The Halls of the Dead: A Novel

by S. M. Hallow

A MULTICAST NARRATION

A queer, gothic horror romance set in a necromancy-tinged London, sure to entrance fans of The Death of Jane Lawrence and Mexican Gothic.

London, December 1849­

Irene Shallcross Haley has dedicated her life to necromancy, a forbidden, reviled art that is passed along through sentient grimoires bound in human skin. With her undead husband St. John—a marriage of kindred spirits and platonic convenience—she has been protecting the knowledge of generations of witches that came before her. Like any magic, it has come at a her reputation, her relationship with her sister, and her soul. But when Irene’s love, Agnes, is hanged for witchcraft, Irene refuses to let Agnes be one more thing that is taken from her.

A true resurrection has not been achieved in two thousand years, but Irene is determined. With the help of St. John, Irene bangs on the doors of the Halls of the Dead, demanding the third part of their triumverate back…or did she? Because the Agnes that awakens comes with both a hunger for raw flesh and a malignant ghost tied to her soul.

Necromancy is the art of saying no—no, I won't let you go; no, I won't let you be destroyed—and Irene’s work is not yet done. She must find a way to bring Agnes back to her true self, she must navigate her feelings for her resurrected lover as well as St. John, and she must do all of this without catching the attention of Sir Silas Underhill, the man who sentenced Agnes to death.

Death is not the end of love. But Irene may realize it can actually be the beginning.

Genres: Horror, Fantasy, Gothic, Queer, Romance, LGBT, Adult

Audible Audio

Expected publication August 18, 2026

Reviews

[Zana · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're a fan of gore and guts and graves in your Gothic fiction, then this is the book to read.

I came here for the Gothic vibes and the necromancy, and this novel delivered 110% on both fronts. I didn't care much for the poly relationship (mostly because I don't care much for romance in the first place), but I'll live. It was an interesting dynamic to read about in a historical fantasy setting, especially since the social norms in this fictional historical London is very similar to the real historical London.

I wasn't sure what to expect from this novel, but this definitely had me seated the entire time. I couldn't stop reading. I loved that this novel treaded the fine line between serious and campy. At times, it was over the top, but the serious parts of the narrative (death, the afterlife, homophobia, misogyny, etc.) managed to reign the story in and keep readers focused on the heart of the story.

Don't get me wrong though, the story did go off the rails several times when it came to the topics of death and reincarnation, but this is Gothic fiction, so those parts were to be expected. And hell, I had so much fun with the soul eating, book eating, and the undead hungering for flesh. Jesus Christ was described as a necromancer, and I was sold on the story.

I would've rated this higher if there were less POVs. Since all three MCs' viewpoints were featured, there was no second guessing or subtlety with anyone's motives. But this is definitely a personal preference since I like a bit of mystery with my Gothic fiction.

Overall, I'm glad I picked up this book. It was dark. It was gross. It was silly. And it definitely satisfied my cravings for a Gothic fantasy.

Thank you to Harper Voyager and NetGalley for this arc.

[Katie (Semi Hiatus) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I keep seeing this book described as sapphic romance and I don’t think it does the story justice! The MFC is married to an undead male Saint and she’s got a girlfriend who has just been hanged for witchcraft as the novel opens. This was one of the more moving portrayals of queer polyamory in fantasy that I’ve read (do love the polys in Murderbot too). The relationship between all three is grounded in friendship, respect as well as attraction. I didn’t love all the seeing permission in each others eyes instead having a conversation before massively changing the nature of their triad. I understand that would have slowed things down so I won’t quibble.

Loved how committed the author was to her concepts. Decomposing bodies smell, have bugs, skin might be falling off, if you bring the dead back to life do those issues stay or not? What does eating a still living person smell & taste like? How do you dead with the trauma of remembering your own death?

Hallows writing is slow and contemplative. The flashbacks aren’t just information dumps. As the characters look back they emotionally grow in the present. Her writing shines most in those moments. The last 1/3 of the book as we shift into present events & the action picks up was weaker than the beginning.

Recommend if you don’t mind a slower more introspective read, love necromancy or non traditional relationships. If those don’t float your boat this isn’t for you!

Warning: There’s repeated graphic descriptions of maggots, spiders, centipedes, flies and other insects. There’s graphic cannibalism as well.

[Liana Gold]

Gothic horror romance set in a necromancy tinged London.

Sci-fi/Fantasy

Many thanks to NetGalley, Avon and Harper Voyager and the author, S.M. Hallow for the early eARC!

Publication date: August 18, 2026

[Logan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was, for me, a very wobbly 2.5/5 stars.

The novel kicks off with a literal resurrection. Which hey, very cool, very bold. However, that scene drags on for literally the first quarter of the novel. It’s interspersed with flashbacks, sure, but the plot—as it stands in the book’s present day—does not begin to move forward until after the quarter mark. That, for me, is a bit of problem. In fact, the majority of the first quarter of this book is spent in flashbacks, and while they were interesting and offered context relevant to the present day plot, things still felt stagnant to me.

The characters, on the other hand, were a joy—especially St. John—though I sometimes found their actions a tad over the top. There were several instances of Irene shrieking her words out “like a banshee,” and contextually, those just didn’t feel natural to me.

