Another one that trudges through its horror. Each page feels heavy with atmosphere when really I just want to understand the story. This frustrates me with body horror; the imagery almost feels like its in the wrong place--I know what it looks like, tell me how it FEELS. The parenthetic asides were more distracting than anything. Just not for me unfortunately.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Publishing for an advanced copy of Honeyeater in exchange for an honest review.

DNF’d at 37%. I really wanted to love this book, especially with that knockout cover and interesting premise, but it ended up being a letdown and not for me.

The writing is undeniably lyrical and poetic, but I found the narrative too confusing to follow. There was little context for who the characters were or what was happening, which left me feeling lost instead of drawn in.

While the language created atmosphere, it also muddled the storyline and made the characters feel flat. We are given a lot of names with only minor exposition and plot, and the way it is written seems to take precedence over the content.

Like other readers, I enjoyed the short snippets of stories interspersed between the main chapters, but overall, nothing was clicking. NetGalley requires a rating, so I am giving it two stars because of the vivid prose.

Honeyeater is a fever dream of a book. It reads like a dream edging into a nightmare, that's really the best way I can describe it. It is deeply unsettling and will stick with you. I don't think I'll look at water courses quite the same way for a while.

Recommeded.

I received an ARC copy from NetGalley in exchange for my honest opinion.

Honeyeater by Kathleen Jennings is dark and rich, a fantasy full of mystery, intrigue, and vivid descriptions, where secrets slowly emerge and the dead rise. I love how the supernatural is written and the story is interspersed with haunting little tales that are evocative. The story is a beautiful blend of creepy and beautiful, terrible and emotional.
Charlie and Grace are both intriguing characters, each with their own point of view and Charlie is dragged into learning the truth of the mysteries of Bellworth, whether he wants to or not, part of those secrets are the consequences from choices Charlie made as a boy. Grace peels back the layers of truths and with the help of a witch, finds a way to deal with those consequences.
If you like dark and rich fantasy with mysteries and secrets, complex relationships and haunting endings, you will love Honeyeater. It is unexpected, it is lyrical and it is full of mysteries, not all of which are explained but all will leave you wanting more.

I really enjoyed the gothic horror vibe of this story. It was strange, eerie, and immediately gripping. The writing was a little chaotic at times, but the story kept me hooked from start to finish.

Thank you to NetGalley, Kathleen Jennings, and Tor Publishing Group for a copy of the book.

Content Warnings: Death, Murder, Animal Death, Death of a Parent, Child Endangerment, Mild Gore, Drowning, Discussion of Colonization, Discussion of Suicide, and Mild Body Horror

“Honeyeater” by Kathleen Jennings is like trying to untangle a bunch of fishing line. There are hooks that sting and knots that seem impossible to work out. Though you desperately try, you are an outsider looking in on a very personal, private bundle of twine; a brilliant mess of debris.

Charlie is a down-and-out sort of fellow, drifting on the waves of life like leaf litter. His aunt has passed away recently, so he has returned home to tend to her estate. His sister, Cora, is present as well, helping when she can while juggling her extremely important job as the town’s counselor. The thing about Charlie is that death follows him wherever he goes; friends and relatives have a tendency to disappear around him, even though he has had nothing to do with their supposed deaths. One day, he meets a woman named Grace, who had woken up in the nearby creek with only Charlie’s last name in her mind and on her lips. “Wren.” His family’s name is carved deep in the town’s bones, a stain that just won’t come out. For as long as there has been a town, there has been a Wren. When ghosts begin to make themselves known, Charlie and Cora have to face their pasts if there is any chance at a future. The big question is, though, is if either of them deserve one.

This was an interesting book. The pace was decent, very steady and even, though sluggish at times. Kathleen Jennings’ words are beautiful and poetic, dripping with symbolism and imagery perfect for any gothic style horror. However, I feel like sometimes the lyrical nature of their writing got in the way of telling the story. There were entire sections of the book that had beautiful language, but in the end, these passages said very little by way of the overall story.

