my seat. I found myself flipping through the pages as fast as possible to see if my guesses were right. I will say it is at times very predictable if you've read other one by one stories. However this didn't take away from my overall enjoyment of the story.

It reminds me of if One By One by Ruth Ware and Near The Bone by Christina Henry had a book baby.

I have always enjoyed Darcy Coates’s writing, and her characters! While this story was suspenseful, immensely atmospheric and very quick paced, I found it to be a plot that is a bit overdone.

All in all, the horror of how each member of the group was being picked off and the couple twists that Coates threw in made for an enjoyable read! If you enjoy Locked Room Mystery and Psychological Thriller then this is a great read for spooky season!