The writing was mostly solid, if a bit navel-gazey. However, there were some turns of phrase that made no sense to me, such as Agnes being so hungry that “her teeth stung.” And for whatever reason, I found that the writing quality tended to degrade during the romantic scenes. Segues grew sloppy, there was ambiguity about who was where, etc. The gore was wonderfully written, though, and overall the prose made great use of the senses, which I always appreciate.

But the most horrifying thing in this book? That corpse we resurrected at the very start? One of the main characters is frenching it post-resurrection but pre-mouth-rinse. Like this person had been dead and buried, and we can’t even get them to chew some mint leaves before we swap spit? Seeing as the necromancer makes no mention of tasting the grave on her lover’s tongue, I’m assuming this makeout session wasn’t intended to be gross or edgy, and maybe was just not considered? Either way, I had a hard time suspending disbelief for that.

If you enjoy books that are vibe-heavy, introspective, navel-gazey, and full of ghoulish descriptions, highly recommend. It just wasn’t for me.

Thank you to NetGalley, Avon and Harper Voyager for the ARC!

[Christina · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ll never be able to hear God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman the same way again.

The Halls of the Dead puts the “romance” in necromancy. It’s a revenge story with incredible catharsis, a poly love story horrormance, a dark fantasy, and one of the best books I read in 2025. The prose is lyrical, gorgeous, absolutely aches with yearning, and the imagery is delightfully gruesome. Hallow clearly has great affection for and knowledge of classic gothic themes and motifs.

The bulk of the plot takes place in the Haley house over roughly six days with flashbacks to the trio’s past in three rotating POVs. In this version of early Victorian London, magic exists and is commonplace, though necromancy is forbidden. I enjoyed the magic system (the foreshadowing, payoff, and attention to detail with the necromancy lore and spellwork was fantastic) and felt like the worldbuilding was sketched out enough for a book with such a tight focus.
(I especially liked the way Hallow nods to faith and the afterlife through St. John’s backstory and the monks at St. Lazarus’s Abbey.) The thematic use of flashbacks to fill us in on the plot events prior to the opening chapter’s resurrection means it can feel a bit slow in the beginning if you’re not someone who enjoys a character-driven narrative, and I did have a bit of trouble keeping track of details and the timeline at times. But after a bit of a lull in the middle, things really heat up, and the gory payoff to the revenge plot does not disappoint.

I enjoyed all three POVs, but I especially loved Irene. I love that this woman failed to resurrect her sister, and rather than take the hint that maybe sometimes people die and we have to move on and let go, she said “no I can do it, for real this time though” and tries again with Agnes. I really appreciated the exploration of the way that depression and disability impact Irene’s life and the lives of her loved ones. And I loved the portrayal of the agony of grief and how it overwhelms and changes us, and can make us into someone we don’t recognize. The scenes between Irene and her sister Willa in the Halls were some of the most affecting for me, but I also loved St. John’s chapters reflecting on his abbot and the necromancers he lost over the years. And speaking of, special shout out to St. John, or as I like to think of him, if Oogie Boogie were a proper Victorian gentleman. His utter devotion to both Irene and Agnes in his narration is delightful.

I think your own relationship with death and loss may play into how hard this book hits for you. I’ve been dealing with prolonged grief from the death of my best friend, so this hit like a truck. Hallow’s observations on grief are poignant and devastating; early on, St. John remarks that he wishes he could make Irene a book after she dies and carry her with him forever, and I found myself in tears. This happened often throughout the book, and consequently I had to take my time with it because it weighed heavily on me. So many sentences stopped me in my tracks. It’s one of the best grief narratives I’ve read, and I’m so thankful I got to read it. 4.5 stars rounded up.

Would I re-read this: Yes

Who should read this:
fans of unlikable/flawed women
queer/poly romance enjoyers
anyone looking for genrebending unique books

If you’re a very visual reader and you like a vibey gothic, I think this will be right up your alley. If you can’t generate your own visuals (and therefore don’t care for beautiful, descriptive language) or you’re a very plot driven reader, you’ll likely bounce off this book. Additionally, while this book is deeply romantic, I think readers picking this up as a romance expecting a typical romance structure/beats might be disappointed.

For fans of: Caitlin Starling, Johanna van Veen, S. T. Gibson, Alix E. Harrow, Maggie Stiefvater

Thank you to S. M. Hallow, Avon/Harper Voyager, and Netgalley for the eARC.

[Daria · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.75 ⭐️

Thank you to the publisher, Harper Voyager, the author S.M. Hallow, and Book Huddle for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this glorious gothic gathering of the macabre.

If someone had told me that one of my favourite novels of the year would include gleeful and enthusiastic cannibalism, a man whose insides were composed of creepy crawlies, and more galleons of blood than I care to estimate, I would have been at least A LITTLE surprised. Not, like, shocked, since I am still a weirdo gothy kid at heart, but slightly taken aback. It is hard not to become wrapped up in this story, however. The writing is beautiful and haunting, with sentences and sentiments that repeat throughout, a steady beat to follow and be enchanted by. The worldbuilding is probably some of the best I have encountered in some time. While I can see how this can be a stand-alone, it feels like there is so much more to discover within the realm of necromancy.

