omg. love love. I pre-ordered a copy when I couldn't find an eARC, found the eARC and devoured it, and am still looking forward to getting my physical copy so I can read it again.

GoodReads has this tagged as horror, but I don't think that's correct. There is a dark element but I wouldn't say the tension is horror-y. Maybe on par with Nettle & Bone? Not like A House with Good Bones, and not as dark as, say, Witchcraft for Wayward Girls.

I loved the setting-- although bright and dry, the *way* it was told had me thinking of Nettle & Bone (pretty much the opposite in temperature and humidity) several times. The setting is a little open to interpretation-- a few comments indicate this takes place some time in a possible future, but most of these could also be interpreted as hyperbole or exaggeration-- there were a few things that I *think* are made-up, but I don't know enough about historic zones and such to know for sure.

I'm telling everyone to put it on their to-read list when anything remotely book-related comes up in conversation. eARC from NetGalley.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing this ARC! I really enjoyed this and T. Kingfisher is becoming a must read! She really writes a compelling story in a shorter novella form. This one had me on the edge of my seat for a better part of the 2nd half and the world building and character building in the 1st half really shined. Didn't have malevolent road-runner god on my 2025 reading BINGO card but here we are. 4 stars!

I have a bit of mixed feelings on this one. For one, the plot summary and the contents of the book aren't exactly a one-to-one match. That's not to say that the things in the summary aren't there; it's just that they play much less of a role than I was expecting. This book is one that is slightly less horror (though that's still there; it's a T Kingfisher novel after all) and more contemporary.

I actually really liked the contemporary bits. It's a combination of highlighting the author's love for the weird, beautiful, and eerie US deserts; finding community and learning to embrace it; a character coming to terms with abuse and breaking free from it. The stuff with Snake-Eater is really there to highlight some of the eerieness, but also to kind of have Selena confront things that she had been avoiding. Unfortunately, I don't think the Snake-Eater stuff was done... well. Mostly because Snake-Eater himself is just very 1-dimensional and his purpose in the story doesn't really do, I think, what the author was intending.

Overall, I really liked the highlights on neurodivergence and building community. I even liked how the minor gods added a slightly spooky, otherworldly backdrop to the story. I just think the Snake-Eater plot and the character himself felt very, very lacking when it could have added an extra layer of impact to the larger plot as a whole.

Snake-Eater wasn't my first foray into Desert Fiction, but it was my first time reading T. Kingfisher. I'm pretty conflicted about how to review this book. On the one hand, it was enjoyable page-to-page: the prose was easy to read, the setting was immersive. On the other hand, the characters were too hollow for something "character-driven," and the plot was not compelling enough to pick up the slack.

I'll start with what I consider the strongest aspect of this book: the setting, Quartz Creek. Most of our time is spent following our main character, Selena, as she makes a home for herself in the small desert town. It's all very "slice of life". It's compelling in a warm and fuzzy kind of way. I think the book could have excelled if it more tightly focused on just these aspects.

Beyond the coziness, though, is the lightest hint of something supernatural. There's clearly some weirdness that goes on in this town, but its inhabitants don't seem bothered by any of it. I expected the story to lean more heavily on horror elements, but there was hardly a single spooky moment in the entire novel. While these mysterious elements drive much of the plot, there’s not enough of them to make either the horror or the story feel substantial.

Similarly, there were a few off-hand comments made by various characters suggesting that this book takes place sometime in the future. Why? I can't say. It adds an unneeded Sci-Fi twist to the setting that the book didn't capitalize on at all.

Anyway, a lot of the rising action relies on Selena slowly uncovering these mysteries of Quartz Creek. But, there are several characters who could have short-circuited the entire thing with a brief conversation. This all leaves the story feeling pretty contrived.

The biggest disappointment was the cast of characters surrounding Selena. Two of them had detailed backstories, but they rarely felt like real people. It didn’t seem like they were thinking, making decisions, or offering unique perspectives. Their histories were interesting, but those histories seemed detached from their personalities. A character can have a dramatic or unusual past, but that only matters if it shapes how they speak, act, and see the world.

More broadly, everyone in Quartz Creek was endlessly friendly, supportive, and emotionally available for Selena. While that makes for a cozy atmosphere, it also cheapens their interactions. After a while, most of the townspeople felt interchangeable. There were several named characters who were indistinguishable from one another. The villain of the book was similarly one-dimensional.

By contrast, Selena herself was very well-written. Her journey is one of healing following the loss of her abusive mother and the end of a toxic relationship. However, much of that healing comes from comparing herself to her ex's shortcomings. The underlying issue isn't acknowledging her ex’s problems (the guy clearly sucks), but it would have been more compelling if she learned to recognize her strengths on her own terms. Ultimately, though, she's easy to root for and I think Kingfisher did a good job giving her a unique voice.

