~ 3.5 stars rounded to 3 stars ~

I've been going back and forth with myself about this read ever since I finished it. On one hand, I was ensnared by the plot very early on. I love a fun, sloppy gorefest, and this book really delivered in that regard. I used to describe Coates' works as light/cozy horror, but after this, I think she has thoroughly demolished that label. She was absolutely merciless with this story, and I am so here for it!

On the other hand, the mystery aspect was incredibly weak. Maybe if you've never read a mystery/thriller, the ending of this book would come as a surprise, but honestly, it's full of well-known tropes that were just too obvious in their execution. I already knew who the killer was in the first 30 pages of the story and figured out the rest of it (motive, the plot progression) shortly after. This didn't feel like a situation where there was a trail of well-placed clues that I happened to pick up on. It just wasn't a very well-executed mystery to begin with.

Overall though I had a lot of fun reading this. Loved the brutality and how quick everything plunged into chaos. The atmosphere was incredible, and I really felt like I was sharing in the character's claustrophobia and paranoia. Definitely worth picking this one up!

Oh my! I needed a nice chipper book after reading Dead of Winter. What an utterly sinister book of unrelenting terror. The winter storm, the suspicious travelers, and the claustrophobic cabin sucked me in and gave me nightmares but in a good way. After a few calming books I'll read more by Darcy Coates. With the lights on.

I loved the setting for this story - an isolated cabin in the middle of a snowstorm, and there’s a killer on the loose, picking people off one by one. However, it did just not work for me.

For the most part, the characters were not unlikeable; they were just bland and I didn’t care about any of them. There was some tension, but they never really turned on each other at the level that I was expecting from characters in this situation. Nor were they presenting a united front in surviving. I think this, along with the characters themselves, made most of the book drag. For me, I found the last 20% to be the most exciting part of the story, but even then, it didn’t have me on the edge of my seat.

This thrilling read starts with the worst vacation ever! You aren’t sure what is going on, other than never-ending murder. Once the remaining vacationers figure out what they have in common, the bad guy was pretty easy to guess, if you were paying attention. The story is fast-paced and keeps you engaged throughout.

Thank you to NetGalley, Poisoned Pen Press, and Darcy Coates for the eARC.

Isolated mystery thriller with heavy slasher horror elements.

This was everything I wanted Ruth Ware’s One by One to be but wasn’t. And I know that isn’t fair to bring up another book by another author to compare at all times, but in this case, that’s what I feel is the closest related book.

Darcy Coates wrote this book masterfully. It felt like a horror movie with characters being picked off one by one in pretty dark and gruesome ways.

The whole time the finger gets pointed to each different character in the book and leaves you questioning who is murdering all the other characters.

While I called it right away and was correct, it was still fun to get to the ending.

My only problem and it’s minor is that the book felt a little slower in the first half than the second half, but it picks up fast!

I enjoyed the characters and I liked being in Christa’s POV.

Highly recommend, especially if you want an isolated mystery with a bit of an edge.

Wow wow wow! That's all I can say! This book really keeps you on the edge f your seat the ENTIRE time! Dead of Winter is one of the best thriller books I have read in a while! If this book was a road, I would get motion sickness from all those twists and turns! Defiantly recommending this book to everyone I know

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/63264519-dead-of-winter


https://www.bookbub.com/reviews/2177165628

I will post my review on Amazon on release day

Murder mystery about a tour group stranded in the Rocky Mountains being picked off individually. The tour group has trust issues as no one knows who they should trust. The murders are gruesome. How anyone can commit these crimes repeatedly in such conditions and display them without being caught is remarkable. No animals ever threaten the tour group or their remains. They only have to fend off each other and the snow.
This was an interesting read. It didn't pull me in. I didn't feel anxious at any point in this book. I wasn't invested in the characters. I did want to know how the book ended. The ending was abrupt and gave me that it's done feeling. I'm happy for people who found this exhilarating. I just feel this could have been fleshed out more.

Thanks to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for an e-arc in exchange for an unbiased review

Stuck in a remote cabin in the Rocky Mountains eight people begin to die one by one…who’s doing the killing and can any of them be saved? My gosh, this book was tense, the plot grabbed me right away and who doesn’t love an ode to And Then There Were None? The setting was perfect and Coates described it brilliantly, I could feel the bitter cold and the intensity in the atmosphere. It was great getting inside our main character, Christa’s head and learning her back history as the story is told from her singular point of view. The other travellers are fully fleshed out, realistic, all are important to the plot and have a significant role.

The winter weather on the mountain is like another character and causes almost as many problems as the people themselves. That ending was perfect because just when I thought I was so smart and had everything figured out, Darcy Coates threw a monkey wrench into the works and the ending blew me away. (I guess I am not as smart as I thought 🤔)

I was really pleased with how good this book was, it takes guts to take on a book that is anything close to Agatha Christie…kudos to the author for that, she did an amazing job of it and she made it uniquely her own. This is really more of a tribute and not a copy.

If you like dark, claustrophobic locked room type mysteries with flawed realistic, multifaceted characters this book is for you. And let me say that the mystery is just that, a mystery because there were red herrings throughout and I kept changing my mind on who the culprit was. This is my fourth read by Darcy Coates and I think it’s her best.

