This book blew my mind! Robin Quain is a historian researching the intersection of witchcraft and alchemy who has had her research stolen by a colleague she trusted. In an effort to disprove the theories the colleague published, which were her own theories originally, Robin accepts a residency at Hildegard College in Colorado. Right from the start, things get weird, and each mystery leads to a new puzzle. I wanted to read fast so I would finally find out the ultimate secret, yet I wanted to read slowly because I didn't want to leave this mysterious setting. Many thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

I received an eARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher, for which I thank them.

“Atlas of Unknowable Things” is by McCormick Templeman. I found the premise of this really interesting, but somehow the book didn’t deliver what I hoped it would. The main character, Robin, was just someone I couldn’t wrap my head around. At times she’d be dropping references and citations about a wide assortment of things - showing the book smarts - but then she’d make some rather odd decisions - showing a lack of street smarts. It was a bit frustrating, too. I think the author did a great job at creating the high stakes mystery, but this book took its sweet time getting to the heart of the plot (things picked up toward the 2/3 mark of the book). There are references to the occult, supernatural beings, and ancient practices - but something just didn’t quite sit right for my reading pleasure. Maybe it was that there was a lot of showing in this book … maybe it was that many characters felt flat … maybe it was that Robin kept “noticing” things she hadn’t before … but this book just missed the mark. I think it could be written more tightly, which would help with the pacing at minimum.

I love a good suspense. Bonus points if there’s a bookish main character. Even more bonus points if it feels reminiscent of Gothic literature. Atlas of Unknowable Things gets all the bonus points because it features a young woman, hoping to finish her doctoral thesis and ends up getting caught up in the supernatural. The fact that she is a skeptic and refuses to accept it at first adds a bit of levity to the narrative. This novel also has quite a cozy feel.

I received an ARC of Atlas of Unknowable Things by McCormick Templeman in exchange for an honest review.

Robin Quain is a historian who just had all her work stolen and published by a man that she thought loved her. In order to redeem herself as well as take her mind of the betrayal, she decides to go to a small college, hoping to meet a professor who may have the key to her current research. Robin applies for a residency and gets it. However, when Robin arrives at Hildegard College, she discovers that the professor she was so excited to meet disappeared last year. Yet then she is told to move into that selfsame professor’s cottage…a cottage that still has all the professor’s things in it.

As you might imagine, this novel is creepy and nerdy and also a fair amount of cringe that comes with a realistic bookish character. The cover is also stunning, in my opinion.

Stars: 4.5/5

One thing that is not exactly part of the narrative, but helped me to enjoy the novel is the fact that it is set up like a thesis paper, with sections and subsections. Another thing that got me into this novel is the way that the protagonist nerds out over her favorite subjects. I think that all nerds, regardless of what kind of nerd you may be, enjoy sharing their favorite subjects. Templeman was able to match that energy and get it perfect on the page. Robin is also very stubborn in a way many academics are and while I was screaming in my head to tell her to get the heck away from that college, I knew that she wouldn’t because she felt she had a point to prove.

Over the course of the novel Robin realizes that not only could her weird dreams be more than that, but everything she’s known (including about herself) is a lie. What eldritch horrors hide in the woods? Why was she attacked? And will she ever be able to leave? While it may take a bit to get into this novel, it is definitely one that I would recommend reading.

Thank you, NetGalley and Mccormick Templeman, for the ARC. I leave this review voluntarily and happily. Also, thank you publishers for your hard work!

This was definitely a strange and unique read. I had no idea what was going to happen, and i loved it. I loved how, at the beginning of every chapter their is a quote. If you enjoy conspiracies, cults, and just straight up strange things, this book will definitely be up your alley. A lot goes on throughout this book, but not so much it leaves you mind-boggled. I really enjoyed the characters as they are very much different from one another, and you can not tell who you can trust.

Also, you learn a lot in this book dealing with history, botanical, and just a lot of things that are interesting. It's like a puzzle of sorts throughout the book, and parts of this book will have you gasping and shocked. It did, at least for me. There is evil in this book. You just can't tell if it's all human or something else, and I liked that a lot.