Overall, Snake-Eater is a cozy, slightly offbeat story that doesn’t quite come together. The setting is strong, and Selena is a solid main character, but the plot lacks momentum and the side characters don’t add much. It was an enjoyable read, but not one that’s likely to stick with me.

Thanks NetGalley and 47North for the ARC.

This is my 2nd T. Kingfisher book and like the first, it was an easy 5 stars. This is one I expected to like but I ended up really loving it. There's a whole gaggle of interesting, big hearted, and hilarious characters here. Also some major character growth with the FMC, Selena. Her struggles with social anxiety, being in her head and feeling out of place was so damn relatable, I really loved her. And we can't forget about her dog Cooper and Grandma Billy - she was definitely one of my favorite characters. This is a mix of strangeness, paranormal mystery, and found family. I can't recommend it enough! Thank you Netgalley for the ARC!

Wow, I was expecting some good T Kingfisher fantasy or horror but instead got an empowering story about finding faith in yourself again after toxic relationships.

Selena has arrived in a teeny tiny town looking for her Aunt Amelia. She just buried her extremely religious and kinda hateful mother and just could not fathom returning to her partner who constantly belittled and manipulated her (even though she genuinely believes it was all well intended).

Instead she learns that her aunt died the year before and is horrified at her impulsivity that's landed her in this tiny town with nothing but $27 and her dog, Copper.

The people of the town are thrilled with her appearance and begin to ease her into her aunt's home and the community itself. Soon she finds herself almost feeling like she could actually make a home in this place.

Until strange things start happening. Voices that come from nowhere. A little spirit in the garden. Things peeking in her windows at night. Something doesn't like her being in her aunt's home. Something believes she has a debt to them.

Anyway this is 5/5 for me. Fantastic read!

If you are looking for a tale of found family with a touch of horror, this might just be the book for you. In truth, I would not really consider this to be horror, but more of having supernatural fantasy vibes. Selena and her dog, Copper, find themselves in an isolated desert town seeking a fresh start. They find themselves embroiled in the small matter of native gods, spirits and unwitting promises made with deadly consequences.

Selena is a very sympathetic character with hidden depths and her neurodivergent traits are well-portrayed. This is a story about finding Selena recovering from an emotionally abusive relationship, finding her sense of self, as much as it is about finding her own people and community. Selena's growth arc is very believable and and the lovely thing is that she never really changes who she is at the core, but merely learns to recognise the strength that she always possessed.

The cast of secondary characters are well-fleshed out and did not end up being caricatures. I must highlight the character of Grandma Billy who is absolutely eccentric and so much fun! For all her eccentricity, she is so very dependable and practical, and matter-of-fact about steps that needed taking ( which I think contributed to why this did not come across as a horror story. You cannot be truly scared while Grandma Billy is there!).

The gods and spirits in this story are fascinating. However, I was a little disappointed in the main 'villain' spirit-god as he comes across as a little simple and petulant. A little more depth to this character would have rounded off this story nicely and given it more tension.

T. Kingfisher's writing is excellent as always and the story moves along at a good pace. The whole story is truly atmospheric, eerie in parts, light-hearted in parts and very immersive. I enjoyed this book very much.

Thank you to NetGalley for a free ARC in return for an honest review.

This was my first Kingfisher book and I don’t think it shall be my last. This was a unique and quirky story that I enjoyed!

Selena escapes a very toxic relationship and ends up in the middle of the desert looking for her aunt. She instead ends up living in her aunts house and meeting all of the funny townspeople and gets unfortunately roped into a relationship with an evil roadrunner God.

I wasn’t sure what to expect with this but I didn’t find this to fit much in the horror aspect, maybe more magical realism and maybe thriller aspects!

Loved the characters and even minor ones stood out. Watching Selena grow her wings was a great part of this story and I really enjoyed that. Grandma Billy and Father A were funny people and I didn’t expect the mystery’s with their backstory’s! I wish the plot was a bit more interesting i wanted more drama and conflict in this but for a short story it was great!

As always I loved Kingfisher’s writing, she can do no wrong in my eyes.

This is the story of Selena escaping an emotionally abusive relationship by fleeing to her aunt’s house with her dog and little else. The book is a horror but also focuses heavily on the friends she makes, the found family is immaculate.

I’m a big fan of (most) of T. Kingfisher writing, from her cozier fantasies, through her eerie horrors. SNAKE-EATER has been – in my opinion – mislabelled as horror, and from what I can see of ratings and reviews, that’s been working against it, so I beg you: go into this one with an open mind. If you’re looking for bone-chilling horror, you’re going to be disappointed.

