We all love an A24 movie, but when you want to relax we all know it’s Halloween, Scream or Childs play that we are really reaching for, something Brian McAuley knows best!

McAuley can do no wrong in my eyes! Fast becoming one of the masters of the slasher genre. The way he creates comfort with the familiar tropes and beats of all our favourite flasher movies. The characters he writes have such heart that I never feel like I’m just reading a tired worn out idea. They hold your attention, they are not merely fodder in our monsters path, and this to me is what makes McAuley great. While I absolutely love the unthinking of Friday the 13th, McAuleys MC always strive for Sidney or Laurie - fully fleshed, making you back them all the more.

A fun comfort read, that you should definitely pre order!!

Breathe In, Bleed Out by Bryan McAuley is my latest slasher obsession. This one is pure dread and horror, the perfect read when you're after something dark and sharp.

Set against the unrelenting heat of the Californian desert, five friends head off on the ultimate wellness journey to a retreat called Avidya.

Our main character, Hannah, is running from the trauma of her past and the death of her fiancé, but what starts as healing quickly spirals into something far more dangerous.

If you’re looking for a fun, bloody time, I can’t recommend this enough. Release date is September 2nd , get it on your TBR, you don’t want to miss this one!

𝑳𝒂𝒄𝒌 𝒐𝒇 𝒔𝒆𝒍𝒇-𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒘𝒍𝒆𝒅𝒈𝒆, 𝒊𝒏 𝒑𝒂𝒓𝒕𝒊𝒄𝒖𝒍𝒂𝒓, 𝒊𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒓𝒐𝒐𝒕 𝒄𝒂𝒖𝒔𝒆 𝒐𝒇 𝒉𝒖𝒎𝒂𝒏 𝒔𝒖𝒇𝒇𝒆𝒓𝒊𝒏𝒈.

An absolute must-read for slasher fans, BREATHE IN, BLEED OUT was campy, nostalgic, creepy, with some truly perceptive insights into human nature.

Hannah has suffered a truly traumatic event. She and her fiancé Ben went on a wilderness trip, but only Hannah came back. Only Hannah knows what happened the day Ben died, and she won't talk about it even with her close friends. Also, no one knows that Ben has been haunting her ever since through horrific waking nightmares replete with imagery; the crunch of snow, the bright sheen of blood, and the accusing look in Ben's eyes.

After being placed on leave at work, Hannah is adrift with too much free time. So when her friend group gets an exclusive invitation to a restorative spiritual retreat in Joshua Tree, Hannah reluctantly agrees, determined to put the past behind her.

Right away, we have all the ingredients for a grade-A slasher...a remote location, a charismatic yet mysterious guru, and a journey to 'self-discovery' that quickly descends into hell on Earth when an unnamed killer begins targeting the group and killing them one by one, each kill grislier than the one before.

I didn't figure out the identity of the slasher until right before the big reveal because I was so caught up in the story. This one is completely immersive and pulls you in to Hannah's world right away. For me, Ben's death speaks to the guilt we often feel when we take on burdens that aren't ours to carry.

The author's notes are NOT to be missed! Thank you to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the early copy. This title is expected to publish September 2, 2025.

Oh man, this author writes slashers in a unique way that I absolutely love. I thought Curse Of The Reaper was amazing and Candy Cain Kills was kick ass. But with this one, he raises the bar on what a slasher novel should be.

A woman who's suffered a horrific event while hiking with her boyfriend has separated herself from her friends. She has nightmares about that day and even waking hallucinations as if her dead boyfriend is stalking her.

One day her best friend insists that she, along with a group of other friends, go to a weekend spiritual retreat deep in the desert. This exclusive invite only retreat features meditation, yoga, organic raw meals, crystals...all of that woo woo new age stuff.

She reluctantly agrees to it. This retreat is basic, has no modern conveniences and is run by a white guy who goes by the name Guru Pax. But, oddly, she starts feeling better about herself. She's been addicted to Xanax and thinks, perhaps, this retreat might be life changing for her despite the cheesiness of it all.

Of course, when her friends start being slaughtered one by one, this retreat becomes a race for survival. As the bloody rampage continues it becomes obvious they've been targeted. But by whom?

This novel reminds me, happily, of Scream. There's several possible killers and your mind will run wild as the book points towards certain characters with a suspicious eye. Of course it will be revealed at the end and it's a complete mind fuck! Never saw that coming.

You've got a whole group of great characters, a twisty narrative which always keeps you guessing, and the desert atmosphere is perfectly defined and puts you right in that environment.

It's also a lot of fun! I always love a good slasher book and this one will be at the top of your list. A brutal, bloody, high octane read. I highly recommend it.

Brian McAuley knows exactly how to deliver what horror and thriller fans crave in Breathe In, Bleed Out. This final girl slasher ticks all the right boxes, serving up inventive, fast-paced, and satisfyingly gory kills that never feel recycled. At the heart of the story is Hannah—a grieving woman struggling with vivid hallucinations and a borderline addiction after losing her fiancé. When her college friends take her to a remote wellness retreat near Joshua Tree, the lines between healing and horror quickly blur. Is this a sanctuary, or a cult with something far more sinister lurking beneath the surface?