Darkness comes in many forms, and in this book, you will find out what forms some of those are. Nightmares, dreams, and intuition they all have something to tell us, and it makes me wonder what im missing sometimes. Reading this book, like I said, a lot goes on, and it's so unique. I think it truly earned its stars.

The Atlas of Unknowable Things by McCormick Templeman was such a fun, twisty story! It is a fantastic gothic/dark academia novel. The book is the type that takes you along for the ride; it can be confusing at the beginning (as it should be), and you slowly start to uncover what is happening alongside the protagonist. At times, the plot seemed a little ridiculous, but it didn't bother me. I could see this book not being for everyone. But if you love Gothic and/or dark academia books and are willing to suspend your disbelief, it was an entertaining and enjoyable book!

Thank you, NetGalley, and St. Martin's Press for allowing me to read this book early. The opinion in this review is my own.

This book took a long time to get going and make sense. It is a book you need to trust the process and keep plugging along until it does make sense. The atmosphere is great, and the characters have depth. The pacing is slow at times and I got bored periodically. It does get better and the mystery is worth it in the long run.

Fans of Dark Matter by Blake Crouch, this is for you. When Robin Quinn has the opportunity to dive into the rich resources of a private college in the mountains of Colorado, she applies, hoping to find the link between Joan of Arc and a secret society of witches. What she doesn’t expect, though, is the breathtaking beauty of the place or the claustrophobic sense that something is wrong and that her fellow academics are playing wicked games. Good pacing, believable characters, and a good twist—definitely grab this one and savor the journey.

This one only makes sense after the 60% or more, The main character is going to a college (no staff, no students) to write about it and discover what happened to the missing girl, but the large plot twist, turns this novel into a chosen one, good vs evil fight. It takes time and persistence to get to that point, but I am happy to have read it because I like thrillers with evil paranormal forces that humans can barely survive.

After Robin’s best friend takes credit for their shared research and end their friendship, she finds herself seeking residency at a college in Colorado that houses rare manuscripts. But what she finds there is a group of people with a lot of secrets that she is determined to unravel.

As I reflect on this book, I realize I still have no idea what was going on. The twists and turns and underlying speculative mysticism was a bit much for me.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martins Press for this ARC.

This one is deeply weird and solidly in the gothic story realm (with a mix of dark academia but only with faculty, no students). Robin Quail is both deeply in mourning and beyond furious when her (now ex) boyfriend steals her phD thesis in folklore and witchcraft and publishes it as his own and gets the job in academia she coveted (as someone IN academia, this is an awful betrayal and also I wouldn't wish academia on anyone). After a bizarre split with her cousin Paloma, Robin gets a summer job offer from Hildegard College in rural Colorado, the very place she wants to go because she believes a professor there has an artifact that will actually disprove her own thesis and embarrass her ex but this professor has disappeared.

If the book nails anything it's the gothic, old school, isolated nature of the college. Robin meets several others and quickly learns that even though the school is out for the summer the faculty are still on campus and act like an odd family (seriously, they eat together, have gliterati style parties etc). On the face of it, Robin's there to study witchcraft via herbal spellcraft and healing and alchemy (which is rather my own subspecialty and field of study from the biology side of herbal healing) but she's really there to find that missing artifact and to learn where the missing professor went.

But as she's there, unspooling a series of clues and sleepwalking out of the cabana they put her in (which was the other professor's space still with all her clothes), Robin finds herself wondering about her fellow faculty members, all of them seem to have something to hide. The suspense rachets up nicely as it edges from mystery to eldritch horror.

There are some really neat twists to this though I think the other characters could have been fleshed out a bit more (always a trial with a first person pov) and the ending felt a little rushed.

As I mentioned this is first person pov and conversational at that, like Robin's in the room telling you this story.

I very much enjoyed it (but again it had a lot of my personal areas of interest) but I can see this not being for everyone.

The atmosphere is haunting and mysterious, and I liked the gothic setting. The pacing dragged at times and some plot points felt unclear, but it kept me interested enough to finish.

Atlas of Unknowable Things follows Robin Quain, a historian who takes up a residency at Hildegard College, a secluded institution in the Rocky Mountains. Initially there to examine ancient manuscripts, Robin's true purpose is to locate a specific artifact before her former best friend turned rival does. As she delves deeper into the college's mysteries, she encounters cryptic messages and unsettling occurrences that blur the line between reality and the supernatural.

