First of all thank you to NetGalley for my ARC of this book! Very stoked and honored to be able to read and review this book before it came out 😊

At first I was kinda meh on the character development- it felt surface level and detached… but the last 20 minutes of the book explain that perfectly haha.

This was a short and fast read, about a very scary look into the sketchy parts of AI and technology. Cue existential dread. *throws out my Alexa Echo Dot*

Would absolutely recommend!

AI and horror mixed is such a fun concept! William is a story of Henry and Lily and what happens when a few of Lily’s coworkers visit and see what Henry has been working on in his home laboratory. Hint… its name is William.

I will start by saying that I enjoyed this book a lot, but I did not like the characters!! Henry has agoraphobia with panic disorder, which leaves him house bound. Both he and his wife are engineers and are just odd people. I could not relate to them, but I did enjoy learning about their absolutely bizarre dynamic. Lily felt so cold to me, especially as she is an expectant mother. Very career driven. Also, I kept imagining Henry’s bicycle magician man creation as the puppet from Saw. It was hard not to mix the two in my head.

William is a quick read with short chapters - always a bonus! This is a book worthy of your time due to its originality as well as the killer ending. I did not see it coming and I loved it!

Thank you to NetGalley, Penguin Group Putnam, G.P. Putnam's Sons, and the author Mason Coile for the ARC of this unsettling book!

This was a weird, scary ride and I was absolutely not expecting the ending. This short book packs a big punch with scares, and has some fun sci-fi elements to it as well.

I liked the concept of this book when I read it, but it turned out not to be for me. The idea of AI is very relevant in today's world, but I did not enjoy the story.

This was crazy in the best way possible. I would say my only issue was that the climax was a little too long and dragged, this could have been cut a little bit more or make it a little diverse in the climax. I loved how spooky this was PLUS the plot twist. THE ENDING was amazing! I liked how we go over what makes us human and how AI could possibly go rouge or make catastrophic errors. I am excited that this is coming out in September which is when spooky season officially starts. This would be a recommendation for Halloween night read.

This book read as a novella. I read it in one sitting.
If you like horror, think M3gan, you will really enjoy this.
Henry is an engineer and has created W1ll1am, a robot that has only the top half of him completed.
No one knows about W1ll1am, not even his wife, Lily. However, W1ll1am knows more than Henry is aware of.
When Lily invites coworkers over one evening, Henry is not interested. He has agoraphobic and no interest in meeting others.
He introduces himself to the coworkers then flees upstairs.
That is when the real horror begins. I did not expect the ending at all.
I would recommend.
I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Well I read through this book really quickly it definitely grabbed my attention and the creeps and scare definitely there! I thought it was good. I look forward to other titles coming out from Mason Coile!

Super creepy not bad at all. The AI of it all was wild and the cover really drew me in. I can see the comparison to a Stephen king book because the anticipation was real. I also finished this in one sitting. It wasn’t my favorite read but it did leave an impression.

I was REALLY looking forward to this read based strictly on the description. The idea of an AI house that takes over and tries to kill those in it? Sign me up. I gave this book 4 stars for ONE reason. The pacing was so quick that I did not feel invested in Henry and Lily. You jump into the story with an already tense moment with Henry working with his AI William. Which, while I love an intense start to a novel, it didn't provide me the back story I really wanted. To me, William read as a short story rather than a full length novel. However, the writing, the twists, and the ending are certainly enough for me to recommend it to others!

Thanks NetGalley for the advanced copy!

I don’t know what I was expecting out of this story but what came out of it was definitely not it 🥴

This story follows Henry and Lily, a married couple of engineers living in their high tech home. Henry has been working on quite the project - an AI robot named William who is exhibiting some strange behavior. Henry soon finds out that getting rid of William is not going to be as easy as he expected.

This story is a short thriller/horror that really could have had some potential but I feel just did not live up to it.

The POV’s threw me off… there was no rhyme or reason as to how the character pov switched and it really was unorganized. The dialect between the characters was very surface level and almost monotone. I feel like so much yet absolutely nothing happened in this book.

I really struggled getting through this one.

Okay first off, LOVE this cover. So so good, that's definitely what pulled me into this.

I had a hard time putting this one down. This was something I haven't read before, AI gone wrong basically. Its something I've seen a lot in television, but not something I have ever seen in written media that I've picked up. It took me a bit to get into at first, but once I did it was full throttle.

Suspenseful, well-written, humorous. And it was a quick read!

