A review by aspirin
Smithy by Amanda Desiree

3.0

The epistolary format/collection of fictitious primary sources really worked for me. It felt like a fast-paced way to tell the story and examine the situation from a number of angles. The distinct voices in some of the sources helped me differentiate the characters and enjoy spending time with them individually. Every scene has some degree of conflict or helpful piece of information, and this shunted me through the story very quickly, since I consistently felt rewarded. However, it never really arcs into something. It never meaningfully confronts the questions it sets up or leaves us with even a moderately satisfying resolution. For the long swaths of time we spend with these characters, it wraps up incredibly quickly and not very believably. It feels like it never really knew where it intended to end or what it wanted to tell us about the possibility of a haunting. Perhaps this was for the sake of realism, but it didn’t ultimately work for me.