"The Dark Between the Trees" is a horror novel following two timelines in a dark wood, filled with mysteries and secrets.
The first group we follow is in the present, and it is formed by an academic researcher, her pupil, and some forest guards, the second one is in the past, and it follows a group of soldiers in the forest.
These soldiers are known, in the present, to have escaped the woods, but only three of them. What happened to the others? What lies in the woods?

I have to say I expected more from this book. The premise is intriguing, and the atmosphere is stunning, it seems to truly be in the forest, between the trees, like the title suggests, but in the end I think the actions taken by the two groups were quite repetitive, and while I get that the action is set in the same place throughout the novel for obvious reasons, at the same time the novel dragged quite a bit.
The ending in my opinion was rushed, and while I appreciated a thing in particular, I also feel that I wanted a bit more of explanation of the turning point, that I guessed at the half of the novel.

Tha characters are what redeemed the novel, I felt that they were scared and I got why they were frightened by their surroundings, I would have liked to be scared myself, since this is a horror novel. Sadly, that was not the case, but the vibes were immaculate, that I have to concede.

This novel felt a bit flat for me, but if you like horror books set in mysterious forests, this is the book for you.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

DNF at 20%. I really wanted to love this creepy, forest Gothic but I just couldn't get into the writing style

The Dark Between the Trees was an interesting read about a research group who ventures into a forest to learn about what happened to a group of soldiers there 300 years ago. After a while, they feel they are being stalked by something and that not everything in the forest is as it seems.

This alternates between the modern-day timeline of the research group and the pst timeline of the soldiers. It was a good, creepy story.

I would compare this one to an episode of the Twilight Zone. Do all your questions get answered? No. Some is left for you to think about, but you can reach reasonable conclusions of what happened based on what you read. I’ll definitely be thinking about this one for some time to come.

"The Dark Between the Trees" had a really promising start, but started losing my attention about a quarter of the way through. It dragged for me, and I found myself wishing it was 100 pages shorter. But the ending was disappointing, so I found myself wishing for more. No book will ever please everyone who reads it, and I'm sure this one will have plenty of fans.

My thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley. This review was written voluntarily and is entirely my own, unbiased, opinion.

Thank you Netgalley, author, and the publishers for allowing me the opportunity to read this e-arc.

The Dark Between The Trees by Fiona Barnett is an impressive debut, but not exactly what I hoped or expected it to be. There are two narratives, which is something I love in historical novels. In the first one, we follow five women in the modern day who embark on an academic research trip to Moresby Wood. The other is set in 1643 and we trace the steps of the soldiers hiding in the same woods.

From the get-go we know there’s something sinister going around, and one of the women - Nuria - tells her companions and us the ghost story of Moresby Wood... In the both narratives, events quickly escalate, things are no longer what they seem, and it gets bloody and spooky. Although it all sounds like my perfect book, I didn’t like the soldiers’ chapters and found them really boring, even the gory parts. I really enjoyed the women’s chapters, though - the characters were well written, I loved their dynamic and interactions. Then again, although I would prefer the woods and the Corrigal to turn out to be something else than it was, I did like the ending. So overall, a mixed bag but an interesting premise and I will definitely look out for more writing from Barnett!

Thank you to NetGalley and Solaris for this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley and Solaris for letting me enjoy this early digital copy in exchange for my honest review.

I think this book has a great premise, interesting set up and I read it fairly quickly but for some reason, it didn’t hook me fully. The dual POV’s went back and forth through time and that may have something to do with it. There was also not one (or even two) distinct narrator(s) so that made it hard to connect with anyone in particular.

I found the idea of this book really interesting and the opening chapters are certainly engaging. However. I felt the story dragged a bit and I lost interest at some points. OK but if I'm completely honest I would struggle to know how to recommend it. Some of the reviews from other readers make interesting points and have inspired me to revisit parts of the book!

The Dark Between the Trees is billed as a deep woods horror for fans of the Ritual and the Decent - but sadly the only real comparison between this book and those projects is the setting.
Barnett serves up an intriguing premise about a mythical beast known as Corrigal that stalks a remote, English wood killing those who enter but falls flat in what ends up being a rather suspenseless telling of the story.
The story is told across two timelines - from the POV of a group of ninetieth century soldiers who cross paths with this dark presence while fleeing a battle - and of a group of modern day amateur historians seeking to learn the soldiers fate.
Unfortunately the characters are undercooked and the narrative drags when it has all the right ingredients of a thrilling tale here. A strong idea let down by execution.

“ The wood was a liar, but beneath that was buried something true, and fascinating, and the wood was telling her what it was, if only she could tune into it properly, or decipher it.”

The Dark Between the Trees tells the tale of soldiers who went missing in the darkness of Moresby Wood while following a group of women who set out to discover what happened to those soldiers so many years ago.