Additional details I adored include the chronic pain representation, how dead spirits show multiple faces, one for each year of life, and the glimpses into the lives of other necromancers from times gone by. I really enjoyed reading the multiple POVs – something I know is not everyone’s cup of tea but personally I relish. It’s also undeniable that, besides the gothic, horror, and historical elements, this is an inherently queer book. Queer as in not-heterosexual, queer as in polyamorous, and queer as in subverting typical, heteronormative romance and gender roles. While the world-building and the magic are central to the story, at its core it is also very much a love story between three characters. We really don’t get enough throuples in literature.

My one drawback is that the pacing of the story was somewhat uneven. We got such wonderful, in-depth backstories for all three characters, as well as some of the side-necromancers, but the latter third of the book seemed to walk with a bit of a limping gait. Not slow, per se, but somewhat at odds with the first 2/3 of the novel.

Overall, a beautiful and horrifying (in the best way) debut novel. I am both satiated and starved for more.

[Magdalena (magdal21) · Rating 2 out of 5]

In theory, this book sounded exactly like the kind of thing I’d love. Victorian, gothic settings, morally questionable necromantic magic, the dead refusing to stay dead, and complicated queer relationships are all elements that usually work for me. Unfortunately, while all the ingredients were there, the story never quite came together in a way that fully engaged me.

The story follows three main characters: Irene, a necromancer, St. John, who is undead, and Agnes, a woman who has just been hanged and is being brought back to life. Their relationship forms a kind of polyamorous triangle. John and Irene are married, but their relationship is presented as largely platonic, while Irene and Agnes are clearly in love. This dynamic is further explored throughout the narrative, and because of that, I wouldn’t really call this book simply a sapphic story as some readers suggest.

One of my biggest issues with the book is how unevenly the characters were developed. Irene ends up being by far the strongest and most fleshed out of the three. The story relies on flashbacks, which isn’t inherently a bad thing, but the way they’re used creates an imbalance. We learn most of what we know about St. John through his past, while Agnes spends most of the book in the present with very little background. Irene is the only character who feels fully realized. Reading this book often felt like being dropped into the middle of an ongoing story, almost as if I’d accidentally started with the second book in a series.

The heavy use of flashbacks also hurts the pacing. The first half of the novel is packed with them, which means very little actually happens in the present timeline. As a result, it takes a long time before the story’s direction becomes clear. Agnes’s resurrection, something that’s revealed in the synopsis, occupies roughly the first third of the book, which means the story is slow to find its footing. The stakes don’t properly emerge until around the halfway mark, and things only started to become genuinely interesting for me in the final third. Even then, I wasn’t entirely sure what the characters were working toward or what their larger goal was supposed to be. Without a clear sense of direction, it was difficult to become fully invested in their journey, despite some intriguing developments later on.

That said, the worldbuilding and necromancy lore were interesting. I just didn’t find them compelling enough to carry the story when I was struggling to understand where it was all headed. The writing itself was accessible and easy to read, and honestly that’s what saved the book for me. Without that, I’m not sure I would’ve felt motivated to finish it.

Overall, I think the idea behind this book is great, but the execution didn’t fully live up to its potential. Still, readers who enjoy a bit of ambiguity and don’t mind feeling slightly lost at times may get a lot more out of it. The strong gothic atmosphere is definitely one of the book’s biggest strengths.

Thank you NetGalley and Harper Voyager for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thanks to NetGalley for the e-Arc!

I am astounded, utterly flabbergasted, that there's no The Locked Tomb comps in this book's marketing. It's just as unhinged and undead, if not quite as clever and well-plotted. The story of The Halls of the Dead is about resurrection (emotional, physical, spiritual), and glorious retribution. I wish I had a wife who could swallow evil politicians whole. The reports of poor pacing are not exaggerated, but I was having such a good time with the characters that it didn't slow me down or mar my enjoyment of the book. This novel made me think hard about religion, about the where the line is between a miracle and a sin, and the ethics of raising the dead. The imagery is gorgeous (if you don't mind bugs or viscera), and while Irene is obviously the main character, Agnes and St. John complement her story perfectly. Overall, a meandering, weird novel that puts the romance in necromancer.

[Casey Bee · Rating 4 out of 5]

All you have to do is say necromancy, and I am sold. Set in a gothic Victorian London where dark magic and necromancy are forbidden, this book follows Irene as she attempts the impossible after the execution of the woman she loves. What follows is part horror, part romance, and part meditation on what happens when love refuses to let go. It's also told in a pretty campy tone, for lack of a better word, and I was not expecting that but did enjoy it! Described as sapphic, I wouldn't necessarily agree with that, as it's really a polyamorous relationship with Irene, her husband St. John and Agnes, the woman she is looking to bring back from death. Hallow doesn't shy away from the grotesque. There is body horror, blood, rot, and some genuinely disturbing imagery, but it never feels shocking just for the sake of it. The horror serves the story's larger questions about mortality, identity, and whether bringing someone back is truly an act of love or something more selfish. It is definitely a character-driven story where love is both salvation and ruin. 

Thank you to Harper Voyager for the e-ARC! Book releases 8/18/26.