Where I had the most trouble was the plot and the characters. Everything was very dream-like, very floaty feeling. Again, the language used often got in the way of telling the story, meaning that there were portions of the plot that seemed to simply stop in order to allow the scenery to chew the characters, or for the characters to doubt themselves into oblivion. Parts of the book were extremely confusing, with the characters acting as though in a dream. A lot of the ‘why’ and ‘how’ seemed to be swallowed up and discarded by the ‘what’ and ‘when.’ While I do like that not all questions were answered, leaving a lot up to the reader, at least some of these questions should have been attempted. Leaving everything so open ended feels like the plot wasn’t well thought out to begin with.

Overall, I think “Honeyeater” would be best suited for readers who just want something that is more of a mood than substance. If you want something that has dream-like qualities and isn’t heavy on explaining, then yes. Pick up “Honeyeater.” Otherwise, I cannot recommend this book.

This was a strange and lyrical story about one family's connection to the land and the ghosts, real or imagined, of a place. There was an overabundance of parentheses in the first third, but that dwindled once I got further in to the story. The atmosphere of Bellworth, the Wren house, and the creek is reminiscent of a stagnant, oppressive day, which is reflected in Charlie and Grace's feelings about themselves and the town. Sometimes the taxi driver's daughter felt younger than her age, but overall Jennings developed her well as a curious child. Don't expect to fully understand what is going on, even when revelations are made in the explosive ending, but enjoy the moody, lush writing and mystery.

Honeyeater is an Australian gothic small town/dying house horror that for me never really came together. Everything in the description seemed it'd be right up my alley, and I was excited to start eating this one up but I found it sort of a drag to get through and I can't even put my finger on why. The writing is decent, but I'd have to go back and re-read things on more than one occasion and I never connected with any of the characters, and when the twist came at the end I actually fully expected it (at least, the first one). It was fine, but maybe it wasn't really for me for whatever undefinable reason. I wanted to like Grace most of all and I kept... almost getting there, but a lot with her either didn't make sense (within the world) or was explained... *just* not enough (hence the rereading several parts) I wasn't always sure what to visualize or what exactly was going on, and Charlie who's supposed to be our sort of in to understanding the world we were being brought into ... had no real connection to anything, and thus as readers we couldn't really vie for him or have sympathy for him or anything. We don't know much about why he did anything or clarity on how he felt, even in regards to the crummy things that befell his whole life. Even in a book less than 300 pages, there was a lot of space to breathe but not a lot of breathing done. Oh well!

Thank you to Tor Books for the eARC in exchange for honest review.

The prose is lush and atmospheric, and that’s what kept me turning the pages. Line by line, it’s beautifully written. But I struggled to connect with the story or characters…there wasn’t much depth or development to hold onto. The focus seemed more on mood than substance, and without that grounding, I often felt lost, unable to see the forest through the trees.

This cultivated a dark, spooky vibe that I really appreciated, especially when I was reading it on a cool rainy day. I wouldn't say this is particularly scary, but I liked the lush swampy setting. The author I feel very successfully balances an evocative prose with the ability to move the story along.

This was very gothic but not very horrific. I loved the vibes, the setting, the feeling. It was creepy and it was unsettling. It was a quick read.

Honeyeater is intriguing. It sneaks a lot of detail into a short novel, and packs a punch. It's the kind of novel that had me thinking about it weeks after I finished.

It's Charlie's story, and it's Grace's story, and it's Bellworth's story, and it's the story of the ghosts who linger in the pages. In some respects, it's a hard story to describe, because I don't feel focusing on the plot alone does it justice. It's a mystery, and it's horror, and it's an examination of what it means to live and to make the most of your life. 

Honeyeater explores how living in a place that floods shapes the neighborhood and the people who live in it, and how significant events impact community. It looks at how people often see what they want to see, or when they're confronted with uncomfortable truths, they don't respond directly, but relay stories about what they've seen. It touches on that part of us all that looks away when we don't know how to respond to things that make us uncomfortable.

This book won't be for everyone (no book is) but it's for those people who love atmospheric stories. It delivers surprising revelations in a layered story that explores what it is to truly live versus going through the motions, what it is to lose someone, and how the world around us shapes our lives.

For me, it was a book that thoroughly engaged me and left me thinking about it long after I turned the final page, and the writing is exquisite, which is why I give it five stars.

A dark fantasy that mixes in suburb horror and a bit of spookiness. It's a short read, and it kind of throws you into the middle of it. I love horror and yet this one just was kind of a miss for me. I never really got hooked and the way the story unfolded was just meh for me. I wish I could like it more but it just isn't for me unfortunately.