What SNAKE-EATER actually does, and does well, is an isolated, small-town setting with all the insularity you’d expect, but in a positive, community-centric way as opposed to somewhere negative, that excludes outsiders. Selena is embraced whole-heartedly into poor-but-welcoming Quartz Creek but everyone she meets: until she pisses of titular Snake-Eater, a small god (or spirit) of roadrunners. Then the tone of the book becomes a little creepy, with a vague sense of ‘wrongness’ as Snake-Eater conjures creatures to attack Selena’s new home, but it’s never what I would call scary. Instead we get some great, no-nonsense attitudes from the locals, include 70-year-old Grandma Billy with her shotgun.

SNAKE-EATER feels like a perfectly ‘Kingfisher’ book, with that knowing, darker fantasy tone that’s hard to put your finger on – I’d put this one somewhere in vibe between Nettle & Bone, Thornhedge, and The Hollow Places?

Kingfisher uses SNAKE-EATER to tackle some meaty themes with a splash of social comment. We look at the positives and negatives of religion, from different angles. We see both Selena’s social anxiety, and how that blends with her upbringing, and how she feels about ‘deserving’ (or not, as the case may be) help and support when down on her luck. There’s also a very topic look at abusive relationships (familial and romantic), gaslighting, and control. As well as the negative and/or violent way men handle rejection, and the ways women are socialised to soften the blow.

Personally, this was one of my favourite Kingfisher stories and feels like a complimentary story to The Hollow Places, another favourite. However, this isn’t as dark as What Moves the Dead and is definitely more ‘unsettling vibes’ than actively horror.

In this story, we follow Selena as she seeks refuge from a strained relationship after her mother’s death in the desert town of Quartz Creek. She stays in her late aunt’s house and finds herself in the crosshairs of a local god known as Snake-Eater.

Like all of T. Kingfisher’s books, I was easily swept up in the story and fell in love with the characters right away. She has a way of bringing life to each one, and I enjoyed the whimsy and comedy of her writing. I also enjoyed the few horror elements that were sprinkled throughout the book.

While I really enjoyed the first half of the book, the second half was a bust for me. I found the spirit/human elements to be too strange and oddly comical when I don’t think they were meant to be. The villain was too strange and unbelievable, while the motivation behind his actions made me uncomfortable. Also, the climax and ending of the book felt lackluster. I was really hoping this book would have been more like A House with Good Bones, but this wasn’t even close. This book had very little horror in it at all.

Overall, this was just an okay read for me. If you enjoy T. Kingfisher’s writing and are looking for a fun, whimsical read that really focuses on found family with strong character development, I think you’d really appreciate this one to its fullest.

Thank you to NetGalley and 47North for approval of this eARC in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC. I am now enthralled with Kingfisher's writing. I will devour everything written. How eloquent writing. How amazing worldbuilding. She is a master of the genre. Thank you thank you..

3.5/5
Things only started to make sense around 70%... The beginning freaked me out a little (not usually a horror reader), so I actually liked how Snake-Eater created that vibe/ suspense. Unfortunately, the build up to climax was too just long for me to properly enjoy the rest 😞

But as always, lots of representation in Kingfisher's stories. The aspect of obsessively sticking to scripts for conversation responses really highlighted the struggles Selena experienced because of a toxic relationship. It was powerful when she finally let them go and even stood up against her ex-partner. I do think that part was a little rushed as the tension build up was short and resolved fairly quickly.

Like the last Kingfisher book, I love the supporting characters! Cooper, Grandma Billy, and Father Aguirre... the perfect trinity 😂 Overall, Snake-Eater was a cozy horror with low-stakes.

Thank you to NetGalley and 47North for the e-arc. All opinions are my own.

3.5 stars

Snake Eater was my first book by T. Kingfisher, and I definitely want to read more.
The setting descriptions and atmosphere were masterfully done, and I felt a creeping sense of dread throughout. I would say that the overall atmosphere felt more cosy than creepy.

The strength of this story was the cast of fantastic characters. Each one was believable and had depth, leading to some great moments between them that made me laugh. I was surprised by how attached I was to some side characters by the end! This was a short read, but it told the story without feeling rushed, and I got to know the setting and people well. The middle section felt like it dragged slightly, and I would have liked slightly more creepiness for something marketed as horror. Overall, I had a good time with this.