[Holi Maples · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a gothic horror romance set in Victorian time. TW: bugs LOTS OF BUGS. This was a very bloody story about necromancers, and contained different POVs as well as flashbacks. The flashbacks really messed with the pacing for me, and I had a hard time really getting into the flow of the story. The love between Irene, Agnes and St John was really well written (minus the freaking bugs!) but it took me a while to warm up to the story in general. Thanks to NetGalley for the eARC.

[Katie (Katieeatsbooks)]

08/10/2026-08/12/2026

Thank you so much Harper Voyager for the gifted proof widget of “The Halls of the Dead” by S.M. Hallow 🦋

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
(Coming August 18th, 2026)

That was a debut?!?! Holy shit.

I cannot begin to tell you how gorgeously written this one is! 🗡️

Occasionally I love a good read that makes me squeamish, nauseous and lightheaded. Especially when it also leaves me at the edge of my seat, gasping and eager for more. ☠️

This one in all its “gore”y was eerily good and disgustingly bingeable! 🪦

[m&gs · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5

this book had a lot of potential but ultimately the pacing of both the plot and overall book really hindered it. it starts off really strong with a resurrection and established relationships but instead of rewinding back to what led to the death and resurrection, we continue forward with the plot while also being given a lot of flashbacks. i’m really not a fan of being stuck in a sort of suspense mode in general but this dragged on for so long. it isn’t until about halfway in that the majority of the flashbacks end. and it makes perfect sense why the flashbacks are there because all three characters have really important backstories and it really influences how they react but because it’s both flashbacks and the current tense, it’s just really difficult to follow through.

and unfortunately, the focus of all the characters’ stories just isn’t evenly matched. st. john and irene both have strong backstories— but st. john’s is really lacking in the present tense, whereas irene’s is clearly the strongest and really the character the story revolves around the most. agnes on the other hand, has the weakest story despite being the one resurrected and has to deal with the repercussions of that. and on top of that, we also have the plot that leads up to the death and resurrection itself.

this really should’ve been a duology, book1 focusing on the past and book2 on the present. but i will say i did love the witchcraft, necromancy, and bloodlust parts. the world building was very intriguing, i just wish i cared about the characters.

[Nenia Campbell]

Literally counting down the days until this comes out because it's ticking all the boxes for me

[Kayda Noelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5⭐️
Well written with a very interesting plot. I’m a big fan of gothic horror. Love a Victorian times moment. Especially loved the sapphic addition. It’s been a while since I’ve read about necromancy, and I found this twist to be really cool…the whole “bring this person I love back from the dead, but they aren’t the same” vibe. It had some pretty gory moments! If you like body horror…this would be for you.

Big thanks to William Morrow and the Tastemaker program for the early copy!

[Erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pros:
- Queer
- Romantic vibes
- Necromancy
- Poly romance with an undead husband
- Multiple POVs
- No loose ends at the end of the book
Cons:
- Pacing (slow but the story also takes place through the duration of a single week?)
- Writing is somewhat cryptic at times, it felt like a lot of information was missing getting into the story
- Gore & bug/body horror (could be a pro for some!)

If you’re a fan of gothic romantic fiction, this book would be a good match.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for providing me with an ARC!

[Josephine Coleman · Rating 5 out of 5]

(4.5)

The perfect queer gothic horror. I won the ARC for this at my local bookstores book bingo and I couldn’t have made a better choice. St. John, Irene and Agnes’ relationship was mesmerizing and the way the story flowed was fantastic.

[mo • lesmotsdemo · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 rounded up for Goodreads and Netgalley.
It was a solid read, overall. Its strength, for me, was in its well-crafted dark and gloomy atmosphere. The author truly built something grim and eerie. The plot was interesting but a little bit weak at times, its pace was steady. The horror elements were assuredly there but I feel like they could have been even more detailed. There was some work on the characters for sure, but I didn’t connect with any of them. In fact, the two female characters were more developed than the male character, and I feel like he was sometimes useless. I would have preferred a story with Irene and Agnes only, there was potential for a stronger story with these two. Also, when I read the synopsis I thought the romance was going to be sapphic and I was unfortunately wrong. It was a polyamorous relationship between the three characters, and I didn’t like it very much. There was a little bit of disappointment there but it was wholly my fault so it doesn’t have an impact on my overall enjoyment.
It was a nicely written and atmospheric gothic romantasy with touches of horror sprinkled in there, and I definitely recommend it.

Thank you to Netgalley for an e-ARC in exchange for a honest review.

[Sierra Hess · Rating 4 out of 5]

woah look an actual review. thanks netgalley

Deeply Gothic and romantic, gruesome and bloodsoaked. The mix of necromancy and religion was so captivating and I was obsessed with how Hallow never shied away from the brutality and gore associated with the dead. Corpses decay and rot, bugs and maggots crawl over everything. What does a bucket of blood smell like. What does a body taste like. What an honor it is to die, but also, what an honor it is to continue on and share everything you are for eternity. The prose was stunning and vivid, each character POV was unique and individual, I understood perfectly their desires and fears. My favorite was Irene, who through sheer force of will and strength carried this story even at her weakest points. I adored the way Hallow approached magic and spellwork, particularly the way Agnes and Irene were forced to come up with new spells on the spot.