The novel offers a compelling blend of dark academia and gothic suspense. The setting of Hildegard College is atmospheric, and Templeman's writing effectively conveys a sense of isolation and intrigue. Robin's journey is marked by intellectual curiosity and a growing sense of unease, drawing readers into a world where knowledge and the unknown intertwine.

That said, I found the pacing uneven at times, with certain sections feeling slow or disjointed. The blending of academic themes with supernatural elements, while ambitious, didn’t fully satisfy me, leaving more to be desired overall.

Overall, Atlas of Unknowable Things presents an engaging exploration of academia, mystery, and the occult, though it didn’t completely land for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the advanced digital copy of this book.

2 stars

Both this book and the last book I read (the excitable FORGET ME NOT by Stacy Willingham) feature female main characters who are invited into someone else’s space then immediately think they have the right to start breaking into private spaces and nosing all around. What the heck is with these people? This sort of stuff gets you SHOT, and, you know what? Mind your own damn business.

Robin Quain is an academic and she arranges an visiting status at a university in Colorado (which the author treats as if it’s Oxford without taking into account, I guess, the Colorado hasn’t even been around that long.). There are a handful of other faculty around, no students and it turns out that the apocalypse is closer than anyone thought (this is done really poorly.)

Though this didn’t go in a predictable fashion, which is nice, if you are looking for clear explanations of the whys and wherefores they are lacking here I must be a nerd to want it all to make sense. The farther away I am from having read this the more I dislike it.

⭐️⭐️⭐️ (3/5)

Creepy vibes, cool concept—but it didn’t totally land for me. Atlas of Unknowable Things has a lot going for it: an isolated college in the mountains, ancient texts, mysterious disappearances, and a touch of the occult. The setting is super atmospheric, and I really liked the mix of dark academia and folklore.

That said, the story took a long time to get going, and I never fully connected with Robin as a character—she’s interesting, but a bit closed off. I kept waiting to feel more pulled in, and while things do pick up in the second half, it wasn’t quite enough to totally win me over. Also, a few of the plot threads felt a little too vague by the end.

Still, if you’re into slow-burn mysteries with a strange, cerebral edge, this might be your kind of read. Just go in knowing it’s more about mood and mystery than fast-paced action.

I was really drawn to the title of this upcoming horror novel. Atlas of Unknowable Things sounds so poetic to me.

The story‘s prose was, in fact, a lovely descent into darkness and its early ominous vibes were quite compelling.

McCormick Templeman skillfully guided me into eerie, mysterious territory, and it was easy to feel hypnotized by it all.

What Templeman eventually revealed didn’t work incredibly well for me, but it didn’t ruin the book for me either. After its explosive unveiling, Atlas of Unknowable Things shapeshifted into a story that felt much different than the one I started with. Even though it wasn’t where I wanted to go, I can applaud its originality. I will also confess that the last few lines had me wiping away tears.

This blend of suspense and horror would be a nice addition to your spooky season stack! Look for it when it hits the shelves on October 7!

I am immensely grateful to Netgalley, St. Martin’s Press for my copy. All opinions are my own.

*3.5 stars*

If you’re looking for a genre-defying book that is both a truly frightening and fun read, Atlas of Unknowable Things is for you. For those of us who have loved reading our whole lives, sometimes you have a story from your childhood that haunts you as an adult reader; you’re always trying to chase the feeling that book gave you. In the best way possible, this is a book that woke up the young reader I once was who still lives somewhere inside of me. Though it is an adult book (and it is definitely an adult book- both thematically and in the scariness level), elements of it reminded me of some of my favorite series when I was younger- Goosebumps and The Mysterious Benedict Society in particular; it gave me the same sense of creepiness and adventure that once kept me reading long into the night. This is not an easy thing for an adult book to accomplish, especially one as atmospheric as Atlas of Unknowable Things is; and I very much enjoyed this reading experience. If either of the series I mentioned formed the foundation of your love of reading, and if every now and then you still find yourself wishing you could go on a frightening adventure that forced you to solve puzzles and perhaps run from a monster, I think you will really enjoy Atlas of Unknowable Things.

