Thank you to St Martin’s Press for sending me a finished copy of What the Woods Took by Courtney Gould to review. I appreciate it!
What a ride! I was excited to read this story in the wake of the news of the bill in the states Paris Hilton has been working on had passed. Our children deserve to be protected especially the ones who are already struggling. For more details on this bill please check out this link: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/paris-hilton-bill-congress-troubled-teen-industry-rcna181632
Alright – the book.
We start off with one of our main characters being woken up in the night inside her foster home by two men kidnapping her. But we are quick to discover that Devin is not actually being taken by kidnappers, but rather by two transport specialist who have been authorised by her foster parents to take her and deliver her to Revive – a wilderness camp for troubled teens.
The book is really slow to open up about our characters and what brings them to the trouble teen program, but we find out small pieces of each of them as they are forced to hike into the Idaho woods. cook their own food and sleep under tarps. The two councillors seem a bit out of their depth with a group with so many dynamics and then things really take a Lord of the Flies twist when they cross and river that seems to be the border of something nefarious in the woods. The councillors disappear, food gets destroyed and trust is broken as our teens fight desperately to make it to the next milestone. It turns out that they are not only fighting for survival but as they start to see mysterious faces in the woods, they have to learn to work together if they want to make it out alive.
I enjoyed the style of the book, there were just a bit of slow parts, but over all an interesting twist. An inclusive book with queer characters, but please be warned there is discussion of substance abuse, assault and self harm.
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