Such an intense book! Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC for the purpose of this review. Four stars! Coates does an awesome job with describing the winter scene, the feeling of the cabin and characters. I was invested in the outcome!

This was a thoroughly engrossing thriller. While I was able to correctly guess the killer about a fourth of the way into it, there were many twists I did not anticipate. I read this late at night and I actually got a bit jumpy. With the isolated dangerous setting and the gruesome deaths, this was a really creepy read. I really enjoyed it.

The first two chapters were so descriptive, it was if I was there. You automatically want to know if Christa and Kiernan make it. The book was nicely paced. As you finish each chapter, Coates gives your a little cliff hanger or a twist to make you want to keep reading. The lamp that was broken on purpose, the blood in the snow, the open shed door, the noises from outside, the teeth on the window ledge, etc. Each chapter would leave you with this eerie/being stalled feeling. You feel as if you are a part of this story. Coates also does a good job making me change my mind constantly trying to figure out who is the killer. Also, short chapters. Who doesn't like short chapters? The story was like a really long game of Clue which was fun to read but there were so many things happening that I started to take notes after the first few chapters. When they realized they were all connected and were brought together on purpose 🤯. And then later on the killer was revealed and I knew it! But this did not take away from how good this book was. Definitely give this a read!

The synopsis on NetGalley said that there are no ghosts or slow burn with this horror/thriller. There weren’t any ghosts (I appreciate that; sometimes it seems like an easy-cheesy way to explain a story) but this was definitely a slow burn. Normally, I don’t care for those, but this is a page-turning slow burn!

We start with a small bus load of people who are headed for a two-week stay at the Blackstone Alpine Lodge in the Rocky Mountains. Our protagonist, Christa, and her newish boyfriend, Kiernan, are heading there for some clean air, beautiful scenery and a new adventure together as a couple. I will say, they got all those things they were hoping for!

The rest of the group includes:

Brian, the tour guide
Denny, a mechanic, and his teenage son, Grayson
Alexis, a quiet true crime fan who is always writing in her journal
Hutch, a DJ going to scout the lodge for a client’s wedding
Steve and Miri, a middle-aged couple hoping to work on their marriage
Simone, a former military ice queen whose friend bailed on their trip, and
Blake, who just retired from her job as an emergency dispatcher.

Eleven people are on this bus, but a downed pine tree leaves them stranded. Brian has a plan to saw the tree into small enough pieces to move, and the group takes five to all take in the scenery. The storm they’d been driving in is intensifying though, and soon Christa and Kiernan are lost from the group. As they keep blindly searching, Christa falls and loses track of Kiernan … but gains sight of a cottage. She gets there and finds the rest of the group there as well - but where is Kiernan?

You’ll find out soon enough what happens to him, and what starts happening to all of them. They are stranded in a random cottage without electricity, running water, or cell service. It’s freezing, they’re starving, and they are all realizing they’re in danger when one of their heads is found impaled on a tree. One of them is a killer, but they’re all stuck together. Will anyone be able to find out who is responsible for the killing before they are all dead?

This was written so beautifully! The scenery was vivid, the story was unbelievably suspenseful, the characters all had decent backstories and while it was slightly slow, I didn’t mind. This is a book you savor, and become one with the horror and backdrop of the story. I was going to give this 4.5 stars rounded up, but the ending I never once saw coming makes this a solid five stars.

(Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press, Darcy Coates and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my review. This book is slated to be published on July 11, 2023.)

Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

As a fan of thrillers set in snowy landscapes, I couldn't wait to dive into Dead of Winter by Darcy Coates, and thankfully, it delivered.

From the very first chapter, I was hooked on the story's chilling premise - a group of strangers trapped in an abandoned cabin during a blizzard with a killer among them.

The scene is set with Christa joining a tour group in the Rocky Mountains with the hope of finding peace from her past. But things quickly go awry when the group is forced to take shelter in an abandoned cabin due to a bitter snowstorm. Here is where the real action begins, and I couldn't put the book down once I started reading.

The tension builds up steadily as the situation in the cabin becomes more and more dangerous. The discovery of the severed head of their tour guide outside the cabin throws everything into chaos, and Christa and the other strangers find themselves with a killer among them.

What I appreciated about this book was how well the author was able to create a claustrophobic and eerie atmosphere. The sense of isolation and being trapped was palpable, and I could feel Christa's rising panic as the number of survivors dwindled.