I will say though, I wish this was a duology, even if I would have been so frustrated waiting for the sequel. There are elements to the world that felt a little unexplained - it's common to have magical households items and there are magical judges, yet magic is also frowned upon? How did St. John's transmutations work, if he could turn blood to water and bone to silver, could he not try something to protect the books? The events of the book happened so quickly (and at times, rather slow) that I feel maybe it would have been interesting to follow Irene, Agnes, and St. John just a little longer. I loved them, their tender dynamics and just how willing all three of them are willing to go for each other.

[Nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

** Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for an early copy in exchange for an honest review. **

Be sure to check the trigger warnings book before reading! This book does not shy away from the darker aspects.

The halls of the dead is a vibes book. It follows three characters in England in the 1800s. It is full of deep descriptions, dark actions, and necromancy.

It does not shy away from including the uglier aspects of necromancy(smells, dirt, bugs, etc.) which I’m quite appreciative of. It speaks as an ode to it without glamorizing the process like I’ve seen previously.

The characters are the shining piece of the story. From Agnes trading one “prison” for another, to St. John’s devastating journey, to Irene’s determination they were an immense joy to follow.

But this is a slow book, and I really struggled with it in the beginning. So much time is spent on the descriptions, that the plot does not start to get moving until at least a third of the way into the book. Once it started to get going plot wise, I enjoyed it a lot more.

With that being said, there were times in the beginning of the book I felt like I was just dropped into this story with no explanations, to the point I thought this might be a sequel. I had to let it go in order to get further.

Overall I’m glad I read it, and think this brings a new perspective to necromancy.

[Fauwxx · Rating 5 out of 5]

This novel is a spectacular breakthrough in the tropes of gothic horror and horrormance! Marketed as a queer, gothic horror romance- this novel reads like a (high?) dark fantasy filled with beautiful prose and (historical) world building that pulls you in and won't let you go. This felt like reading an actual account of the history of necromancers. The author also weaves in subtle nods to Christianity/Christ (resurrection) in regards to the morality of raising the dead and those details gave the story extra depth that pulls you even deeper into this mystical and gothic world. The characters were phenomenal- I couldn't help falling in love with all of them. The romance in this novel is more of a polyamorous nature- and you will run into a few spicey scenes as well. If you like gothic horror like The Death of Jane Lawrence (5 star read for me) then you will absolutely love Halls of the Dead.

**Thank you to Avon and Harper Voyager | Harper Voyager, S.M. Hallow and NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of The Halls of the Dead in exchange for my honest review. Expected Pub Date: Aug 18 2026.**

[Madalyn S. · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Halls of the Dead is an interesting book and not my typical read, but it intrigued me. My main issues are the pacing and the writing style. For about 40-50% of the book, I had no idea where we were headed or what the plot was actually going to be. Everything was described within an inch of its life (including the gore) but I still didn’t understand what we were actually doing or where these characters were trying to go. I think for folks who like a dark, gothic romance book and don’t mind some gore, this is a solid read. Just not my cup of tea.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the free advanced copy.

[Amber · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5⭐️
The beginning was a struggle. The writing felt odd and disorienting, almost like I’d accidentally started with a sequel. About halfway through, though, it improved significantly and really found its way. The gore and body horror was great, and I especially loved the relationship between the three characters and how it evolved over time. I’ll always love a throuple. I would’ve rated this higher if the opening hadn’t been so rough, but overall it was a fun, haunting read.

Thank you NetGalley and Avon and Harper Voyager for the eARC.

[Abbi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Original, mesmerizing, and magical! Fed my soul (😉) with every page!

Thank you Netgalley and S.M. Hallow for allowing me to read this ARC

[aud · Rating 4 out of 5]

the halls of the dead said we are soulmates please text me back (arc read - my in-depth review is available on netgalley!)

[Demetri Papadimitropoulos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even the Library Comes Home Without Shelves
In S. M. Hallow’s “The Halls of the Dead,” resurrection becomes less a victory over death than a lesson in how bodies, books, and loves survive by changing form.
By Demetris Papadimitropoulos | August 10th, 2026


“The Wound Becomes Room” – In the ochres, bone tones, muted greens, and plum shadows of “The Halls of the Dead,” Irene stands before a doorway that gradually seems to pass through her, turning the wound left by what cannot be restored into the very space where books, voices, and another kind of future can be kept.

Death is the first verdict Irene Shallcross Haley refuses. In S. M. Hallow’s “The Halls of the Dead,” that refusal begins with a knife through the palm over an unmarked grave and ends somewhere less triumphant, and more interesting: with the recognition that what has been lost cannot always be restored, only carried forward in another form. Hallow opens with resurrection as an act of defiance and spends the rest of the novel revising the word. The miracle is not getting the old life back.

Everything about Irene has been trained toward undoing. London, December 1849: her lover, Agnes Driscoll, has been hanged for witchcraft; her husband, St. John Haley, is an undead guardian who has spent centuries trying to rebuild the Crypt, a necromantic library whose books contain both knowledge and human souls. Irene herself has survived Sir Silas Underhill, the magistrate who secretly ate part of her soul and then helped turn the resulting collapse into evidence of madness. With St. John and a sentient grimoire bound in human skin, Irene digs Agnes out of the earth and attempts a True Resurrection. It works. The corpse breathes. The harder question is what, exactly, has returned.


