This book was good! I don’t typically read much horror but this story was YA so I was hoping I wouldn’t have to sleep with the light on!

Devin Green wakes in the middle to being abducted…except this was planned and her foster parents are in on it.

She is part of a group of "troubled teens" in a behavioral therapy program who are dropped off in the woods and told they have 50 days to “change their ways” during a hike. This is a very stressful situation - add in a bully too - but what happens when the counselors go missing?

Something isn’t right about these woods….

This book is creepy and heartbreaking and has some great twists! We really dive into each character and what they are going through as they try and survive in the woods. I thought there was some great character growth (especially in an unexpected place.)

There is this sense of tension and that will keep you just on the edge of your seat throughout this story. We see some great friendships form and I loved the sense of found family.

By the end, you might be asking yourself who the real monsters are in this story…

✨What To Expect
🌳YA Queer Horror
🌳Sapphic Story
🌳Enemies to Lovers
🌳Found Family
🌳There’s Something in the Woods

Devin is taken in the middle of the night, but it's not a regular kidnapping. It's one her foster parents signed her up for. With Ollie, another teen in the van, Devin is on her way to a wilderness therapy camp. With 3 other teens and 2 counselors, what could go wrong? But soon Devin, Ollie, Sheridan, Hannah, and Aiden wake up to find their counselors gone. And is lost in the unfamiliar woods really the best place to be?

This book is queer, you say? It's written by Courtney Gould, you say? Enemies to lovers, you say? That's all I need to know. Well, I also need to know who designs her covers because *chef's kiss.* From this book I'm getting The Breakfast Club, but without the weird character-shattering makeover at the end. It puts five unique teens in a place together and gives them the opportunity to get their deepest, darkest secrets out. But there are monsters. You hear the story with Devin and with Ollie. I enjoyed Devin's trek more than Ollie's to be honest, but both are needed for the story. The character development is great, even for Hannah and Aiden, who don't have as much page time as the others.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for this ARC.

This was just ok for me. The creepiness wasn't there, it was more of an emotional roller coaster with this read. I felt for the kids, and they had a nice ARC each, but the whole plot just a bit unbelievable (obviously not looking at the horror elements of it), and the back stories for the kids seemed disjointed. I couldn't understand some of the negative feelings towards the parents, or parents' reasons for taking their kids to this camp. I also didn't feel like these kids would be easy targets for the mimics, as they didn't feel like they've given up on life. I felt like they were opposite, out there to fight whatever is brought onto them. I missed the desperation of their lives/situations.

Overall not for me.

My favorite kind of YA: horror/thriller with queer characters. This book was gritty, full of trauma, drama, and tension. A middle of the night “legal” kidnapping, wilderness survival, trusting strangers to help keep me safe and alive, the disappearance of those who were charged with keeping you safe, chaos ensues. This book is seriously my biggest nightmare put to pages in a book - it was truly giving a confined closed room thriller….but in the wide open wilderness which may personally more terrifying to me!

WOW! This is an amazing survival story! 5 kids and 2 adults enter the woods. The kids are various stages of rebellion and this is a "retreat" they have all, in one way or another, been forcefully pushed into. The goal - 50 days of hiking, talking, and growing.

But they are barely a week into the hiking when the trip goes sideways. The adults disappear and the 5 kids are left wondering what happened and are forced to use the small resources they have and their own wits (and each other) to survive. But maybe something in the woods doesn't want them to.

I was hooked right from the start. The kids being abducted out of their beds and forced into the forest was nightmare enough. When the woods started to get dark and scary, it was amazing to see how the kids stepped up and how each of their unique skills were put to the test. I loved the twists - this read like a horror movie and I loved picturing it all. I wish I'd paused on the cover longer in the midst of the story. NOW I can see who is who on it and I just love it so much more.

This story hooked me from the start and kept me locked on the page to the end. Don't miss this one, it was so good!

A huge thank you to the author and publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

Thank you to NetGalley, Courtney Gould, and St. Martin's Press for providing the ebook. This story was an intense journey from start to finish. A troubled teens program in the woods, spanning an unbelievable amount of days, with twists and turns that never stopped coming. The few survivors will carry the weight of their experiences for the rest of their lives. The personal growth and evolution of their relationships were truly inspiring.

What the Woods Took by Courtney Gould is a haunting and atmospheric novel that weaves mystery and emotion into a compelling story. The eerie small-town setting and the gripping suspense kept me hooked from start to finish. Gould's writing is vivid, pulling you into the woods and the secrets they hold. While some parts felt slower-paced, the emotional depth and strong characters made up for it. A great read for fans of supernatural thrillers!