If you're a fan of thrillers or love a good trapped-in-a-blizzard story, this book is a must-read. Dead of Winter kept me entertained until the very end.

Thank you to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the opportunity to read rage and review this title which is available wide on July 11 2023.

All Hail the Queen of suspense and horror. In my humble opinion. Ms. Coates steps away from the haunted house slow burn books she normally writes for this insidious horror book. I was so engrossed in it that when my kid interrupted me I legit screamed. Oh this book is a keep the light on kinda horror.

Thank you to Netgalley and Poisoned Pen Press for this ARC of Darcy Coates' upcoming Dead of Winter. This was a well done page-turner of a locked-room thriller. Christa, our narrator, and her boyfriend Kiernan, along with 8 strangers and a tour guide decide they are going to get away to the Blackstone Lodge, an isolated retreat in the Rocky Mountains during the worst possible time of year where there is nothing but snowstorms and no way for anyone to reach them. When the tour bus is forced to stop due to a fallen tree in the road, the group finds an empty cabin in which to shelter. Soon after, one by one, the members of this group are found gruesomely murdered and the remaining group fights to survive between lack of resources, mistrust of each other, and in the most inhospitable environment. 3.5 stars

Another awesome read from one of my favorite authors. Every book from Darcy Coates is within the horror genre but completely different. I love that the books are creepy and scary with gore but not so much that I feel uncomfortable with my teen reading them too. Loved it!
Thank you NetGalley for the advanced copy!

Dead of Winter is an exciting, easy read. Unfortunately I found the killer to be a bit too obvious but still enjoyed seeing how things would play out. I enjoyed the atmosphere and found the overall experience to be relaxing. I prefer the horror aspect of Darcy Coates others works a bit more but it is wonderful to see the author diversifying her work if thrillers are also something they want to dive into. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to receive this ARC.

I love Darcy Coates. I love her writing, her imagination and her ability to get my heart racing with fear.

Dead of Winter is a ‘who done it’ mystery and thriller. Even though there are no ghosts in this book, I was still frightened. I could feel the cold and fear as she wrote how her characters are freezing and trapped in a secluded cabin.

A group of people are traveling together on a bus up to a posh winter lodge. On their way to the lodge, they end up unable to complete the rest of the journey by bus. They go out in search of help. They find a remote and abandoned cabin for shelter. Then someone gets murdered and the body is found in a very gruesome way. Read on! You will not regret it.

I’d like to thank Darcy Coates, NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the arc.

#DarcyCoates #NetGalley #PoisonedPenPress #mysterythriller #whodoneit

4.5 Stars. Christa and her boyfriend join a small tour group that sends them off to a snowy lodge in a desolate part of the Rocky Mountains. While almost at their location a crazy snowstorm takes them over, so the group has to take shelter in an abandoned hunting cabin. Christa was hoping to get away from a traumatic experience she had a few years before the trip, but it seems this trip might be just as traumatic.
The tour guide goes missing and the group find his head on a pike in a large tree. Christa has to watch her back to make sure she’s not murdered next. It could be an outsider or it could be someone in their group that is the murderer. Tensions soar as their small amount of food dwindles, they have no cell service, and slowly one by one they drop like flies.
This book was a page-turner from page one. It was fast paced and perfectly detailed to make you feel like a part of the tour group freezing in your parka. It’s was a more gruesome version of And Then There Were None. I was wrong almost ever step of the way and it was delightful. I felt there were a few loose ends left untied, and a lot of idiocy for a whole group of adults, but overall it was a great book. There’s a “no way!” moment that I didn’t see coming to tie it all together. Read it and see if you’re the detective I was not. Coates did a great job on this one. I feel the frostbite.

textbook who dunnit..

group of strangers go on a tour together and they slowly start dying off one by one. the characters did fall a little flat, in turn i kept forgetting who was who.. maybe could of had a longer intro into the different people before arriving at the lodge ??

i did guess who the killer was very early on, for me the clues where quite obvious from the get go but i still enjoyed reading on as it got more exciting in the second half

I have been wanting to read a book by Darcy Coates for quite a while, so when this one was offered by NetGalley, I jumped on it.

It begins with a planned getaway to a mountain resort. However between Christa and Kiernan getting lost in the woods, blocked roads, and snowstorms, the bodies start piling up. No one is above suspicion, but they have to depend on each other to try and survive. The "who done it" kept changing in my mind, so the author did what she set out to do....keep me guessing.