As a T. Kingfisher fan, I was thrilled to see that she’s releasing 3 books this year. Snake-Eater did not disappoint. It was a classic Kingfisher horror novel, featuring all the things her fans have grown to love as hallmarks of her work: a woman with a dog, a weird house, found family, delightful descriptions of gardening… etc. While using these familiar ideas, Snake-Eater also managed to forge some new ground. I think this might be her strongest stand-alone horror yet, and part of that was due to the vividly realized community of Quartz Creek and the desert itself.

This book and several of her others are marketed as cozy horror, but I think that’s a misnomer in this case. While her horror novels are often heavy on the cozy, this one didn’t feel like horror at all—more like an urban fantasy novel. That’s not a mark against it because I enjoyed this book immensely. However, if you’re going into this expecting to be terrified, you should adjust your expectations. I loved this novel and I hope Kingfisher continues to write more desert-set books. This one’s a keeper!

Thanks to the publisher and to NetGalley for an early copy of this book.

3.5 stars

Not my favorite by Kingfisher but a good one nonetheless. Cozy light horror, not so much my cup of tea but it was a nice break from the harder more intense things I read.
I really liked that she represented neurodivergence so well and fairly.
I wasn’t a fan of the end but it also wasn’t horrible.

Snake Eater is a gentle fantasy/horror about life in a desert town, and found families that see who you really are.

Selena arrives at Quartz Creek at a low point in her life. Her mother has died, she has left her partner and she only has a tiny amount of money. Hoping to stay with her aunt, she instead finds an empty house and a community that welcomes her and her dog. Selena has been taught to think of herself as a burden, but the people of Quartz Creek seem to want to help her, and to accept her help where she can give it.

A lot of the heart of this book is about Selena's everyday life as she adapts to life in the village and learns about her neighbours. The fantasy/horror elements turn up with the spirits that live in the vicinity, and their responses to finding Selena in the empty house. The book is also quite careful to make it clear that it is not a commentary on native beliefs or practices. When malign magic turns up Selena's friend is "pretty sure this was all caused by a well-meaning white woman, and you know how much trouble we are."

I found Snake-Eater to be an enjoyable and mostly gentle read. Selena's personal journey as she rediscovers her self-worth is convincing, and it's heartwarming to read of a misfit being welcomed into a community. The storyline with the spirits was not quite to my taste, but it still worked for me because it kept Selena and her relationships at the heart of the story. The book gives a vivid impression of small-town desert life that I really liked. Overall a great book.

Thank you to the publishers for providing a free advance copy. This review is left voluntarily.

i stumbled into this read with very little in the way of knowledge or expectations – i knew that i loved t. kingfisher (i’ve read her “sworn soldier” and “saint of steel” series, both of which i greatly enjoyed), but i knew next to nothing about this book beyond its author. i figured i would enjoy it because of that, but somehow i think this book has immediately skyrocketed to my favorite work of hers that i’ve ever read! i wanted to tuck selena right into my arms, along with everyone else in the town of quartz creek. overall, i was reminded of how it felt to listen to welcome to night vale. something about an isolated town with an eccentric radio host, the mysterious expanse of the desert, small gods and local spirits… it’s an intensely specific vibe, and one that really works for me.

while this book was on the shorter side, it didn’t feel too quick or rushed at all. i really enjoyed the pace of it, and i loved watching selena’s journey as she learned how to accept help from others without feeling like a burden (and also learning to stand on her own even within her newfound community). the resolution of this book genuinely made me emotional. seeing someone like selena get the life and home she deserves brought a tear to my eye!

Snake-Eater follows Selena and her dog Copper as they flee from a bad situation and wind up in the little desert town of Quartz Creek. It seems like the town might be the perfect place for the pair to land, but then Selena becomes tangled up with a vengeful god.

There are a lot of elements I liked in Snake-Eater. Selena is an easy character to root for, I love the relationship she has with her dog, the locals are all big characters in the best way, and the desert setting is vividly described. But I was hoping for more horror and the lack of scares—there’s only one scene I would describe as truly creepy—holds the story back for me. That’s definitely a me issue though and I think this book could work perfectly for people who aren’t big horror fans.

The uneasiness this book stirs from the first chapter is uniquely T. Kingfisher.

A woman in her 30’s runs away from her stale, stifled life to find her aunt in a small dessert town. Accompanied by her dog, Copper, Selena finds much more than just her aunt’s community within the desolate town of Quartz Creek. As Salena begins to give herself a second chance at life without a critical, watchful eye always looking over her shoulder, she begins to form a friendship with the locals, humans and spirits alike. One spirit in particular cannot understand the nature of their friendship and things take a dark turn. Selena and her motley crew work together to banish this spirit to their resting place.

The horror element in this story was fantastic. That feeling of wanting to partially cover your eyes to save yourself from a scare is how I would generalize my feelings while reading Snake-Eater by T. Kingfisher.