Hemlock Island: A Novel

Kelley Armstrong

Sep 2023 · Macmillan Audio · Narrated by Angela Dawe

About this audiobook

A standalone horror novel from #1 New York Times bestselling author Kelley Armstrong.

Laney Kilpatrick has been renting her vacation home to strangers. The invasion of privacy gives her panic attacks, but it’s the only way she can keep her beloved Hemlock Island, the only thing she owns after a pandemic-fueled divorce. But broken belongings and campfires that nearly burn down the house have escalated to bloody bones, hex circles, and now, terrified renters who've fled after finding blood and nail marks all over the guest room closet, as though someone tried to claw their way out...and failed.

When Laney shows up to investigate with her teenaged niece in tow, she discovers that her ex, Kit, has also been informed and is there with Jayla, his sister and her former best friend. Then Sadie, another old high school friend, charters over with her brother, who’s now a cop.

There are tensions and secrets, whispers in the woods, and before long, the discovery of a hand poking up from the earth. Then the body that goes with it... But by that time, someone has taken off with their one and only means off the island, and they’re trapped with someone—or something—that doesn’t want them leaving the island alive.

A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin’s Press.

Ratings and reviews

Hemlock Island is a a paranormal thriller and horror novel about a group of childhood friends stuck on an island where unsettling things have been happening. Unfortunately, this novel didn’t work for me. The characters felt like strangers to each other despite the fact they’ve all been acquainted since childhood. They had zero chemistry and I didn’t buy any of them as actual humans or find them particularly compelling. Most of the thrills and action are made up of Laney running all over.

About the author

Kelley Armstrong graduated with a degree in psychology and then studied computer programming. Now she is a full-time writer and parent, and she lives with her husband and three children in rural Ontario, Canada. She is the author of the Rockton mystery series featuring Detective Casey Duncan, which begins with City of the Lost, and the novel Wherever She Goes. She is the editor of the young adult anthology Life Is Short and Then You Die.