The Night Guest is one of those books that you sit down to read and swallow whole. I read it one sitting, shocking myself when I realized it had gotten dark out. Iounn is tired - tired of her ex glaring at her, tired of her boring job, tired of feeling tired. She's desperate for rest after waking up sore and bruised for weeks. She's tried everything everyone suggests, and everyone is eager to suggest. When she starts tracking her movement and leaves her watch on overnight, she's convinced that the 40,000 step count must be a mistake... or is it? A creepy little novella for the weird girlies! It's strange and ominous from the first few pages, and though I felt for Iounn right away, I knew she couldn't be trusted. Beware if you have a queasy stomach, but if you don't mind some dark imagery this has it too. This novella is sparsely decorated in setting and plot but provides you just enough to be hooked until the end! Highly recommend to get out of a reading slump or to read all in one go.

⭐️⭐⭐3.5 Unhinged Stars

What the heck did I just read??

One minute I was sitting down with my cup of coffee and the next thing I knew the book was over . It's like I was transported in to the future and here I am left wondering what happened it unearthed so quickly .

This little novella takes off right away instantly you are immersed and inside someone's head , and you can tell she is not well, maybe a little unhinged and quirky. You like her , but you're unsure what's going on but you want to know more .

Iounn is not well, everything in her body is achy , heavy and she is constantly tired all the time . She has been through many doctors and no one has a diagnosis , all her blood work comes back fine .

She gets a young residence doctor who Iounn convinces to prescribe sleeping pills as Iounn has discovered she is sleep walking and maybe that is why she feels like crap all the time.

Then really strange sh*t starts happening , she is waking up dirty , bloody fingers nails, blood on the sheets and covered in bruises and is happening every night , ...but she can't remember a thing .

I had so many thoughts going through my head specifically vampire thoughts and got a little over excited because that definitely was not the case.

This was very fast paced engrossing crazy read that literally left me with a bit of a cliff hanger saying to myself , what just happened ?

Read this if you like:
* Short Chapters
* Unhinged Characters
* Short Novella's
* Mystery with an edge

Thank you Netgalley , Tor Publishing Group and Hildur Knutsdottir for this gripping little digital ARC.

Respectfully Another Read by Angie

A genuine psychological horror for everyone who enjoy a good story in which the protagonist is either going insane or some other supernatural force, like a ghost or possession, is at work. incredibly fast-paced, and you might not be able to sleep either because you are so overwhelmed by the fear.

**TRIGGER WARNING**
Animal cruelty / Violence

Holy smokes, this book! Bone chilling for sure. An absolutely can't-put-down short book that was so unexpected. The pacing was done so well, and the ride you would be going on with this book would catapult you to wince, groan, and just... well... be oddly entertained. Following along with the main character, as she was trying to figure why the hell she was so tired and waking up with cuts and bruises, was so thrilling. The interesting thing, though, was that you kept thinking... we know bad things were happening, but do we want to know exactly in details? Thank goodness, honestly, that the author played with that foreboding thoughts so well, allowing us the readers to fill in the blank the horrors throughout the entire, especially near toward the end.

And that ending. So ominous and even though I got of why it was written that way, I needed more! After reading that last page, I was like...um...I'd been in deep and now I was left a void. That was cruel to the max lol. If you love horror with gore and suspense, pick up this book for sure.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC of this great book. All opinions are my own.

Iðunn is having trouble sleeping and is waking up with cuts and bruises... Just what is happening during the night?

This book has an interesting premise and I was eager to read more Icelandic fiction. I was really enjoying speeding through the book, even when I only had 10 minutes or so to pick it up, as the chapters are very short. However, in somewhat of a contradiction the pace of the story is rather slow. There's barely any progress in the plot until the end, when everything happens at all once. In fact, the ending comes about so quickly that I was surprised to turn the page and find nothing else there. I was unsatisfied with the lack of real conclusion and explanation given that there was so much slow build up.

The translation also took a while to find its feet, seeming a little clumsy early on but soothing out as the book progressed.

Decent for the most part, but I was left unsatisfied and needing more in the end.

Thanks, NetGalley for this ARC.

The Night Guest is a creepy paranormal story that highlights the real horrors of unprocessed grief and medical dismissal.

Iðunn is tired. Every morning she wakes up feeling worse than when she went to sleep. The doctors don’t know what’s wrong with her. One night Iðunn leaves her smartwatch on and wakes up to find she’s walked 40,000 steps while she is asleep.

I blew through this novella in two sittings. The chapters were short and impactful, the stripped-back narrative voice conveying heightening tension and conveying Iðunn’s fatigue.

As a chronic illness sufferer, I related to Iðunn’s experiences with her health care professionals and thought this was well dealt with.

I wish the end had been extended a little so I could fully understand the big reveal, which was where the book failed to stick the landing.

When the horrors of the monotony of life turn into a terrifying quest to discover the truth behind a blurred reality.

