A review by w0lfyfr3n
The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling

adventurous challenging slow-paced

3.25

To this book's credit, I genuinely felt like I was down in the caves with Gyre, and it really delivered with the horror aspect of being trapped/isolated underground. Some of the caving equipment and terms were difficult to understand in places, but not in a way that impacted the overall story too much. 

However, especially after around the 70% mark, the story was so long and sometimes frustrating that I expected somewhat more from the ending, and it fell short. 

The part I had been most interested in, i.e. the walking dead folks, were never fully explained and I'm still unsure if they were ghosts, hallucinations or shroom zombies. Also, with regard to the conclusion, it feels super unnecessary for both MCs to retraumatize themselves just to confront Gyre's mom ? Did they learn nothing from this expedition ?! A similar trend is followed throughout the story, where Gyre and Em have some nice interactions but they both then make inexplicable U-turns with their character growth.


It still gets points for the creepy underground adventure but I was left unsatisfied. 
Expand filter menu Content Warnings