What a bizarre little book!

Root Rot follows nine unnamed cousins—The Liar, The Secret Keeper, etc—as they return to their grandfather’s old lake house one summer, only to discover that something strange is going on in the grounds by the water.

Written in first-person plural, the perspective in Root Rot constantly shifts between the nine cousins, often without the reader knowing exactly who’s speaking. It’s immersive and disorienting in the best way; amplified by the bleak, atmospheric setting—think old manor akin to T. Kingfisher’s What Moves the Dead or Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House. The imagery is pretty striking.

The horror elements are also incredibly effective. I’m a seasoned horror reader, but even I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. The dinner scene, in particular, left me quite unsettled.

The ending took me by surprise, the way it shifts into something almost dreamlike. I’ll be honest… I’m not sure I fully understood it, but I definitely enjoyed it.

Overall, I’d definitely recommend this to those who enjoy Strange Little Novels(TM) and fungal horror—I think there’ll be something for you to love here.

Thank you to NetGalley and Creature Publishing for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you Saskia Nislow, NetGalley and Creature Publishing for this ARC,

Root Rot is a novella that’s hard to describe; there's a little bit of horror, sci-fi, fantasy and something else. The vibes GO HARD and the aesthetic of it is delicious. Plot wise, it’s hard to say something without spoiling, so, I’ll say this: is it aliens? Mushroom people? some sort of eldritch horror? Black mold? Rich people's problems? Who knows…

At 140 pages, this is a novella rather than a full-length novel so it won't take you very long to read, but either way it is an unnerving page turner! Each child is introduced with a descriptive/archetypal label, rather than a traditional name, which is fitting for folk horror. There's (1) The Oldest, (2) The Boy Twin, (3) The Girl Twin, (4) The One Who Runs Away, (5) The Secret Keeper, (6) The Liar, (7) The Crybaby, (8) The One with the Beautiful Voice, and (9) The Baby. Make no mistake, the naming convention does not reveal much, gender roles are irrelevant, and no single child is necessarily tougher or more capable than the others. What is coming after them is particular in its methods, but not discriminating. The appearances of mushroom circles around the property are the reader's first hint of what the children may be facing, but is it already too late?

I would have given this one a 5 ⭐ if the cast had been trimmed down a bit. There's little room to give proper due to each character. Attempting to track 9 children - who are or aren't where they should be at any given moment - is confusing at first. It does add to the shifting reality though, and you'll find yourself questioning the who, where and when. The Young Aunt, I thought would have a much bigger role having a separate designation from the Adults, but this was disappointingly disceiving. However, Niblow does an excellent job of maintaining the suspense and tapping into the core - sometimes irrational - fears and self-doubt of childhood. I recommend it!

🍄ＢＯＯＫ ＲＥＶＩＥＷ 🖤

I enjoyed this book... I think. It was like waking up from a dream, and the more you try to think about the details, the less you can remember!

The names of the children made it hard to keep track of who was speaking and who things were happening to, but I then again it was happening to all of them ... not that I know what it was. I would have liked their names to have impacted the story more, I know The Crybaby cried a couple of times, but I wanted The Liar, etc, to mean more.

This was definitely a fever dream kind of book. The horror elements were spot on for me, the body horror was enough without going too far, the author takes you to a point but lets you look away. It made me feel unsettled throughout, like someone was waiting to jump out at me, I knew it was coming, but I didn't know when.

Fans of WTF did I just read, and folklaw horror will lap this up.

I flew through this one! What happened? I can’t be sure, but it’s great. There’s something of a Victorian/ethereal/supernatural force within these pages.

Extended family holiday to the lake house sounds like great fun right? What if things at the lake house are not as they seem? The narrative jumps between the cousins (there’s a lot of them), and I LOVED the terms of references for the cousins, who needs names. I’m talking ‘The Liar’ and ‘The One Who Runs Away’ type of thing - this tells me a lot more about these children and adolescents than any name ever could. It goes without saying there’s some bizarre events and a spreading fear and paranoia between the cousins, all at different rates. It’s an incredibly immersive read.