“The Corpse Breathes” – At Agnes’s opened grave, the disturbed earth slowly assumes the shape of an enormous book beneath her body, turning Irene’s impossible success into the first warning that bringing someone back and restoring what was lost will not prove to be the same thing.

Miracles in this book keep arriving with invoices. Agnes comes back with memory, desire, and love intact, but also with an appetite for raw flesh and the malignant attachment of her dead brother Owen, whose control over her has outlived him. Irene diagnoses a botched resurrection. She is right, but only locally. Owen is not the whole cause of the hunger; the Halls of the Dead have conscripted Agnes into another kind of work, one aimed at people who have cheated death. St. John, who has survived for centuries by magic, suddenly belongs to the problem. Irene’s missing soul-fragment, once only proof of Underhill’s assault, opens onto dead people who cannot pass through the Halls at all. The book keeps changing the charge after Irene has already paid it.

Even the romance develops through these reversals. Irene and St. John’s marriage began as a platonic arrangement organized around a shared obsession: recovering the Crypt. Agnes enters the household first as Irene’s lover and then, almost despite everyone’s excellent manners, as the missing third point of a bond already taking shape. Irene resurrects Agnes; Agnes had once coaxed Irene back toward wanting a future; St. John has spent years feeding, bathing, healing, and carrying Irene when she could not carry herself; later Agnes and Irene must save St. John together. The eventual triad is persuasive because care circulates before desire is allowed to speak plainly. By the time the three understand what they are to one another, their bodies have been keeping the secret for them.

The magic is most persuasive when a rule of necromancy changes the terms of a relationship. Human bodies become books; books hold voices; blood unlocks knowledge; burned libraries become mass graves. The distinction that matters is consent. The Crypt’s necromancers chose to have their knowledge and souls preserved in human-skin volumes; Underhill takes Irene’s soul for himself; Owen keeps treating Agnes as property after his own death. Irene’s resurrection of Agnes sits uneasily between those poles, since love can summon someone back without acquiring the right to decide what she must be once she arrives. Hallow’s occult machinery is sharpest when it makes that uneasiness physical.

Resurrection keeps being revised. Agnes returns hungry. St. John survives as a body of stone, grave soil, insects, flesh, and magic, and later loses an eye that does not grow back. Irene never recovers the piece Underhill consumed. The original Crypt does not rise again shelf by shelf; burned grimoires persist only after shedding their bindings. Here “The Halls of the Dead” brushes productively against Julia Armfield’s “Our Wives Under the Sea,” another novel about loving someone who returns altered, though Armfield stays with estrangement where Hallow insists on remaking. Hallow’s sharper claim is that intactness need not be the admission price for a future.

Irene may prefer her sorcery solemn, but the Haley household refuses to behave like a mausoleum. Its rooms contain argumentative corpse-books, marital squabbles over blood loss, Christmas decorations hung beside the aftermath of dismemberment, and an immortal gentleman whose waistcoat conceals rather more beetles than etiquette generally anticipates. St. John’s dry patience is especially useful against Irene’s conviction that most inconveniences can be improved by sacrifice. Hallow lets the grotesque and the domestic share a chair without tapping the reader on the shoulder to make sure the joke registered.

Prose is where Hallow’s appetite occasionally outruns her control. Her sentences gather pressure by accumulation: tactile detail thickens into metaphor, metaphor edges toward prayer, then the rhythm snaps into a vow, command, or fragment. Irene’s narration is the most incantatory. She thinks in absolutes and self-issued liturgy. Agnes is brighter, St. John drier, though all three remain recognizably inside Hallow’s heightened Gothic register. Anatomical diction rubs against scripture, legal language against household detail, romance against rot. Bones, tendons, soot, blood, marriage, teeth, and gaslight inhabit the same weather.

Anatomy gives those ideas somewhere to land. Trauma is not merely remembered; Irene’s soul has a missing piece. St. John’s immortality is not a philosophical proposition; when it fails, he spills grave dirt and insects. Agnes’s hunger does not stand politely for desire; she eats. A mouth can kiss, consume, speak, confess, or steal a soul. A book can be ancestor, corpse, weapon, refuge, or body. Hallow has a useful instinct for making the metaphor happen to somebody’s flesh, and the novel is often most alive before anyone pauses to explain what the flesh means.

Problems begin when Hallow glosses images that already speak fluently. She will stage a potent metaphor, let a character suffer its consequence, and then often supply the interpretation as well. In a story built from spells, vows, grief, and obsession, repetition can become rhythm; here it sometimes becomes marginalia attached to its own best effects. The emotional volume also stays high for long stretches. When nearly every room contains revelation, devotion, terror, or sacrifice, a climax can arrive to find the furniture already standing on tiptoe. Hallow lacks neither voice nor nerve. Restraint is scarcer.

