The Twisted Ones

Winner of the RUSA Award for Best Horror

When a young woman clears out her deceased grandmother's home in rural North Carolina, she finds long-hidden secrets about a strange colony of beings in the woods in this chilling novel that reads like The Blair Witch Project meets The Andy Griffith Show.

When Mouse's dad asks her to clean out her dead grandmother's house, she says yes. After all, how bad could it be?

Answer: pretty bad. Grandma was a hoarder, and her house is stuffed with useless rubbish. That would be horrific enough, but there's more--Mouse stumbles across her step-grandfather's journal, which at first seems to be filled with nonsensical rants...until Mouse encounters some of the terrifying things he described for herself.

Alone in the woods with her dog, Mouse finds herself face to face with a series of impossible terrors--because sometimes the things that go bump in the night are real, and they're looking for you. And if she doesn't face them head on, she might not survive to tell the tale.

From Hugo Award-winning author Ursula Vernon, writing as T. Kingfisher, The Twisted Ones is a gripping, terrifying tale bound to keep you up all night--from both fear and anticipation of what happens next.

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400 pages

Average rating: 6.8

51 RATINGS

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6 REVIEWS

Community Reviews

J_Ortiz01
Nov 21, 2024
6/10 stars
Our club was intrigued by the Appalachian theme & were constantly on edge. Plot was good but could have been more descriptive.
Hartfullofbooks
Nov 02, 2024
2/10 stars
I usually enjoy T. Kingfisher's lighthearted horror but something about this one just missed the mark. The premise sounded so interesting, a woman going to clear out her mean grandma’s hoarded out house in the middle of the woods all alone with no one but a dog? Sounded great! Unfortunately, it was not great. The main character feels like a self insert by the author and I found her to be boring, dull, and dumb. I listened to the audiobook for this one and the narrator read everything with this snarky, sarcastic, smart ass tone that made listening to this book a true test of my patience. Our dull main character, Mouse, meets her neighbor who is named Foxy…..and together they start to investigate the weird occurrences in the woods. This story did not make a lot of sense to me and was very boring. I had to listen at 2x speed just to finish this one I honestly can’t think of one thing I enjoyed. This is not a good book, but is it the worst thing over ever read? No. I’m so glad this isn’t the first book by Kingfisher I read, and I recommend checking out her other books and skipping this one.
lady_of_shalott
Aug 22, 2024
4/10 stars
Once Foxy made an entrance the book went totally south. Giving it two stars because the beginning was really good. However, the last 150 pages and “big reveal” was a hot mess. The more Foxy said “hon” the more angry I became… Like, let my imagination do SOMETHING. I don’t need to read trashy humor and the word “hon” to understand who Foxy is…. Gooooood grief.

Their reaction to being held hostage by a demonic, devil, magic cult was so insanely unrealistic that you lost me completely.

This was going somewhere good and the author got lazy.

La- deee-daaaaa
Rannaluv
Aug 11, 2024
5/10 stars
I love T. Kingfisher, and this one had pieces in it that were really good. I think it would have been more interesting as a series.
Tintenfischjoe
Aug 11, 2024
8/10 stars
It was a great read. Best way to describe it is millennial woman meets folklore as she cleans out her grandmother's harder house in rural North Carolina. A well told story with unconventional strong female lead. It also slightly tapped into a childhood fear I had in one scene. I recommend this to anyone looking for something like a modern dark fairytale. Has some smatterings of eldritch horror

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