This book was a good book, and because of it, I will read more of her books. However, I did not love it. Too many characters to keep track of and in writing this, I think if the characters had more depth, I would have had an easier time remembering their stories.

Overall, I recommend this book.

I really wanted to enjoy this one; as I love reading Darcy Coates’ horror but this one was hard for me to get into. I couldn’t connect with the characters & while the idea was intriguing; the plot was slow & underdeveloped.

Darcy Coates definitely knows how to write suspense. The end of each chapter left me juuuust enough on edge to feel like I NEEDED to know what happens next. Her writing is effortless and easy to jump into. This was a great and gorey whodunnit with plenty of little twists to keep you guessing.

Okay, okay it was good… but I didn’t love it. I had a hard time staying engaged with the story and often felt bored during non-thrilling scenes. I found myself skipping through the chapters, just to sort of “get it over with.” Now I will say, this has nothing to do with a lack of good writing and gruesome horror elements (that for sure was there!), but more so to do with my own preferences and attention span.

I still recommend this book (the ending was definitely unexpected), however, it’s a three-star read for me.

MYSTERY THRILLER WITH LOTS OF CARNAGE!! 4.5 stars
A tour group are taking a bus in the winter time somewhere in the Rocky Mtn National Park to a large cabin retreat they received for free. Midway up they cannot go any further because of a tree fallen in their path and blizzards conditions. They have to flee the bus to find shelter. They all find a cabin to hunker down in til help can arrive. Well if that doesn't seem like enough, people start being killed off in the group in gruesome ways. One of them has to be the killer, but who?
My pros:
I liked this book. It was fast paced and easy to read. I was on the edge of my seat at times The third act is the best. This would make an excellent movie. I would go see it. This was my first read for Darcy Coates and I enjoyed her writing style. At no point in the book did I think it was slow. I always hated putting it down. It has short chapters, which I love. It makes me feel like I am accomplishing something faster. This book was tight. No real flaws or gaps in the story. Which you get a lot in horror, mostly everyone made smart decisions.
Cons:
This is minimum. I have been to Rocky Mtn National Park in June and they was a snow storm so bad we could not reach areas of the Park. It doesn't make sense they the Tour group is going in the winter. Maybe they were just oblivious or maybe that is what Northern People do? I live in the South. I don't know.
Thank you to NetGalley for allowing me to read this book in advance.

This is the first book I’ve read in years that I wasn’t able to figure it out before it ended! It had me questioning things and second guessing who I thought was the killer the whole the time. That is so hard to find in books these days! And I felt like I was out there in the cold. I even had to turn my heated blanket on at one point. Great writing does that. Makes you feel like you there. The only reason for 4 instead of 5 stars was it did start out slow. But once it got going I was hooked. Made sticking through the slow start totally worth it.

Thanks to NetGalley for an arc copy of this book!

First I do want to say this is the 4th Darcy Coates book I have started and the first that I finished. The set up will grab Clue lovers right away. In this one we see a darker more gruesome side of Coates and I must say she did a good job with it. It is a book you wont put down until you find out whats going on!

The story right from the beginning had me hooked, I could feel the anxiety increasing inside me, the feeling of being trapped, the feeling of being hunted down, the feeling of being helpless. Author has so beautifully crafted this piece of art, I could feel every emotion of the story inside my bones. It took me some time to get used to all the characters in the story, considered the fact that there were many, once I got into the story there was no turning back. The spite of having a single point of view, single timeline this book has so much of effect on me. I mean to say is the story was so powerful and was so efficiently written that it needn't had to have anything else.

The characters were lovable, personally I connected to the main protagonist so well that it made me feel that I was right there inside her body. Author manage to create a very spooky environment, truly claustrophobhobic, the right amount of details really helped me create a picture of the scenario in my head. 1 point I would like to highlight is that the amount of details we just perfect, not inadequate, nor excessive. Just the right amount.

The writing was super easy to understand, the work of someone who knew what he was doing. A fastpaced thriller with all the creepiness. The book was almost everywhere on the book is community, it deserves all the applause and appreciation it gets. The book had me hooked. I just could not put this one down honestly I read this one in a day.

Definitely recommended anyone who loves thrillers, suspense, locked room mystery and even horror. Just go for this one.