In "William," Henry, a reclusive engineer, creates an artificially intelligent consciousness named William. However, as William's fixation on Henry's wife, Lily, grows increasingly unsettling, Henry realizes he must destroy his creation. Yet, William's malevolent presence lingers, haunting the house and threatening to take control. This up-all-night thriller blends psychological horror with a locked room mystery, offering a unique twist on the traditional ghost story. With a chilling atmosphere and eerie narrative, "William" delivers a gripping read that will keep readers on edge. A four-star review for its innovative take on haunting and suspenseful storytelling that keeps readers engaged until the final page.

This uses the psychological horror element perfectly with the overall story being told. The characters worked well in this plot and worked with the horror perfectly. It had that cyber noir element that I was looking for and enjoyed the mystery element perfectly. Mason Coile has a great writing style that I enjoyed reading this.

I love a good creepy horror novel. This is perfect for fans of M3GAN and even Five Nights at Freddy's.

Thank you to Netgalley and Putnam for the arc in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts are my own.

My first horror of the year and boy was it a good one. I really loved this book and it was hard to put down. From the beginning, you can tell something isn't quite right with the characters. The writing here is really strong and I loved the setup of the entire world (just a house, but it feels so much bigger than that). There's a creepy atmosphere from the jump.

Lily's dialogue is really stunted though. Everyone's dialogue is odd like that, but I had my suspicions about why that was. When I finished the book and my suspicions were confirmed, I realized the dialogue is justified for everyone except her. I get that she's talking to him as his creator, but she talks just like him. I don't know. Whenever she spoke, it was just awkward. I knew he was a robot from the moment he stabbed Davis, but the dialogue made me wonder if she was also a robot.

Another thing is that there were multiple points where the same thing seemed to happen. It was clear the ai had full control of the house, but she still operated as if things were fine? Two times she let herself get locked in a room when she knew the doors could close on their own. I feel like she should've been smarter than that especially toward the end of the story.

All in all, this was a fun read and definitely not what I was expecting. It was reminiscint of a good old school horror with some creepy and relevant modern aspects added in.

I was excited to learn about this book and looked forward to reading an entertaining
and futuristic novel featuring AI and a great Robotic experience. This is not at all the
story here. My first disappointment was how drawn out the parts of the story were,
each situation drawn out beyond my patience, Sure, you have to build your character’s
but there were not many characters and none were that compelling. Finally, the
Robotic that Henry created, called William, was mean. We don’t know why, as he is
not real, yet is meaner than the people. And with Henry’s wife being pregnant it
just did not seem right to have this weird, viscous Robotic William running their’
new age home.
For folks who are disturbed by these comments, you could love this story. I had
expected and looked forward, but it just isn’t there.
My thanks to Penguin Group Putnam for the download of the book for
Review purposes.

_William_ by Mason Coile is a fast-paced and dark thriller told from multiple points of view about AI and how it can go terribly wrong. Inventor Henry created the robot William with consciousness, only to find out William holds dark depths and contains something sinister. When Lily and Henry host a small party in their home with colleagues, William unleashes his dark side and haunts the house. _William_ is a quick book that will leave the reader unsettled.

What happens when AI has a mind of its own? Who haunts a house? William is a dark tale about human overconfidence and the pitfalls of AI.

4 Stars

Wow, this cover is as creepy as the story within! William is the name of an AI that Henry created. Although Henry is proud of his creation, he’s also super disturbed by it. He refuses to let his wife, Lily, see it, until Lily invites some co-workers over and makes Henry jealous. Wanting to prove himself to his wife and her friends, Henry finally shows William off. William misbehaves, though, and as the group tries to flee the house in fear William takes over the high-tech security system, trapping everyone in.

This novella really packs a punch. The few kills in it are incredibly tense and gory and are sure to satisfy any horror-lover. I was incredibly disturbed by the couple of scenes where the AI was trying to harm Lily’s pregnant belly, but luckily nothing terrible happened. If it did, I would probably not be able to finish.

The twist in this was so good! I genuinely did not see it coming, but after learning it everything else made so much sense. This would make for an excellent re-read for that reason. I was a little sad to see this end because I enjoyed my time reading it so much. It’s the perfect novella for a creepy evening and I highly recommend checking it out!

Thank you NetGalley and Putnam for an eARC in exchange for an honest review

I hate to say it but I did not like this book at all. I was super excited to read this one because the premise sounded so good but I just could not connect with the characters. I felt the writing was a bit disjointed and didn't flow as smoothly as I would have liked. I typically love books about AI, robots, uncanny valley type stuff but for some reason this one just didn't do it for me.

Thank you to NetGalley, PENGUIN GROUP Putnam, G.P. Putnam's Sons and Mason Coile for a copy of the ARC in exchange for an honest review.