A heart pounding dive into the depths of the psyche of a young woman who, after reeling from the death of her sister, begins to notice strange occurrences happening each time she wakes up. Her body is bruised, her nails are torn to shreds. Trying to keep up the farce of normalcy, she goes in search for answers from health care professionals and family and friends. When she can't find the answers she is looking for, she begins to question herself and find her own ways to figure out:

What happens to her at night? Where does she go and why?

I enjoyed the unreliable narrator, and although controversial, the ending. It had me flipping back and forth to see if there was anything I missed! This was a psychological thriller that really kept me guessing the entire time and wondering where the story would take me. I also enjoyed the fact that there were elements of women vs. the void.

Overall, I am so thankful to Netgalley (mil gracias!) for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Overall, this was a 3 star read for me. I wasn’t loving the writing style at first, but once I realized it was reading more like a journal than a true novel, I began to enjoy it much more.
The atmosphere was cold and creepy, which is right up my alley. I couldn’t tell which direction this novella was going. The last two chapters lost me a bit, but overall worth the read for the other 99% of the story. I would recommend this to suspense/horror lovers, but maybe not to those obsessed with cats (trigger warning?)

Iðunn has trouble sleeping, or more accurately, she has trouble waking up. Every morning she finds herself exhausted and with countless bruises and cuts covering her body, yet she has no recollection of how they could have gotten there. She seeks out a doctor who prescribes her sleeping pills, but even those don't seem to help. When she buys a step-counting watch, she starts to get an inkling about what might be going on, but is she really ready to face the truth?

The Night Guest is a fast-paced novella with a witty and relatable protagonist that makes for an entertaining read. Some of the chapters were as short as one-sentence and I enjoyed this format. It left me turning the pages faster than I imagined and while The Night Guest isn't perfect and certainly has its weak spots, I would still recommend it.

I do have to warn that there is mention of animal deaths (cats), so it might not be for everyone.

What would you do if you realized that your nighttime step count was higher than your day time step count?
Such a quick read! Definitely a little more descriptive in some of the scenes and gore descriptions than others I've read, but that made a nice break up from other books I've read recently. I'll be looking for more by this author and see what else they come up with (in between some more light-hearted books of course).

It’s Labor Day weekend, 2022, and my son Eric and I are attending our first Worldcon, in Chicago. We’re going hard, attending panels from early in the morning until late at night. And then this happens (taken from a post I wrote soon after the con):

“We attended a panel with horror authors reading from their work, and—you heard it here first—there’s a writer from Iceland who’s going to be big. Her name is Holder Knutsdottir, and back home in Iceland she’s won a bunch of awards, but her first novel in English won’t be out until sometime in early 2024. She was funny and charming, and the excerpt she read (translated by Mary Robinette Kowal, no idea why she knows Icelandic) immediately grabbed our attention.”

Wouldn’t you know it, that novel that Knutsdottir read from, The Night Guest, is coming later this year, and I was lucky enough to get an ARC. I’m going to say it again—she’s going to be big.

As The Night Guest opens, we meet Iðunn after yet another visit with a doctor. Iðunn is overcome with fatigue, as if she hasn’t slept at all, and none of the doctors she’s seen can explain why. Her bloodwork is fine—in fact, everything seems fine. Then she starts waking up with unexplained wounds, and blood beneath her fingernails. She wears a pedometer to bed, and realizes with horror that she somehow walked 40,000 steps during the night. And the neighborhood cats are beginning to disappear.

That’s the intriguing setup for The Night Guest. Knutsdottir writes with an easy confidence, drawing you into the novel’s world with short, inviting chapters narrated by Iðunn. Iðunn is frustrated by her situation, but there’s humor, at least at first. All of a sudden I realized that I was turning the pages anxiously, totally engrossed, sucked in by the escalating tension. Knutsdottir does something truly amazing here—she ratchets up that tension in such a way that she’s dug the hooks in deep without you even feeling them, and then lets them rip. This is a lean, fast-moving book that doesn’t waste a word.

The Night Guest is set in Reykjavík, a city Knutsdottir clearly knows and loves well. The novel make me want to visit it, although I might stay away from the harbor late at night.

I’m still curious why Mary Robinette Kowal knows Icelandic.

The Night Guest releases September 3, 2024, and is available for pre-order now. Don’t sleep on this one (see what I did there?).

I really enjoyed this!! It wad captivating and keot me interesting in the story the entire time! I also loved the characters and their development throughout

The Night Guest was such a fun read!! It took me a little longer than it would have normally, but I also had a lot of outside projects going on. There were a lot of chapter, but they were incredibly short. I read this on my Kindle, and the chapters were either a couple of pages to only one sentence.

The main character, Iðunn, lives in Reykjavik and is suffering from fatigue. No doctor can give her any insight to what is wrong. When she gets a smartwatch to track her steps, she is surprised to find over 40,000 steps when she wakes up. So what is going on?

