Not my favorite, but it's an okay "turn your brain off and vibe" thriller.

Such a cool premise that fits so well for a folklore-inspired gothic horror, but the prose and pacing needed tightening to increase the tension and up the intrigue.

Super overwritten, which sometimes helped the immersion and other times ruined it. It worked well to describe the setting of a colonial Sri Lanka, and I liked that the author included words, descriptions, and dialogue in Sinhala. But it bit the author in the ass because everything was overexplained, including the main character Amara's thoughts, feelings, and motivations. Nothing was left up to the reader to decipher. Something would happen that would increase the tension, then the narration would waste time explaining Amara's feelings and spell out her every inner thought in reaction. It felt very hand-holdy and made the book feel unnecessarily long.

There are two main mysteries that unravel side-by-side, the animal-esque attacks happening to men in the village, and Amara's terrifying dreams that seem to coincide with them. It was heavy-handed, with not a lot of nuance and some in-your-face foreshadowing. The twists were predictable. About midway the author introduces a mysterious character named Bhagala (forgive me I listened to the audio and couldn't find the actual name) which basically replaces the main character's sense of agency, which was already almost non-existent.

Loved the themes but felt the overwritten prose held it back from being amazing. The focus on Amara's internal monologue makes the reader feel disconnected from the story and ruins any amount of tension that the narrative works for. I guess it's a story of female rage, but we don't really get to feel it in the impactful way that it should have.

I will say the horror elements were well done, but I almost wish the author pushed them further. Some really good, gruesome scenes with a folklore inspiration. I think if this book leaned more into supernatural horror rather than an unreliable narrator mystery, it would be saur good.