Root rot in gardening terms is essentially a disease caused by a fungal pathogen(s) which can ultimately lead to death. An undermining of growth and the ability to thrive.

If you liked the film Midsommar, and for those of you that have read The Ladie Upstairs by Jessie Elland, I implore you to give this book a go. That gut-feeling of something not being quite right is going to haunt you with this read.

Initially this can be off putting but as the narrative plays out it makes a lot more sense. I read this in one sitting and with it being so short it's perfect for a lazy afternoon. Because of the style of writing with the switching of perspectives and use of "We" (which presumably is the 9 cousins, with switching between single members or small groups of them) the story becomes immersive. You have to pay attention to who's who and where and as that knowledge sets in so does the dread and paranoia. Small creepy things start to happen, what happens is questionable, but also this plays out during long hot summer days which never seems to exsit in a linear reality.

Highly recommend to those who love fungal horror.

Root Rot is a weirdo fever dream of a story that follows a group of young cousins on an extended family trip to their grandparents “LakeHouse”. I will say at first the writing style was throwing me off but after a while it finally clicked for me and I couldn’t put it down. The body horror is fantastic, I found a lot of the times that it would be a strange balance of beauty mixed with the grotesque. I would definitely recommend this to people who enjoy weird books like “Follow Me To Ground” or “Comfort Me With Apples.” Thank you to NetGally and Creature Publishing for the advice copy of this in exchange for my honest review.

As an avid horror reader it is so rare that a book truly gives me the chills. This book is one of those exceptions. It was so deeply unsettling and finding out what horror would unfold next was at once riveting and unnerving. The narrative style and imagery is unlike anything I’ve read before as it draws you in making you believe you as the reader are also one of the children getting slowly consumed by the rot and the tragic loss of innocence that follows.

I will say that for such a short novel it starts off very slowly but once it grips you it won’t let go.

Overall an absolutely stunning work of fiction!

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!

This was one of the most interesting, mind-bending books I have read this year! I honestly think I was thoroughly confused throughout a good half of the book, but that was part of the fun. I really didn't expect the ending and was kind of surprised. It left me with a couple of questions. How often does this happen? Is it like a generational thing? Thank you to NetGalley and Creature Publishing for letting me read this book early!

It took me a couple of days to think about this novella.

The novella through me for a loop because there isn't any chapters; there's just random breaks within the book itself, and sometimes it seems like there should be breaks because the section is so long, and other times the breaks aren't needed (mostly because these sections are so short). It was also hard to keep track of the children's names too, but I think that's just a personal preference - some were really long and I struggled with remembering them to the point I started to abbreviate in my head.

What I did enjoy was the subtle horror aspects in the book. Nothing popped out, but the over all uneasiness and uncertainty made it a decent read. It gave me "What Moves in the Dead" vibes with the content matter.

Overall, decent read. I probably won't reread it in the next year or two, but maybe a few years down the road.

I have mixed feelings about this bizarre little novella. I enjoyed it but I still wonder about what I read. This was an exerience, a confuse one

What a bizarre creepy fever dream of a book. Aka a great damn time. lol. I didn’t always know wtf was happening the vibe was right for a creepy book called root rot.

It wasn’t very long and follows a family of kids that are on vacation with their families at the Lake House that sits next to a River and some weird adventures they come up on.

I enjoyed it.

Thanks to netgalley and creature publishing for an eARC.

This is a weird one. If you like strange little novellas I’d give this one a try for sure. I found the naming or more so not naming of characters to be hard to follow and confusing. However the ambiance and creep factors are top tier. I definitely found myself a bit uneasy during many parts of this novella. I need someone to explain this one to me.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for access to the e-arc

I dont know that this book was for me. Maybe it was that I couldn't connect because everyone only had nicknames. It was so hard to keep track of what was happening. A little too confusing for me.