I did find this book a quick and thrilling read, the chapter length really made it fly by. There was some gore, but it wasn't over the top. I always worry with translated books that it won't keep the integrity of the original work. This book was beautifully put into English. My only issue was that there was no closure. The ending was left to interpretation so there's no resolution and that bugged me. Other than that, it was fantastic!

Thank you to @tornightfire and @netgalley for my copy!

AHHHHHHHHHH! GIVE ME ALL THE NOVELLAS!!!! Especially the translated ones...

I am so thankful to Tor Nightfire, Hildur Knútsdóttir, and Netgalley for granting me advanced digital access to this horrific tale before it hits shelves on September 3, 2024.

Iounn, our main character, is feeling restless after a whole night of sleep and is waking up with random bruises all over her body, only to be told it's nothing by her doctors and medical professionals. She obtains a smartwatch that tells her she's hiking thousands of steps overnight, and she has absolutely no memory of these endeavors. On her nightly trips, she makes the same routes to the same place each night, and if ever her awake self tries to take preventative measures for her unconscious self, the outcomes get bloody and violent.

Told through the POV of a burnout employee and short chapters, The Night Guest will keep you on the edge of your seat, wondering who or what could be possessing our FMC to traipse around Iceland at the wee hours of the night/morning. Don't sleep on this one yall.

I absolutely loved this novella. Just enough of everything: plot, creep factor, gore. Hildur knocked this one out of the park, in my opinion. Just make sure you check the TW as some content may disturb readers. Thank you NetGalley and Tor for the opportunity to read this early. Check it out when in publishes September 03, 2024!

A creepy little novella that will leave you scratching your head a bit. Set in Iceland (and translated to English for this release), the book begins with Iðunn seeing a doctor because she is tired every morning, with bruises and scratches all over her body. She eventually gets a step counter and wakes up one morning realizing she walked over 40,000 steps in the night without remembering a thing. A great hook right?

This book FLYS by. I read it in two sittings in one day. Not only is it a page turner, but the chapters are super short. Like, often one sentence short. And the story certainly didn't need to be longer. It's simple, eerie, and to the point. The ending left me a little cold (and.. confused?) but I don't think that should stop you from this fun and weird quick read.

This was such a WEIRD book. I love weird books

lounn wakes up absolutely exhausted every morning and starts to consider she may have a chronic illness. Nothing is helping. After wearing a new active watch (similar to the apple watch) she realizes her step count is increasing as she sleeps.
This leads us into watching as Iounn desperately seeks answers and suspects a mysterious “she” is the culprit. Madness ensues…

The chapters were short and punchy: This whole novel was so atmospheric and fast-paced. I really enjoyed… 95% of this book.

The last few chapters ruined the vibe a bit. The book ended so abruptly. It was like someone stole the pen out of the authors hands and yelled ‘times up!’ It seems unfinished.
These chapters turned a pretty straightforward plot into a “it means what you think it means” fever dream piece

I still believe this book should be read widely because it will be enjoyed for the 95%. I flew through it in a day.

Major TW: lots of dead cats

Thanks to NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for sending me an ARC of this book!

This was so fast paced and unsettling! It didn’t fully blow me away but i thoroughly enjoyed it, although im not sure i fully understand the ending.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to receive an ARC of this book!

The premise of this story is super interesting- the main character waking up every morning physically and mentally exhausted, only to find that it may be due to nightly activities that are playing out unbeknownst to her. It is a really quick read with great pacing, could easily be done in a two-hour window, and is surprisingly digestible for being a translated work! It was also written in a really engaging way, with some "chapters" simply being a stream-of-consciousness sentence from the main character. Despite not getting much time with them, I did find myself really invested in the main character... something just seemed so off-kilter about them right from the start, and the increasing intensity of their problem definitely drew me in and kept me wanting to turn the pages. However, I found the ending to be quite vague and abrupt. I have no issue with keeping the story brief, but I felt there should've been another few chapters (5-10 pages) to elaborate on the mental state of the main character in the ending for at least a little clarity and closure. Still, I think that the first 3/4 of the book makes it worth a read!

Idunn is unable to get any help for her physical exhaustion. She's sleeping well, but when she waked up in the morning, she's extremely tired, all of her muscles ache, and she frequently has unexplained bruising . Afraid she's developing a terrible disease, she visits her doctor, who does lots of tests but finds no explanation. Her family and friends are full of advice and suggestions, but nothing helps. One day she accidentally leaves her step tracker on at night and wakes up to find it shows she walked over 47,000 steps since going to bed. She sets up the camera on her phone to detect what's happening when she's asleep and is startled to see herself get up and walk out of the frame. As she tries to figure out what she's doing when she's asleep, she begins to worry about what this could mean and why she has no memory of her nighttime activities.

The book is really a novella or even a short story. It consists of quite a few chapters that are a single sentence, followed by a blank page, followed by another one sentence chapter, and so on. Not a lot really happens and the ending is a bit of a mystery as well. There are also some clues mentioned in the story that are never resolved or explained. So while the story was short and a fast read, it was ultimately not very satisfying.