A History of Wild Places by Shea Ernshaw

Available now

It’s a bit too long for me to realize that I tend to bring dark, creepy books set in the woods on vacation. Nearly all of our vacations revolve around hiking and staying in remote cabins. Coincidence? Maybe. I have always loved the woods and spend as much as my free time walking trails and looking for new parks. Luckily, I’ve never come across the level of weirdness found in A History of Wild Places by Shea Ernshaw.

Set in the wilds of Northern California, Travis Wren is searching for Maggie St. James, a woman missing for 5 years. Using his unique ability to glean memories from objects, Travis finds more than Maggie’s last location, he finds the location to the mysterious village of Pastoral. But immediately after finding it’s location, Travis also disappears.

What began as community of free thinkers wanting a simpler way of life, has become something far darker. A severe sickness seems to plague anyone who leaves the border of Pastoral and the rains bring illness and death. When a child is born premature, the village becomes divided over taking the baby to a hospital or allowing nature to take its course. As tensions rise, the tightly knit community slowly begins to unravel, revealing the key to many, many mysteries.

A History of Wild Places is dark, twisting, and utterly compulsive. I was immediately drawn to the characters and invested in their journeys and their very survival. From the beginning, you can feel an underlying tension that builds throughout the novel, culminating in an explosive reveal. Ernshaw has crafted an interesting world within Pastoral where you can understand the allure and sympathize with the characters living there, but you can also feel that there is something just not right with their idyllic way of life. I am an absolute sucker for the book-within-a-book and we get that with the Maggie’s book series that she writes for children and may contain clues about and where Maggie disappeared. This is by far one of the most atmospheric novels I’ve read in quite some time.

If you are interested in adding this intriguing and compulsively readable novel to your collection, you can find ordering information here:

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Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism by Amanda Montell

Available Now

If you are one of the many, many people who were immediately captivated by the LuLaRich documentary and are waiting, somewhat patiently for more seasons of The Dream podcast, you are going to love Cultish. Montell goes in deep on the language used by various well-known cults and show the way that many new business such as gyms and clothing companies go on to adopt similar language and then can feel very similar to a cult. I really appreciated Montell’s very accessible and readable language-ha, I know-that made this such a fast paced and interesting read. Montell also provides stories told to her during her childhood, her father was associated with Synanon, and her own run-in with Scientology as a college student.

I was already familiar with MLMs and the language they use to manipulate people into joining them, but to see it laid out so clearly for such businesses as SoulCycle, CrossFit, and even Amazon, was quite stark. One of the most interesting facts to me, was how cults will often develop new words, or alter commonly used words, to create a sense of being special and “in the know” within a community. Now, after reading Cultish, it feels like I’m finding those types of phrases everywhere. This, of course, is nothing surprising, I’m just hyperaware after reading the book but it’s still jarring to find this language everywhere.

I found Cultish to be an absorbing, compelling, and highly-readable book. If you’re looking to branch out into new and different genres and non-fiction is on your list, definitely pick this one up.

You can thank me later.

If you would like to add this to your bookshelf, you can find ordering information here:

Thank you to Netgalley and Harper Wave for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions and mistakes are my own.

This post contains affiliate links and I may earn from qualifying purchases.