Release Date: September 2, 2025

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

*Thanks Netgalley and Tor Publishing Group | Tor Books for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

Honeyeater by Kathleen Jennings is a richly imagined dark fantasy.
A remarkable, compelling, and addictive story.
I was sucked into this story and held captive.
An absolute page-turner!

Thank You NetGalley and Tor Books for your generosity and gifting me a copy of this amazing eARC!

Are you a fan of gothic vibes? The trendy eco horror? In an atmospheric tale, a creepy abandoned house is returned to by nephew Charlie, Wren family sibling who has a reputation to be surrounded by missing people as he tries to finally leave the destroyed town behind. With haunting rumblings of witchcraft, Grace comes to Charlie with an unusual growth of blue roses.

Although scattered and messy, it is beautifully written, especially if you enjoy gothic imagery. Go for this one if you enjoy lush descriptions but not much else to fill. Beautiful prose but overly flowery a little much if you’re looking for any plot progression. The flow of the story was confusing but the detail was so addicting, it was hard to put down. Or maybe it was the confusion that I wanted to solve.

Does this work? I can’t decide. I really wish this was written as a story in poetry, as I think the style of writing would have made more sense. I kinda wonder if the book even knows what it’s about, reading the description and seeing reviews. As much attention that was spent to the scenery, I would have enjoyed that across the plot and characters.

Book Stats:
📖: 272 pages
Genre: Gothic Horror
Publisher: Tor
Format: Physical Arc from publisher
Series: Standalone

Themes:
💫: Loss and Grief

Tropes:
💗: botanical setting

🥵: Spice: 🚫
Potential Triggers: **check authors page/socials for full list.

General Thoughts:
Honeyeater begins with some of the most lovely dark and atmospheric writing. The descriptions are giving all the vibes needed to really immerse yourself in this wet and dread-filled world.

The book really does just drop you into the story. There is not a whole lot of explanation or reasoning for why things are the way they are within the very first few chapters of this novel. This adds to the mystery and overall creepy feeling of the world where you're in this botanical and swampy setting without much explanation. As we learn more about the story and drive deeper into the themes, it becomes this dread filled mystery that encompasses a drowning flooded town and the ache of missing women.

Unfortunately, I did find Charlie to be a pretty flat character overall. A lot of his decisions didn't make sense because we just didn't know enough about Charlie and his motivation.

Unfortunately, partway through the story I do feel like the storyline dropped off a little bit and left me a little bit bored at times. While I was able to pretty easily finish the story, I didn't find myself a really invested in what happened at the end. This is most definitely a me problem and not an overall issue or problematic tendency with the book itself. I think many people will enjoy this story and it might have just been that I prefer T Kingfisher, and their ways of telling a dark atmospheric Gothic story better.

Disclaimer: I read this book as a physical ARC from the publisher. All opinions are my own. This is my honest and voluntary review.

Very atmospheric, and weird. Loved the stories interspersed between the chapters told by the neighbors of folk tales. I'm not really sure how to describe the rest of the story. There is some magic of the land, and people go missing. No one really knows why. Charlie comes back to where he grew up to clean out his aunt's home after she passes, planning on staying long enough to clean it up and go, when a woman shows up with thorns and roses growing out of her body, and he tries to figure out how to help her. I think maybe the rest you should go into blind. It was hard for me to connect with the characters, but the writing is beautiful, again very atmospheric.

I don't even know how to describe this novel. It was strange and confusing. The story was convoluted and I only honestly enjoyed the parts of the novel where some of the neighbors would tell stories of their strange town and their vanishing neighbors. The cover is gorgeous, though, and I really wanted to like it, however, this was almost a DNF.

*Special thanks to NetGalley and Tor Books for this digital e-arc.*

This book is very well written and prose flows so nicely. Most of the time I was not fully sure of what was happening but I really enjoyed the ride overall. If you enjoy a bit of a different horror with an atmospheric feel to it, you’ll want to pick this one up!

4 stars

Thank you to @torbooks for the finished copy! Thanks to @tubbyandcoos for the ARC during Local Bookstore Day! All thoughts are my own.

Cool concept! - really liked to small town mystery vibes and i really enjoyed the writing. Felt a little slow for me and I wish the ending was a bit more expander since I miss that wow factor. Still will recommend.