Root Rot won’t be for everyone but it most certainly is for me - this is straight up a very weird book for very weird people (complimentary).

This is an unsettling little horror which makes use of lots of nature themes (gorgeous), scenes in which different children are experiencing different (aka bizarre) things and quickly forgetting them and then possibly returning from a walk on their own not quite like themselves. Mysterious, strange, at times I had no clue what was going on which added to the experience and I really loved it.

It’s a quick read (I read it in one sitting, I inhaled it, I genuinely loved the eerie vibes, this is exactly my kind of thing) with a lot of things happening that you won’t understand until you do, but that’s part of the fun. It’s a really fun read, it’s unique and the unsettling vibe is just perfect. Oh, I also really enjoyed the names used for the children, it just gives the book another unique edge. The ending (specifically with The Liar) was gorgeous and poignant in my opinion.

Highly recommend. Any author who uses the bloody tooth mushroom in their work gets a good rating from me. 5 stars.

A huge thank you to NetGalley for giving me the arc of this book!

Personally, this book was not for me, but I found the premise fascinating. The idea of writing a horror novella with archetypes as characters is super interesting, the execution just didn’t do it for me.

Root Rot is a hard book to review. Its a book that gives you little bits of information about the characters and builds up the setting with evocative writing. The setting is the main character, the atmosphere and tension are the stars of the show. Saskia Nislow does a wonderful job of bringing the forest and lake house to life.

The story is told through the point of view of the children. All cousins, they have come with their families to the grandfather's lake house. No character is referred to by their name, just a little nickname that happens to tell you a bit about who they are. Like The Liar, The Girl twin, The Baby. The parents are in the background, hardly mentioned.

From the moment they arrive they notice some things are off with the house and forest, they see things out of the corner of their eyes, feel uneasy, but no cousin wants to stand out, so they don't mention anything. They don't want to rock the boat. Slowly the forest seems to take them over. So much of this book is hinted at. Family problems, grief, and identity are themes that are never really openly discussed but they are all tied throughout the story. So much of this story happens internally. It was odd, and quite different to what i have read before.

I think the horror genre is hard for me to review because I rate them based of vibes. Root Rot brings the oppressive tension, the feeling of time running out, the sense of it all being inevitable.

Root Rot is an eerie and surreal novella that immerses readers in a strange, unsettling family gathering at a remote lake house. Told from a collective "we" perspective, the story follows nine children—each known only by descriptive titles like The Liar, The Secret Keeper, and The Crybaby—as they experience bizarre and disorienting events. The book blurs the lines between reality and nightmare, creating an atmosphere that is both claustrophobic and hypnotic.

Saskia Nislow’s writing is undeniably vivid, packed with unsettling imagery that lingers in the mind. The prose feels almost poetic at times, and the way she crafts the eerie setting is one of the novel’s strongest aspects. However, the unconventional storytelling style—especially the use of vague character identities and a fragmented plot—makes it difficult to fully connect with the story or its characters. Readers looking for a more traditional narrative structure may find it frustrating or too abstract to fully enjoy.

While the book succeeds in creating a haunting, dreamlike experience, it sometimes feels more style over substance. The lack of clear character development and resolution left me wanting more depth and clarity. Still, for those who like new horror movies that focus on mood and atmosphere instead of plot, Root Rot is an interesting but sometimes confusing experience.

This unique fungal horror is about nine children who go on a vacation to their grandfather's home. And it's so much more than that; it's a fever dream, nature is a main character and strange and uncanny things happen to all the children.

This book has no single narrator but is written as "we" and differing perspectives. To me this echoed the mycelium beneath the rotting ground- a hive mind, a web of thoughts..I don't want to say more in case I spoil anything - although to be honest I think it's impossible to spoil this kind of story. You go in it just to experience it and come out of it with lots of ideas and speculations and I loved that.

Thanks to Netgalley and Creature Publishing for the ARC.

A strange little book that left me feeling a bit lost and confused? I honestly don’t know if I liked it or not