A truly terrifying psychological thriller and equally terrifying characters!! A well thought out and written novel. I gave it 3 stars because there were many chapters that droned on and on and I skimmed a lot of the story & didn’t miss anything. The ending will leave you speechless!!

I love a good scary story. There's nothing like being stranded in the snowy Rocky Mountains and stuck in a ramshackle hunting cabin with a small group of strangers who had been on their way to a Lodge for a winter retreat. One by one they are being beheaded and our narrator Christa knows it must be one of the people she is stranded with.

Christa realizes that she can't trust anyone and therefore has to be on her guard 24/7. The snowstorm is relentless while they are there. One of the major problems is that each person must leave the cabin to relieve themselves and that is when the killer attacks, so everyone is watching everyone and trying to keep track of who is outside and who is inside.

As numbers dwindle some of them start to figure out that they are a group selected because each of them is connected to an event that happened a few years ago that resulted in a young man's life. But there always seems to be a missing piece to the puzzle. The puzzle is solved in the end.

The book just ends abruptly, and I would have liked to find out what happens to any survivors and the killer.

Thank you to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for an Advanced Reader copy of this book!

Such a great book that gave me the chills from the setting and the writing. A locked room YA horror novel, this one pushes all the buttons for me!

Want summer chills? Read Dead of Winter.

Stuck in a snowstorm, a group of tourists must survive when one of them appears to be picking them off one by one. There was a lot going on throughout the book, and I was hooked from the first couple of pages. In the beginning, there was a time jump that felt unnecessary, as the book jumped back in time for 2 chapters, then jumped right back. Otherwise, even though I had an idea who the killer was from early in the book, the author did a fantastic job of making me second-guess myself until the big reveal. Great book!

First off, I am so glad I read this while the temperature was warming up because I don’t think I could have handled reading it if it was cold out!

Second, I will never travel with a group anywhere there could be a snowstorm.

This is the first book of @darcybooks I have read 🤦‍♀️ and am definitely planning on reading more! The story kept me hooked and guessing from the very beginning. Highly recommend for readers that want a fast past thriller!!

Thanks to @poisonedpenpress and @netgalley for the advanced copy!

Dead of Winter is out July 11 (believe me, you will want to read this in the summer!)

Dead of Winter by Darcy Coates – A tour bus is stopped by a fallen tree in the snowy Rocky Mountains. A snowstorm descends and the vacationers become stranded. Nine survivors huddled in a cabin as far away as possible but still so close that we can smell one another's body odor, wait for rescue. The next morning, they discover the severed hear of Brian, their tour guide. As another body is discovered, Christa has a premonition, we are all going to die here. Someone has committed atrocities against our companions. And the kills are so efficient and terrifyingly precise that it's hard to believe the butcher has never taken a life before. One by one Christa's companions are losing their heads. Four bodies now lie in the snow, and still, no one in the outside world even knows that they are in danger. Coates presents a chilling tale of survival and horror that will keep you turning pages!

I enjoyed this book however there were some issues for me personally, for example, the beginning of the book was action packed. On the other hand, there was a lull in the middle of the story. I enjoyed the writing, and thought it was easy to get into and easy to understand, and I thought that the setting was laid out very well. However, one of the most negative things for me personally was how much repetition there was in the story, especially in the middle section. In addition, I thought the ending was well though out. However, I saw it coming (maybe I read too many thrillers!) Overall, I enjoyed this book and will for sure recommend it to people who like fast paced, edge of your seat thrillers.

Thank you so much to Poisoned Pen Press and NetGalley for the ARC copy, in exchange for my honest review.

Wow! This is fantastic. Nine people and their guide are going to a lodge for an outdoor adventure. A snow storm quickly comes up and a fallen tree in the road stops them. They are close so they start to walk and find an empty but equipped cabin near by. Then one-by-one they are murdered and decapitated. Which one of them is the killer?

I'm used to Darcy Coates' ghost stories so I was surprised by this devilish thriller. There are a couple of twists that shocked me. I was on the edge of my seat at the final scenes' fast-paced climax. A great group of people with fine character development. An intricate plot that keeps you guessing at every step

An isolated unrelenting horror! This book grabbed my from the very first page and absolutely did not give any chances to catch your breath! This book was Incredible & gory!! I was blown away by the ending and I never had a clue! It kept the twists and turns coming…. a beautiful winter Mountain vacation gone horribly wrong….. or did it????

Thanks to Poisoned Pen Press for the free book.
Believe it or not, Dead of Winter was my first Coates novel, and now I’m going to be devouring her backlist. This is a fast-paced, tense, edge-of-your-seat thriller. A group of eight strangers are stuck in a blizzard in a cabin when they start being murdered one by one. Christa was the perfect narrator because of her own story and little distrust of everyone. And everyone is suspicious. Coates delivered just enough information to keep me guessing on who the killer was up until the end of the book. She also created the perfect creepy atmosphere. It was so well done!

The first half of this book felt impossibly long and formulaic, to the point where I saw I was a little over halfway through and went “what else could possibly happen?”

Let me tell you, the second half of this book is worlds better than the beginning. Twisty, fast paced, terrifying. There is a legitimate jump scare somewhere around 70/75% through. I entertained the idea of the killer’s identity early on, as the author does lay the framework for a solid reveal. The last half alone would have gotten a higher rating, but because it took a while to get to the good part, I’d give this 2.5-3 stars. Slow to pick up, but ultimately an entertaining read.