This review is based on an eARC (Advance Reading Copy) provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. We Are All Ghosts in the Forest will be released on November 7, 2024.
I had never heard of Lorraine Wilson before seeing We Are All Ghosts in the Forest pop up on NetGalley, but the premise of digital ghosts sounded fresh and intriguing, and an herbalist trying to live out a quiet and peaceful life in a world that won’t let her was promising enough for me to check it out.
We Are All Ghosts in the Forest stars Katerina, a biracial photographer who moved to her grandmother’s home in Estonia after the digital world collapsed into often-dangerous electronic ghosts. Her new life as an herbalist with a pinch of magic does plenty to help keep herself and others in her town alive and safe, but she’s never truly gained the trust of a small town that views her as an outsider, and when a mute boy approaches her with a letter from his father demanding her help, the stability of her quiet life becomes harder and harder to maintain.
It’s clear from the beginning that there is a big, life-and-death plot on the horizon. There are dreams and portents and rumors aplenty. But even so, the first half of the novel is a fairly quiet one, with an herbalist going about her life making tinctures and remedies, caring for a scarred child on her doorstep, and dealing with a prejudiced and mistrustful town. This is an obscure comparison, and the books are written for very different audiences, but there were times in the first half where it reminded me of Wise Child, which I read this spring for the Druids square on last year’s Bingo board. For all the apocalyptic paranormal happenings, the first half of the story feels tender and grounded in a way that really drew me in despite the action itself developing slowly.
Unfortunately, as that action developed, my connection to the characters and their concerns began to unravel. It’s not that I stopped hoping for their success—after all, saving the world is very easy to cheer for—as much as I began to feel more and more distant from the story. Part of this is likely down to taste. I am repeatedly on the record about disliking thriller plots, and the third quarter of this story reads a little bit like a frantic, extended chase scene, with dangers around every turn and a never-ending supply of magical devices at hand to turn them aside. The magical devices are well-established by the slower build in the story’s first half, but the changes to the pacing and the shift in focus to the specific ways in which the magics work both made the story feel less personal and more formulaic, even if they were well-supported by the novel to that point.
The final quarter of the novel combines the overarching threat and the small town interpersonal plot in a way that brings the story to a satisfying close, but so much hinges on whether the lead can put together the proper mix of herbs and magic that it still feels less grounded that what came before, even when returning to the interpersonal elements of the story. The story elements mix in a way that makes sense, but the resolution occupies an awkward in-between space between different types of fantasy stories—the magic doesn’t feel systematic enough to satisfy those who love novel uses of magic to defeat hard problems, whereas the resolution relies too heavily on quick-thinking application of magic to satisfy someone like me who is looking for a more grounded, interpersonal tale.
Ultimately, We Are All Ghosts in the Forest is an engaging read that is at its best when dealing with small town prejudice and the almost slice-of-life tale of an herbalist navigating a paranormal apocalypse. But the fast-paced save-the-world plot is a bit too neat and streamlined for my tastes, and there’s probably too much slice-of-life for readers looking for a magical thriller. It’s still a good read, but one that occupies an in-between space without an obvious major audience. The writing quality, the themes, and the carefully crafted setting will surely make this a favorite for someone, but it will need to be someone who is comfortable with a story that can slide back and forth between slice-of-life and thriller elements.
Recommended if you like: slow builds and fast finishes, magical herbalists navigating small-town prejudice.
Can I use it for Bingo? It’s hard mode for Small Town and Survival. It’s also Published in 2024 by an Author of Color and features Dreams and a Character with a Disability.
Overall rating: 14 of Tar Vol’s 20. Four stars on Goodreads.