This book started slow, picked up, gained speed, and then took us to a confusing place. I enjoyed this book for the most part- I rooted for Harper, read furiously as Alice and Sue engaged in a battle of wills, and hoped desperately that someone would get out alive.

However, the ending just didn’t deliver in the way I hoped- and for some who like cosmic horror, this might be your jam. It wasn’t BAD or anything… it just wasn’t satisfying.

This story is incredibly atmospheric and I often felt right there with our characters- though I think it was (surprisingly) easier to connect with the soldiers than the present day women. They just weren’t as fleshed out and felt a bit more hollow, which was a disappointment.

If you enjoy a confusing, cosmic story with a haunting atmosphere- this might be just what you’re looking for. It’s a solid, 3.5 stars for me. Rounded down to 3 for NetGalley purposes.

It’s hard not to get strong "Annihilation" vibes as this book begins, what with a party of five women, each with different professional skillsets, entering a mysterious forest where things are not what they seem. To some extent that comparison continues as you go deeper into the book, even though this quickly turns toward gothic-folk horror and not cosmic sci-fi. Unfortunately, the comparison doesn’t do this novel too many favors, because this often feels like it is treading a similar forest path without discovering too many new treasures.

I really enjoyed this story, itself. The setup, the decision to tell multiple storylines/timelines simultaneously by switching back and forth between chapters, and even the ending, which may not be satisfying to everyone, but I felt was really fitting for this journey. However, I found myself repeatedly underwhelmed by the actual writing, as well as the character development, for both characters in both the contemporary and historical storylines. The characters all felt like they were defined by one trait, and that is fine for the considerable secondary characters, but I really wanted more for the primary four-ish characters. In the back half of the book there seems to be a sudden exposition dump giving more character explanation and motivation for one character in particular, but it felt like too little too late, and even with what was given it didn’t feel convincing, but instead somewhat expected. I would have been able to overlook somewhat flat characters if the writing was more compelling, but unfortunately it did not draw me in. It was plotted well enough, for the story it wanted to tell. But the writing just felt disjointed, moving back and forth between characters in a given chapter in a way that felt somewhat slipshod. The writing wasn’t offensive, and I will say that you could make an argument that the writing was trying to recreate the emotional experience of being lost and in disarray, paralleling the characters. But in the end, I just wanted the actual writing itself to be stronger, and the characters to be more robust, because I didn’t feel like I had any emotional connection to what anyone was doing, and nothing about the prose or the style was pulling me deeper in, leading down the paths to the heart of the wood, as it were.

The story itself is strong, and enjoyable, if not entirely new or groundbreaking. For story alone I would give it four stars. But the writing style feeling like it needed to be more focused and the characters all feeling somewhat underwritten unfortunately drops me down to three.

I want to thank NetGalley and Rebellion, Solaris, who provided a complimentary eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Finally, Dr. Alice Christopher has gotten permission and a crew together to explore the Moresby Wood, an area plagued by superstition and old legends. She plans to follow the trail of a group of soldiers from the 1700s who all disappeared in the wood, all but one deserter. But the deeper in they go, the more strangeness happens... and through flashbacks to the group of soldiers, it's clear that something is stalking them through the wood.

I knew this was a book I'd be into when I saw the comparison to [book:The Ritual|10239382]. The contrast between the group women in present times versus the group of men in the past worked well, and since they ended up not following the exact path of the soldiers there wasn't always a direct correlation of soldiers experiencing something and then the present-day people experiencing the same thing. The wood itself was its own character, and the imagery was surreal in a subtle way that made it even more disturbing. I would have enjoyed just a little more conclusion at the end but overall this was the perfect kind of read to usher in the fall season.

I was very excited for this one, but it seems the hype didn't quite lived the expectations.

For me the book was so dragged it was very difficult to want to even finish it, sadly it did have a good idea to come into but it didn't went all out for any reason, it could have been maybe the way it was written or that it's feel more like a normal madness think that you just stop looking for the shadows that were supposed to be there.

There is so much here to love - this book is just spectacularly atmospheric, and I envy the readers who will get to enjoy it during “spooky season” (such a perfect book for an October release). The author does an amazing job of capturing the woods, a “thin place” if ever there was one, and the alternating storylines were so effective. I was mesmerized by the woods - I could almost feel the mist and hear snapping branches. And I love the way that a very old legend is woven through, even as the narrators acknowledge that there is no single story, no single way of seeing the woods or understanding what happens there. This book reminded me of a darker Susanna Kearsley - high praise from me. This novel is set in a time and place that are not very familiar to me, and I was completely immersed.

But…there were two main issues that kept this from being a 4 or even 4 1/2 star read for me. First, the characters felt too thin. I didn’t need to like Alice, but I did need to understand her. It didn’t ring true, to me, that she’d abandon her good sense and her companions simply because she was bitter about a lack of grants or departmental politics. Second, I felt a bit shortchanged by the ending (Nuria’s ending).

All in all, though, I really enjoyed reading this book - I read it quickly, over just a few days. Thank you so much for the chance to read and review it.

