The Low, Low woods by Carmen Maria Machado

Illustrated by DaNi

Octavia (Vee) and Eldora (El) are high school seniors in the town of Shudder-to-Think, Pennsylvania.  Their coal-mining town is plagued with sinkholes full of fire that filled the coal mines ages ago, and the holes and soot claim many lives throughout the town.  Nevertheless, people can't seem to leave Shudder-to-Think, guilty of leaving their dead behind in shoddily marked graves empty of inhabitants, swallowed by even more sinkholes.  Aside from the soul-sink that is the town, something else strange is going on that seems to affect townspeople intermittently - they forget whole swaths of time, hours, days, or more, and can't account for their whereabouts nor their actions.  Vee and El enlist the the help of the local witch, who knows more about all of these strange phenomenon that she lets on.  The truth is horrifying, and each victim of the forgetting disorder is faced with a pivotal choice - to keep forgetting, or to face the horrible truth of the nature of their town.

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This story is part of the Hill House comics, where Joe Hill follows in his father's footsteps to promote horror stories.  The Low, Low Woods is a very creep tale that doesn't end with what you think it will at all.  Readers will be horrified, for sure, but not possibly in the Halloween-horror genre sort of way.  The haunting mystery and blend of imperfect magic makes this a fairly unique story, but it isn't enough to overcome major plot twist that underpins Shudder-to-Think's way of life. DaNi's illustrations are fairly rough, but the coloring and jagged edges perfectly compliment the terrible things happening in Shudder-to-Think.

The Low, Low Woods is rated for Mature audiences, and it definitely is.  

Sara's Rating: 6/10
Suitability Level: Adult

This review was made possible with a digital reader copy from the publisher through Net Galley. 
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Tags: Rating: 6/10, Suitability: Adult, Comicbooks, Horror, Mystery