Set in a tech-free, isolated desert, the story turns isolation into pure dread—no help, no signal, and no one you can truly trust. Hannah’s trauma becomes a living nightmare, as her emotional unraveling and ghostly visions make her a classic unreliable narrator. Perfectly placed red herrings keep readers guessing, while the deaths—tied chillingly to hot springs, yoga studios, and spiritual rituals—stay true to slasher roots but feel fresh and brutal. Hannah’s Final Girl status is far from typical; she’s flawed, vulnerable, and deeply human. Her survival isn’t about perfection, but resilience in the face of grief, fear, and disbelief. Breathe In, Bleed Out is a tense, twisted ride that cuts deep and refuses to let go.

Let’s talk about movies for a second. I’m a slasher hound, and so it’s no surprise to learn that one of my favourite horror films is Scream, the game-changing slasher whodunnit, much copied, never bested. Slasher fans know that it’s not so much legendary director Wes Craven but the scriptwriter Kevin Williamson who we have to thank. Scream has been much aped since for its wink wink meta which changed the horror landscape, but Williamson knew that a great slasher mystery thrives on three things: characters you care for, kills you remember and a mystery plot with more red herrings than a bloody fishing lake. You know who else likes Scream? Brian McAuley, because Breathe In, Bleed Out, his fourth slasher, out from Poisoned Pen Press September 2, is a love letter to all the elements above that make the perfect stabby whodunnit while driving the genre forward in new ways. The master of slasher is back, and my god is he here to slay.

The setting for Breathe In, Bleed Out is a remote spiritual healing retreat in Joshua Tree, the wilderness of Southern California being, it turns out, a perfect location, up there with the more traditional cabin in the woods or campsites in terms of isolation and sense of unease. Attending this retreat, which is headed by the marvellously named potential bullshitter Guru Pax, is a group of young friends, the ostensible aim being to help our protagonist Hannah heal her trauma—her trauma being losing her fiancé on a mountain hike a year before. Seems a good plan—get in touch with your inner self—but when a killer starts taking that a little too literally, this place of healing becomes a fight for survival in the best slasher traditions, with everyone from retreat staff to friends to out-of-towners a suspect.

The first thing to note is that McAuley, for all the fun he’s having with the setting and taking the mighty piss out of the cynical mash-up of cultures (sound baths! Yoga! desert hallucinogens!) that can compose these spiritual retreats, cares for his characters—and wants you too, as well. Hannah’s tragedy and trauma is established immediately in the book’s opening chapter through a genuinely poignant (and classically tricksy) opening that roots you to her cause. Then McAuley pulls a neat trick. Her friends seem frankly awful; subtler Gen Z takes on the old slasher stereotypes—there’s the cynical boorish finance guy in place of the jock; the yoga-loving, condescending “just want to help everyone” type in place of the dumb blonde, etc. But McAuley uses the concept of a spiritual retreat—where people come to terms with their own dickishness—in a genius way to put you in their heads as they decide to be better and then, well, kill them. It’s a brutal way to make you feel for initially unlikable twenty-somethings, and a narrative masterstroke, as well as a witty commentary on the falsity of convenient self-realization.

But this is slasher, and we’re also here for the kills and the thrills. And boy, is there a better death-scribe than McAuley in horror at the moment? The kills in Breathe Out, Bleed In are art. In his afterword, he notes how he wanted to emulate Final Destination-style deaths (the Final Destination films being slashers of course, with death as Ghostface) and I think it’s safe to say he achieved this; these deaths are carefully constructed assault courses of fatality, step-by-step grim montages which are creative, deeply awful, and also entirely fitting for the characters getting killed. A kill involving a healing crystal is worth your money alone.

And then there’s the final Scream ingredient to make the perfect slasher whodunnit: the mystery itself. Almost everyone is a suspect, with plausible motives; there’s more misleading clues here then the devil’s escape room, and the reveal feels satisfying in that “should have known but also wtf” feel that defined those final twisty Scream moments. And like the best of the genre, the reveal isn’t just for kicks—it’s all part of the Final Girl’s catharsis; it’s thematically relevant, baby.

Overall, Breathe In, Bleed Out is another hit from an author who knows how to keep us horror freaks guessing, wincing, and feeling all at once. Take a deep breath then take a deep bow, because Brian McAuley wears the slasher crown.

Did I read this book in one evening? You bet your ass I did. It’s no secret I’m a Brian STAN. His stories never disappoint. They’re full of all the slashery goodness we crave with a dash of the best, most hilarious one liners in the business. Hannah goes on the spiritual retreat from literal hell. The kills in this book rival Final Destination, in both imaginativeness & gross factor. I loved every second. Thank you so much to Poisoned Pen Press for the ARC. I implore you to give this a read when it publishes September 2, 2025 I MEAN IT.