Apologies to the author and the publisher, but this was exhausting to read, and thoroughly repetitive and confusing. There's a reason "The Yellow Wallpaper" is the length it is. This book is the reason.

Unequivocally my favorite psychological thriller of the year. The dread is heavy and unrelenting. I have yet to have a psychological thriller make me feel like I’m losing my mind until this one. It got under my skin and buried itself within me. Every time I thought I would get clarity, I spiraled back into a state of confusion and fog.

Willow is a prisoner in her own home, drugged and in a haze, she’s trying to understand how she got here, why her husband has changed and what abuse lies in store for her daily- when days are good her routine is tend her garden. make dinner for Liam, then he bathes her, gives her her meds, and she goes to bed. As the days continue, something isn’t right, and under the fog of her medication she starts to realize something is amiss. She stops taking her meds and starts to remember what happened, why she’s here, and why the walls keep talking to her- but when Sarah, the neighborhood girl, comes to her garden and then goes missing, Willow must find her before Liam can put her back in her drug induced stupor.


Excellently executed, beautifully written- I cannot wait to get my physical copy and read this again.

Thank you NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the privilege of reading this ARC in exchange for an honest review

What an absolute mind fuck this is and I don't say that lightly.

Willow, is trapped in her home by her husband, Liam. Her only salvation is that of her garden. They have a routine. The same thing every day until the days start to bleed into one another. Until time seems to slip away all together. Is Liam her savior or her captor?

Then there is Sara a young girl that keeps visiting Willow in her garden. When Sara suddenly goes missing Willow spirals down the rabbit hole in what can only be described as a fever dream of absolute despair.

What is real? What is imagined? You'll have to read this to find out.

First things first, this book won't be for everyone. This story is pitch black. The anxiety and suffocation Marie Still puts her readers through is unrelenting yet I couldn't bare to put this down. My need to know what was happening far surpassed my need for comfort. Another thing that I'm going to mention is that many may find this book repetitive because we only have Willow narrating and her thoughts are utterly insane (or are they?) and being in her head for 300 pages could be exhausting for many. I, on the other hand, was fascinated.

And then that ending: GUT. PUNCH. 👊

This psychological horror novel will not only horrify you but it will guarantee to break your heart. Absolutely outstanding if you dare to read it. 5 stars!

Thank you to NetGalley and Rising Action Publishing Co. for my complimentary copy.

This book is a nightmarish fever dream. Honestly, 90% of this book is confusing and twisted, though it mostly works since it is a psychological horror book. The main character, Willow, is an unreliable narrator who struggles to understand what is real or not from basically the very beginning of the book, and as a reader I was just there for the ride, trying to pick out bits of what might be real. This is a style of story I generally enjoy, and I think it was written very well, but to be honest, this book was just too long in my opinion. After a while, the endless procession of fever dream-esque scenes just got boring for me. I think this book could have been fantastic if it had been edited down to a shorter length. As it stands, I found this book pretty enjoyable, it just dragged on for too long for my taste. I would still recommend it if you’re a fan of trippy, fever-dream type stories and psychological horror.

Thank you to Netgalley and Rising Action Publishing for providing me an e-ARC in exchange for my unbiased review.

“…while I drift, a prisoner behind my own eyes. The world blurs at its edges.”

Willow does her best to get through her day, every day. She follows the same routine for a husband who, sometimes?, loves her: dinner, chores, TV, bath, bed. The highlight of her life is her garden and the little neighbor girl, Sarah, who occasionally visits. When Sarah goes missing, Willow goes on a quest to find her and learns that her routine may have been holding her prisoner all along.

I don’t have enough good things to say about this book. I really didn’t know what to expect when I started reading but by the end of it, I was ugly crying. After I finished the epilogue, I sat and stared at the wall for a while thinking about the last few pages in particular, and the way they tied everything together.

This was probably the best piece of psychological/grief horror I’ve ever read. The emotions are so well-written that it sets the reader in the mind of someone who is experiencing a great deal of trauma. This book explores a lot of mental health themes including domestic abuse, postpartum psychosis, depression, and dissociation and the pain of all of that is so thoroughly depicted.

The haunting imagery wove together a tapestry of someone experiencing a large amount of grief and heartache and gave the sense of not only losing your mind but how hard it is to find yourself again.

Bad Things Happened in this Room is going to stick with me for a long time.

Has to be one of those books that makes you shiver. It will stay in your mind for a very long time because that ending is downright haunting. Being in Willow's mind throughout the story was both heartbreaking and eerie. Because this is the kind of horror that can happen to anyone. The atmosphere and the tension has me gripped from beginning to the end. Read this thing entirely in one sitting.

This book blew me away! I read the yellow wallpaper this year, so I was excited to read a book that sounded so similar but more fleshed out. Nothing prepared me for what I experienced.

The layers to this book had me guessing right up until the last sentence. Every time I thought I knew where it was going NOPE sharp turn in another direction. My heart was broken by the end of this book.

I want to give the most detailed review, but I also do not want to give any spoilers as it would just be a disservice to the brilliance of this book to have it spoiled. It is a wild ride for sure, there will be moments when you are thinking, what am I reading, did I miss something but no it all comes together in the most dramatic, perfectly devastating way.

Willow will be a character I think about often, the portrayal of her mental health is flawless, and I felt myself becoming more and more unhinged with her, I was just as lost, confused, scared and sad at the same time she was feeling it, you only knew what she knew until she knew it all.