Architecture, by contrast, gives the material more air. A Prelude, five numbered parts, forty-five chapters, five interludes, and a Postlude distribute the story among Irene, Agnes, and St. John, with Irene holding the center but not the only key to it. St. John names love as service. Irene experiences devotion as dependable duty until its possible disappearance becomes intolerable. Agnes, less invested in denial, recognizes the household first. The reader understands the relationship before the spouses do. The interludes pull present danger backward into memory, while faux laws, newspaper fragments, and quotations from destroyed books let persecution enter before anyone pauses to lecture about it. The final numbered chapter shifts to “The Dead.” For a moment, the people who have spent the novel as evidence, inheritance, or cargo become the ones telling the story.

Delay comes less from withheld answers than from answers that fail to stay final. Agnes is resurrected, then hungers. Owen seems to explain the hunger, then proves insufficient. Irene enters the Halls looking for one solution and finds soul-eaten dead barred from its gates. Saving St. John reveals that Agnes’s mandate may threaten anyone who has escaped death. Underhill’s regenerating body supplies the blood needed to admit the stranded dead, only for that success to uncover the souls of burned necromantic books. Hallow does not need repeated failure to keep the plot moving. She lets success expose the next debt.


“Those the Gates Would Not Take” – In the cold green and bone architecture of the Halls, barred passageways begin to resemble closed books while human figures appear only in the spaces between them, making absence itself describe the dead whom even death has refused to admit.

Irene’s most important victory is the one that stops resembling recovery. She has spent years trying to rebuild the Crypt as a place; when the destroyed book-souls finally appear, she lets them enter the wound in her own soul. Instead of rebuilding the library, she becomes its next form. The gap Underhill made does not close; it becomes room. That turn is the novel’s cleanest answer to its own premise. Loss remains loss. What changes is the use to which absence can be put.

More quietly, care undergoes the same correction. At first everyone risks becoming somebody else’s sacred project. St. John has organized his existence around serving necromancers. Irene treats pain as proof of seriousness and rescue as work she ought to perform alone. Agnes has learned from Owen that accommodation is a condition of safety. The plot turns those habits inside out. Agnes and Irene renew St. John when silver begins to unmake him; later Agnes holds Irene’s soul while St. John devises the transmutation that lets Irene and thousands of dead voices coexist. Nobody remains merely rescuer or rescued. The triad earns its tenderness because all three learn to receive what they once knew only how to give.


“What She Keeps of Herself” – Agnes stands quietly inside her own outline as the shadow behind her wavers between Owen, flower, and empty wall, with the suite’s richest plum pressure marking not victory so much as the difficult moment when another person’s claim on her body finally begins to lose its shape.

In Hallow’s hands, containers do more than furnish the Gothic scenery. Bodies hold souls; books hold bodies; houses shelter illicit families; institutions decide which histories may continue; Irene finally holds a library inside the wound made by an enemy. Again and again, the question is who may keep whom, and by whose permission. That is why Owen’s control of Agnes and Underhill’s theft from Irene belong to the same moral world as the grimoires. The villains do not merely injure people. They presume the right to determine what another person may retain of herself.


“The Saint Comes Apart” – As Irene and Agnes try to hold St. John together, grave soil and insects escape the elegant body he has worn for centuries and gather, at a distance, into the suggestion of a moth wing or flower – decomposition briefly becoming another image of care.

The distinction begins to blur around Underhill. He combines institutional respectability with private predation so thoroughly that by the climax almost any punishment can feel deserved. The protagonists mutilate his endlessly regenerating body, consume him, assemble a soulless duplicate, compel a confession, and send the puppet to explode over polite magical society. The spectacle is satisfyingly indecorous. It is also convenient. Earlier, willingness distinguishes the Crypt’s preservation from Underhill’s predation; here, vengeance lets the heroes practice spectacular coercion without forcing the book to look very hard at the resemblance. When does punishment become another form of possession? Hallow raises the question more sharply than she answers it.

Revenge is not where the ending earns its force. Irene never retrieves the portion of her soul Underhill ate. She is not healed into a prior version of herself. Thousands of book-souls instead enter the wound, and Agnes and St. John help her survive their presence without surrendering her own identity. This is reconstitution rather than cure. Damage remains part of her shape, but it loses the right to dictate what that shape can hold.

Once Irene becomes the Crypt, the library’s social meaning is impossible to miss. It stores practices, language, memory, personality, and a persecuted community’s accumulated skill; to burn it is to kill the practitioners and then attack their ability to speak forward. Hallow does not need to staple a contemporary headline to that idea. The novel already understands that destroying a library is one way of deciding which dead are permitted descendants. Its answer is transmission: what survives may have to alter the person who carries it next.

Placed beside Caitlin Starling’s “The Death of Jane Lawrence,” Hallow’s occult domesticity feels warmer and more socially expansive; beside S. T. Gibson’s “A Dowry of Blood,” its interest in queer Gothic possession resolves into a more reciprocal form of attachment. The more distinctive refusal, though, is Hallow’s unwillingness to make monstrosity a stage the characters must outgrow before they deserve love. Agnes remains hungry. St. John remains an impossible corpse. Irene becomes stranger. The ending does not normalize them.