Really enjoyed "The Dark Between the Trees" by Fiona Barnett. The sense of place was set really well, and you felt the claustrophobia, the disorientation and confusion. Set in two time periods, each chapter mirrored the one after and even though they were set hundreds of years apart, each set of characters experienced the same sense of dwindling hope of getting out of there alive. Brilliantly written!

I really loved the premise for this novel, and found the writing really week done ... But it just had a hard time holding my attention. I found it a bit dry in parts and needed to keep reminding myself to continue.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC to read and review. All opinions are my own.

Sadly I didn't really enjoy this book amd I actually dnf'd it around the half way mark.
I just wasn't a big fan of the writing and I didn't really care about the characters.
All in all this book just wasn't for me.
Thank you Netgalley and the publishers for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

The description of this book reminded me of the film "The Ritual" a little, which is why I just had to pick it up. Forests and horror stories about mysterious ancient monsters that might or might not exist are just the absolute best fit for each other, and I was very excited for "The Dark Between the Trees" and was hoping to actually be scared and have a sleepless night or two.

The atmosphere is this book's big strength. Moresby Forest, the strange woods the story takes place in, is fascinating and creepy. Noone really wants to go there - not just because there are ancient myths about a monster roaming it, but also because neither GPS nor simple compasses or any kind of technology seem to work once you cross its borders. It's a wild land, unconquered by humankind.
The writing is great, instantly pulling you in. There are two timelines - the first one tells the story of a group of soldiers in the 17th century that disappeared forever in the woods, the second one follows five researchers and park rangers trying to find out what actually happened to these men. I really liked the different perspectives that were wonderfully interwoven with each other, although I do think that the soldiers' perspective reads a little modern for its setting.
The mystery of what happened to the soldiers and what's happening now to the researchers is an intriguing one, and I was ready to give this a high rating - until the ending happened. Or, well, the last few chapters, I guess. The book doesn't seem to care all too much about its characters, doesn't ever allow us to get close to them, and certain things happening to them off screen later on didn't add to this feeling of detachement. The ending itself doesn't fully wrap up the story and leaves us with a lot of loose ends. While open endings can be amazing, this just feels underwhelming.
All in all, this is a good and very atmospheric story with an ending that disappointed me, but I'd still recommend reading it if creepy woods and ancient monsters are your thing.

In 1643 following an ambush, Captain Davies leads his men into Moresby Wood to recoup and recover. Not all his army made it and there are many injuries. Some of the soldiers are reluctant to enter the woods as they've heard all the folk stories of the Corrigal a mystical creature, and the Moresby family.
In present day Dr Alice Christopher a historian who has always been fascinated by the tales of Moresby Wood lead 4 other women to discover what could possibly have happened to the soldiers. But very soon they discover that things are not always as they seem and the forest wants to claim them too.
This was very atmospheric, the chapters alternate between the present and the past seamlessly. You really feel the sense of dread from both era's as the trees seem to close in on the protagonists and take them on their way.
3.5 rounded up to 4
Thanks to Netgalley and Rebellion publishers for this advanced copy, I'm under no obligation to leave my review

The Dark Between The Trees, Fiona Barnett's debut novel, had such potential. It's told through alternating chapters set in two different time periods. In the present day, two historians plus three local experts gain permission to explore Moresby Woods, which is normally out of bounds to the general public, retracing the steps of a group of Parliamentarian soldiers who fled into the woods in the seventeenth century after being ambushed. Only two of them ever emerged, telling a story of a monster that matches local legends of the Corrigan and of the witchcraft that lurks within the wood. The second strand, set in 1643, follows the soldiers themselves. Both groups soon find that the woods are not what they seem; paths seem to rearrange themselves to direct them towards certain places, landmarks shift and go missing. But is the Corrigan the biggest threat here, or does something even darker lurk within the woods?

Despite the strong ideas, The Dark Between The Trees fell very flat for me. The writing didn't work on either a macro or a micro level. Structurally speaking, the book just fails to gain momentum, and while I'm often a fan of an open ending, I felt that it ended before it really explored the potential of a lot of the ideas it introduced, like the 'second wood'. There was no sense of tension or fear as both groups recognise they're trapped in the wood, despite similarities to The Blair Witch Project. However, I think the real problem was the writing. Both strands flip back and forth between the heads of various point-of-view characters in a very uncontrolled way. This is just about OK in the present-day strand, where the characters are more clearly differentiated, but became very confusing in the seventeenth-century strand, where I struggled to tell the soldiers apart. I suspect there was also a problem with psychic distance; we're always at arms length from the characters, never very far away or very close in. This robbed the book of any sense of immediacy. Finally, although I have no problem with writers choosing to modernise historical dialogue, I felt Barnett took it too far with the soldiers, because there's no real sense of an early modern mindset at all (at one point, a character talks about the division between his 'personal' and 'professional' roles). 2.5 stars.