This is what nightmares are made of!!! I was so scared reading this book I couldn't read it in the dark! I don't think I would have come out alive and now I don't really trust people that go camping

From the moment we met Devin I was hooked. As we met the other teens on this retreat and slowly learned about their backstories, I really started to empathize with them and root for them to make it out of the woods alive.
When they have been in the woods for close to a month, that's when things start to go wrong. Devin feels unseen eyes watching her, and just a feeling of wrongness, then the counselors go missing, and the teens are left to figure things out on their own. This really was the moment where all the kids started coming together as a team, but it's also when things take a turn... and not for the better.

Imagine hiking in the woods when you're already not an outdoorsy person, adding the feeling of someone watching, and an unnatural stillness in the air, the hairs on your neck constantly standing up. Then the things come out of the forest, first trying to coax you to into getting what they want, then trying to take it by force, and at the moment there doesn't seem to be any way out. This is so well written I felt like I was in the woods battling the horrors alongside the teens.
From the relationships between the teens to the horrifying things in the forest I was glued to the pages. Courtney Gould has become an auto-buy author, I can't wait to get my hands on a copy of this and look forward to whatever she comes out with next!

Courtney Gould can have my soul in exchange for more books. The writing in What the Woods Took is so atmospheric and this author just honestly has a talent for superb storytelling. What the Woods Took is thrilling and suspenseful, full of realistic and beautifully flawed characters, and the way the plot was executed was *chef's kiss*. I can't wait to read more from Courtney Gould in the future.

**I was provided an electronic ARC from the publisher through NetGalley.**

Actual rating: 3.5

Courtney Gould presents her third novel, What the Woods Took. A YA queer survival horror, readers follow five "troubled" teens who have been sent to wilderness therapy. It doesn't take long for the adults to go missing, leaving the teens to find for themselves in the woods. When they start to see impossible things, it becomes difficult to know who to trust and what is real. Told from the perspectives of Devin, a lesbian foster child who has been kicked out of one too many schools, and Ollie, whose dad accuses him of stealing his grandmother's pain pills from her cancer treatments. What the Woods Took pulls no punches and puts the entirety of the kids' lives into question.

Content warnings for mentions of kidnapping, sexual assault, homophobia, drug abuse, death of a loved one, body horror, emotional abuse, and more. Please read with care.

While there are five teens in the wilderness therapy program, the story told is really the story of Ollie, Sheridan, and Devin most of all. I felt it was interesting to have less weight given to Hannah and Aiden except through the lens of the other characters. This choice, in part, makes sense for numerous factors, but still sits a little awkwardly for me. Gould does well with creating real discord in the group and creating a real threat to survival, but there is a feeling of plot armor that is inherent for our main three characters.

I have learned that I likely should consume these types of stories via audio, since I tend to struggle with becoming initially invested at the start of the story. I did read this book entirely via ebook and found that the pace picked up about a third of the way in.

I would not hesitate to recommend this book to the target demographic or to fans of this type of story. I am grateful for the opportunity to read this book early.

As someone who has a close friend that had to go to a troubled teen wilderness 'therapy' camp and who has always been fascinated by the awfulness of this abusive and scam of an industry, WHAT THE WOODS TOOK combines a supernatural horror story similar to THE THING and brings in some really effective real world horrors. I liked the slow burn pacing, as well as the characters as all these kids are definitely damaged but cetainly don't deserve to be thrown into this horrific situation even WITHOUT the supernatural stuff. I really liked this book, and Courtney Gould really has a unique and unnerving horror voice.

I wanted so badly to be sucked into this book. I wanted so badly to love it. But I just couldn't get myself to care what happened to these characters. Maybe it was the slow burn, with the real plot not beginning until halfway through the book, or maybe it was just the headspace I've been in recently, but I just didn't find myself reaching for this one or wanting to stay up reading more. That is not to say it isn't a good novel. I think the idea of the story is intriguing and I think it will be a book that so many other people love. But it just wasn't for me, right now.

Five teens, one experimental therapy program, and a forest filled with monsters... talk about facing your monsters. When Devin Green is taken in her bedroom by strangers and thrown into a van she realizes that her "parents" had planned it and that she is now being enrolled into a experimental therapy program in the wild where teens learn to change their self-destructive ways and survive a fifty day hike through the wilderness. Devin is determined to escape while the other teen who is taken from the same area as her, is determined to just see it through.... but unfortunately for the teens as their hike begins and they cross a barrier.... something darker... something beastly is out to get them... and will use their darkest fears against them to steal their bodies or rip them apart. The teens will have to find a way to escape the killer creatures and trust one another to find a way out of the wild. This was a mixture of teen coming of age and of horror/nature horror thriller. It's a unique story and read and one I think others will definitely enjoy. I do really like Courtney's writing style and the way she crafts stories. The book itself was a unique read, and while it wasn't my favorite from her it was still one I did like reading at least once.

