What a fantastic start to my 2023 journey of reading. I have been waiting for many years for a new dystopian concept to emerge which truly captured my imagination, the last being Cecelia Ahern's fantastic 'Flawed' duology back in 2016. 'HappyHead', Josh Silver's debut novel, is doing a lot to fill the dystopian void with its chilling narrative and smart commentary. Teenager Seb is invited to join the HappyHead retreat, designed to support teenagers with their emotions and chronic unhappiness. A series of group 'assessments' are given to Seb and his team in the remote Scottish retreat. Seb is determined to be successful for once and win the approval of his family, but finds himself increasingly distracted by the enigmatic and rebellious Finn.

There was a lot to enjoy in this book with its addictive pacing. At first, the assessments seem innocent and genuine therapies to support Seb with tapping into his emotions. It soon becomes clear that some of the assessments are a lot more threatening than they appear as the teenagers are seemingly pitted against one another. My transition from blindly trusting the therapists to deep suspicion and then disgust was quite the journey to go on with Seb. Silver has created a bizarre dystopian world where the only respite is the growing romance between Seb and Finn - it was a relieving counterpoint to the brutality of some of the other sections of the book.

Overall, I loved Seb and Finn's relationship, the twisted assessments were absolutely gripping and the ending made me gasp (partially in frustration! Sequel now please!!). This is a must-read - 5 stars.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher who provided an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Unlimited stars for the wonderful book.

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Omg.

This was everything. I had a feeling from the summary that I was going to enjoy this. Little did I realise how much 😳

Right from the start, I was hooked. Seb is such a perfect narrator for this story. He's so interesting and relatable - and also hilarious at times. I laughed out loud a few times during this book.

But it's also heart-wrenching, tense and twisty as anything- I really found myself feeling for the characters - Seb and Finn especially. Those two 😍 They were so well crafted and fitted the story so well.

This author is clearly special - everything about this was just *chefs kiss*

Some important things to note - this is not a predominantly romance book, but it does have an M/M undertone- there's no steam (please don't be put off by that) - the MCs do NOT get a HEA or even a HFN by the end. It ends on a cliffhanger and sets up a sequel well. My heart was in my mouth.

I could gush about this all day, but just do yourself a favour and give it a read. I needed book 2 yesterday 😂

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC. This is my honest review