It left me asking if it is better to not know what is real or to face reality.

As with all psychological thriller/ horror books I recommend looking at the trigger warnings before reading.

This book is an absolute mindf*ck in the best way.

Following Willow and her day to day life things slowly start to become weird and strange as her world warps and memories start to reveal themselves and we get spoon fed tiny bits of her past so we never really know what’s real and what’s not.

I could not stop reading this book. It was like tripping on acid (not that I know what that’s like) while trying to figure out who’s dead, who’s alive and who’s whose mother? If you love psychologically horror you will love this book.

Wow, this book is written like a legit fever dream. While I did find the first half or so of it very repetitive, it just did something to me, almost a feeling of panic while reading vs claustrophobia, maybe both. I don't know if this writing style will be for everyone, as I found it at times, hard to follow and tiresome to read in a way. But, it was worth it in the end. I don't think I've ever quite read a book that made me feel the way this one did.

4 stars.

This reads like a dark fever dream. The narrative constantly shifting until the reader is just as lost as the main character, Willow.
I would normally pick on the amount of details through out but I think they were important in this as things change in subtle ways.

I really didn’t know what to believe halfway through the book because the narrator was unreliable. It felt like I was going on a journey with her, as she tried to make sense of what was happening to her life.

I went into this blind and expected one type of story and got something so much more. The ending really just packed the punch needed to wrap things up.

I’d advise readers to note the content warnings of this story as it contains some sensitive topics.

Devoured this wild ride of a book. I honestly don’t want to spoil it, so this book read like the ultimate unreliable narrator. The twists were SO CLEVER and the topics discussed were done with such raw honesty that after I turned the last page I lay in bed and stared up at the ceiling for a long time. Highly recommend this book.

Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of this ebook! Opinions are my own.

3.25⭐️
At the beginning, I was lost. In the middle, I was even more lost than at the start. And by the end—although we get to understand what’s going on—I felt like something was missing.

That said, the writing is incredible. It’s almost as if you are the one feeling those emotions.

Sadly, I could not finish this book. After reading other reviews, I may skip ahead and read the ending since that part has amazing reviews.

A fever dream indeed!
While I did enjoy certain aspects of this book, I will say that it was about 100 pages too long.
I understand the need to highlight Willow’s decent into madness, almost as if she is stuck in limbo, but so much felt unnecessarily repetitive that I felt like I was gong crazy myself. Getting incredibly frustrated at the pacing of the story and feeling disheartened that I has only progressed a few percentage into the book when it felt like time has been moving at a snails pace.
Perhaps fever dream horror just is not for me.
The ending did kind of shock me a little regarding Liam, but not of Willow. There were already so many hints behind babies and children that you can guess from early on what spurred on her psychosis.

Received an ARC copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review!

Willow is a woman who seems to be going through it. I really struggle to come up with a quick synopsis of this book because it’s so layered and I don’t really want to give anything away… Do keep in mind there are various trigger warnings for this book!

But for real, this book kind of messed me up. To start, I had a difficult time trying to keep up with the story itself. At various points of the book, I felt like I was Willow. What’s real? What’s fiction? Or is a mix of both? Who’s unwell? What the heck is going on? This book also will probably take readers on various twists and turns. Just when you thought you had it figured out, nope, scratch that. I admit I initially struggled a bit to keep going. Not to the point I was going to DNF it, but more like, I need to take a break. I felt confused and claustrophobic.

But once I got through this… barrier, I just could not stop reading. I needed to know what was going on, what is reality, and who these people actually are. “You know what you did”. Okay but what did she do? Nothing felt solid, and there’s a lot of morally grey areas touched on.

Overall, I’d say grief plays a huge role in this books theme. At least that’s my interpretation. Being a woman is hard, and as someone who has not experienced the hardships Willow went through, I can only empathize.

intense, very gothic, horrific, and quite interesting horror that kept me guessing at every moment as to what is real and what isn't. 5 stars. tysm for the arc.

This book was so dark, had me saying wtf and had my skin crawling with how uncomfortable I felt in the best way possible. If you’re looking for a dark, fever dream of a read… this is the book for you.

Thank you SO much to Netgalley, Marie Still and Rising Action Publishing for giving me the chance to read and rate this book!

I am BLOWN away. This entire book was anxiety inducing. I felt like I was having the same anxiety and worry and fear as the main character. It was so crazy and well written and just...bananas!!!! It feels like while you are reading you don't know which way is up or down because the character is so intense and the plot so hard to figure out. When I got to the end I definitely needed some time to just sit and think about what I just read. I loved it! I wish I could read it over again brand new but alas, I know the ending now so it wouldn't be the same. Just read it. You'll love it!

Wow this book was good but it was based on a lot of trauma and a lot of grief it was good to me I will recommend

"Bad things happened in this room. Good things too. But the bad things are so thick they've smothered the good"

This book is more than a horror story. It is an amazing story about grief, trauma and the tricks our minds can play. It is a psychological horror book that has a female main character that is being held captive by her controlling husband, Liam. I was immediately unsettled and put on edge, in the best way.

"Liam's presence never completely leave the house. Sometimes, it's a fleeting sight caught in the corner of an eye. Then, there are times when it fills each corner of every room, stealing the oxygen, making it hard to breathe"

I caught myself early trying to guess what was going to happen and enjoyed the book even more when I just let go and let it take me for a ride.

Thank you NetGalley, Rising Action Publishing Co and Marie Still for the ARC!

*quotes may be subject to change or removal in the final version.