Release Date: December 10,2024

Publication/Blog: Ash and Books (ash-and-books.tumblr.com)

*Thanks Netgalley and St. Martin's Press | Wednesday B

What the Woods Took, by Courtney Gould, is a masterpiece in paranormal YA horror! Five teens are sent to a brand new wilderness therapy program, taken from their beds in the middle of the night. Their guides are two adults barely older than themselves. It starts out just as terrible as you would expect - they aren't even given tents to sleep in. But it only gets worse when they cross the river and weird mimic creatures emerge from the woods, first taking their guides and then closing in on the teens. The teens' bonds grow stronger, but it's the mimic's forest and they will have to fight to survive. Fragile relationships are tested, as are weak survival skills. Gould creates a breathtaking world that leaves you turning that next page over and over again, because you just have to find out what happens to Devin and the others. 4.5 stars.

What The woods Took is a YA supernatural thriller with LGBTQ representation.

Creepy, atmospheric and tense! I absolutely devoured this one! From the beginning of this book I was hooked and it kept me turning pages.

The book follows two main characters, Devin and Ollie and a band of other teens through treacherous woods.

The beginning of the book starts off running and then its pace did slow as characters are introduced and backgrounds are explained. After this it picks back up and I literally could not put the book down.

In the middle of the night, Devin is essentially kidnapped and finds herself in the woods of middle of nowhere Idaho where she’s has to complete wilderness therapy.
Things seem okay (at least as far as they can be), but then the group of teens start seeing and hearing things that aren’t there. And when they wake up one morning and their counselors are no where to be found, they have to work together to survive and make it out of the woods.

Check trigger warnings as this book discusses several hard topics.

*Big thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

HAPPY PUB DAY TO @gayowyn and WHAT THE WOODS TOOK!✨

This book was gritty, full of trauma and drama, TENSE, TENSE, and did I say TENSE(?), full of heart, a book where you’re really rooting for the characters, full of found family depictions, and showed the resiliency of the human spirit.

A middle of the night “legal” kidnapping, wilderness survival, trusting strangers to help keep me safe and alive, the disappearance of those who were charged with keeping you safe, chaos ensues. This book is seriously my biggest nightmare put to pages in a book! It was truly giving a confined closed room thriller….but in the wide open wilderness which may personally more terrifying to me!

ALL I HAVE TO SAY IS BRAVO TO @gayowyn ! I think books are meant to make you feel something and look introspectively at life and this was such a great representation of that for me! This may have been my first book by this author, but it will definitely not be my last!

5.0⭐️

⭐️WHAT THE WOODS TOOK, out NOW⭐️

Special thanks to @wednesdaybooks who gave me a review copy of this book!

#whatthewoodstook #courtneygould #wednesdaybooks #stmartinspress

What happens to a group of troubled teens gets lost in the woods with no adults to help them get out? What the Woods Took explores this and the troubled teen industry with this spooky thriller.

What I liked: my favorite part of this was the ambience and the potential for something worse to happen. The spooky parts are spooky because we get just a taste of what could happens that builds the tension. This book was creepy and maintained this throughout the entire book. The characters were well rounded in such a closed space setting. The characters were all very independent of each other, but yet helped show the character development nicely.

To keep in mind: While I love creepy books, I could not read this one at night especially since all of the creepy stuff happens at night in the book. If you are sensitive to this, then make sure you read it when it is light out.

Rating: 4 ⭐️ This book was so good and I could not put it down. There was some great character development mixed in with real-life issues. This book was creepy and maintained a consistent atmosphere throughout the book.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and Courtney Gould for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I honestly put this arc off for a while because I am a
✨ chicken ✨ but I did it mom- I finished it! (On pub day but still-better late than never!). Have I watched Yellowjackets? No. Have I read every single episode synopsis? Yes. So when I say this is giving Yellowjackets but not as insane, that’s what I’m working with. I love a good YA horror *lite*.

I couldn’t put this down- it was like every nightmare fuel TikTok I’ve watched too late at night about skinwalkers and mimics and Appalachia and I couldn’t stop. It also is a bit of a critique of the very real and sometimes (most of the time?) flawed wilderness therapy programs out there. Check triggers for this one!

I’ve already told our TL to order it for the library!

This one scared me (in the very best way) but YMMV because I am basically scared of air. :)

A group of teens involuntarily sent to a wilderness therapy program are forced to quickly reconcile their differences and gather any strength they have when they find themselves with no adults to guide them through a forest full of monsters.

I loved this one primarily for the deep character development. We get to know the history of each teen, how they ended up in this situation, what their struggles are. Each one is so complex; we don't know who we can trust or who can pull it together enough to help them all escape. The monsters also terrified me. Seriously, what could be more scary than an entity that can read your memories and take on the shape and sound of the person who most emotionally destroyed you?

I rounded this one up to 5 stars; it was paced so well, just an overall beautifully done horror novel with some complex characters.

Thank you so much to Wednesday Books for this ARC!