I would recommend Atlas of Unknowable Things to readers who enjoy gothic dark academia outside of its normal setting, codes & puzzle solving, and stories that don’t take you where you expect to go (in a good way).

Thank you to NetGalley & St. Martin’s Press for the arc! All thoughts & opinions in the review are my own.

Robin Quain is a historian staring down at a daunting dissertation. She ends up at tiny Hildegard College located in an isolated part of Colorado where she is searching for an ancient relic that she believes is hidden there. The relic could be the key to her dissertation and much more, but can she survive the journey or will she end up missing like the professor that went before her?

I am of two minds with this book. On one hand I really liked the hunt for clues and meaning but I felt that parts of the book were weighed down with long descriptions of the arcane. Perhaps it is just me, I am not a huge fan of this type of fantasy, and that is not what I thought I was getting when I read the description. It's not a bad story, it's just not for me. If you like this type of ancient lore this may be the book for you. 2.75 stars.

I received this advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley and am voluntarily leaving a review.

Interesting read about the world of academia with a cast of very interesting characters. The book opens with Robin sharing an apartment with her cousin, Paloma, and then one day Paloma is gone, having left a note that says “gone to California”. Robin is working on her dissertation and decides that she will apply to Hildegard College to do research and to her surprise, she is accepted. As soon as she arrives, things seem to be “strange” and little does she know, they will get even stranger. Interesting read.

Thank you to the publisher, author and NetGalley for the opportunity to receive and read an advance reader copy of this book.

What an interesting and cool premise. This book follows an academic who is doing research regarding possible witches, and stumbles into a beautiful, remote, college. This book hit all the right chords for me - secrets? witches? secret societies? conspiracies?
The writing was compelling and there were no slow parts and the story seemed to pull you along the entire time, leading you on a twisting and turning ride to the culmination of the book - just prior to the end. At every point, you will never guess where the story was going next. I would recommend this book to anyone who loves interesting and unguessable stories like this.

This ebook was provided by the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I thank Sara Beth Haring for reaching out to me for a free eARC in exchange for a review, I also enjoyed three part puzzle for an 'Atlas of Unknowable Things' tote bag (if I am one of the first 100 to solve it? I've not seen mention of the puzzle online so who knows, guess I'll find out if it shows up or not!).

One thing I kind of regret about eARCs is that they don't often come with final images so I can only guess at them, but that also made it sort of fun too.

Robin Quain comes to Hildegard College in search of a relic to turn her historical thesis on witch covens into something that will have her going down in history in connection to Joan of Arc and more importantly one upping Charles Danforth who betrayed her friendship and stole her research for reasons she can't understand.

With her cousin Paloma disappearing following Robin uncovering a animal (...or werewolf, or vampire) attack of a girl named Sabine, Robin reaches out to Hildegard College where a Dr. Isabelle Casimir's disappearance and discovery of a relic may shed light on her own research.

Isabelle's peers Dorian Dubois, Finn Jeon, Aspen Thomas and Lexi Duarte press her into a labyrinth where her mind and reality seem to unravel and twist. What is true? Her dreams and a strange game bends the very truth of the world and her place at Hildegard a college that looks more and more like part of a cult or some government program gone wrong. Monsters are real, perhaps they are the people around her -or ones just out of sight, or both.

Robin must solve the mystery to put herself and the world to rights and she's running out of time.

I enjoyed all the strange paths within 'Atlas of Unknowable Things' from Helen Blavatsky, Margaret Murray, sanghuppe, to pharmacopoeias (Shennong Bencaojing), bestiaries (Physiologus, Shan Hai Jing, Herodotus' Histories & Phiny the Elder's The Natural History), the ouroborus dreams of August Kekule, the Voynich manuscript and silphium, haruspicy and cynocephali.

To a list of books and short stories Robin encounters 'Bisclavret', Linnaeus' Philosophia Botanica, Paul Sedir's Les Plantes Magiques, Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner", Isak's Language of Hermetic Plants, John William Polidori's "The Vampire" and Ficciones by Jorge Luis Borges and many more that I enjoyed the mentioning of, and will consider recommended reading.