Overstatement remains the tax on that confidence. The Postlude contains the novel’s cleanest recognition – what Underhill took is gone – and then keeps explaining the transformation after the image has landed. Hallow’s symbols are often more trusting than her exposition. A little more silence would let the final pages keep some of their dead with them.

Under all that blood, lore, and occasional over-insistence, “The Halls of the Dead” earns 82/100, corresponding to 4/5 stars: a strong, imaginative, notably uneven novel whose emotional architecture, motif design, and ending outweigh persistent over-explication, some retrospective drag, and a villain who makes the final moral reckoning tidier than it should be. Its best ideas are not pinned onto the story afterward. They are already in the knife, the book, the missing eye, the bitten flesh, the burned shelves, and the wound.

Long after the exploding magistrate, the corpse-books, and the graveyard ritual have done their entertaining work, what remains is the quieter reversal. Agnes does not return as the woman before the gallows. St. John is not restored to ordinary life. Irene never gets her missing piece back. Even the library comes home without shelves. Hallow’s miracle is smaller than defeating death and larger than undoing it: three altered people make room for one another, and a wound meant to prove that something was gone becomes the place where the lost are kept.


“What Leaves London” – Three altered figures move away from London while their separate shadows quietly join into the shape of an open book, answering the grave that began the series with a future neither restored nor finished, but finally shared.


Compositional Thumbnail Sheet


Figure–Ground / Optical-Illusion Construction Study


Cover-Palette Proportion Swatch Sheet


Cover-Color Translation / Proportional Wash Map


Character Anatomical Study: Irene

[image error]
Faint Pencil Underdrawing


Pencil + First Wash Stage


Watercolor Outer Border Details Study


Alternative Full Dust Jacket With Flaps


Six-Image Optical-Illusion Contact Strip


“S. M. Hallow Author Portrait” - S. M. Hallow, imagined through the visual language of “The Halls of the Dead”: moths obscure the eyes while book, threshold, chrysanthemum, skeletal, and gate motifs turn the author portrait into a playful extension of the novel’s Gothic world.

All watercolor illustrations by Demetris Papadimitropoulos.
Watercolors are done on 140lb vellum and then scanned into the computer using an Epson scanner. From there, they are finalized in Procreate. All art and opinions are my own.

[Caroline · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.25/5. Releases 8/18/26.

Heat Index: 6.5/10

The Review:

Now this… is a gothic romance. Which still feels, in many ways, like a genre romance.

Do I think Genre Romance readers would be happy with where The Halls of the Dead ends? Yes. I mean, I am. This isn't an Innamorata situation in which the book is so far off from romance—while still including a prominent love story, this isn't an Innamorata drag but a comparison—that readers would be upset by where the love story goes in its basic structure.

But if you're rolling into this book thinking you're gonna get a romantasy—and I don't know why you would, but people hear "magic" and go "IS THIS ACOTAR?" these days, I guess—you may be perturbed. I'm seeing the horromance marketing. While I was initially open to the idea of horror romance, I'm currently on the "I don't think that exists" train. And I still think some people who would put that on, say, a Brynne Weaver book (again, not derogatory, just an example) will be thrown off by how horror-driven this book can be.

Yet for all the horror… The love story is big. The gothic is big. So. Gothic romance, which fits both the classical vibes of what that means, and the way the gothic is currently getting slotted into genre romance. This is more challenging than it looks, and I'm VERY excited by books and series that get it right. (Off the top of my head, books that are plotwise quite different from this one but similarly make it work: Sierra Simone's Thornchapel series and S.T. Gibson's An Education in Malice.)

From the jump, we're hit by the intensity of the horror and the intensity of the love. Irene's beloved—her bride, as she refers to her, while being in a legal marriage of convenience and friendship with the immortal and beloved St. John—Agnes has been hanged, and Irene and St. John are on a mission to resurrect her before it's too late. You get the dirt and the bugs, and the harrowing nature of resurrection versus reanimation. And uh… it only gets grosser from there. Complimentary! Huzzah!

The way you can tell this is gothic romance done right is that I've seen several reviews criticizing the fact that characters get horny freshly after resurrection, or after some Really Intensely Gross Activities Of The Devouring Nature. Sex and blood go hand in hand. Flesh means multiple things. There Are Bugs. There is an intensel homoerotic description of delving into the body in a corpse way, but maybe also a sexy way?

THIS. IS. GOTHIC! While this book doesn't have a ton of sex on the page—in fact, in a rather clever choice, Hallow leaves even the established pre-book dynamic of Agnes and Irene physically unconsummated at first, letting the tension amp up as carnality becomes more attainable for them post-death—the eroticism and tension is all over the place. And in the same sense, magic and the deathly arts can stand in for violation. While Hallow skirts around assault in the conventional sense, the idea of the soul being violated is directly paralleled with the body being violated. Everything is one and the same, inextricably linked, and a soul injury impacts the body.

With all that soul stuff happening, there is also… eroticized religion! And a decent amount of interaction with Christianity in general, despite the book being set in a kind of alternate Victorian era in which necromancy is like, a known thing. I am for all of this, to be clear. The concept of Irene being married to a literal saint who was maybe a fanatic and maybe in love with his abbott to the point of dying for him? Hell yeah, absolutely. The fact that Jesus was a necromancer? Yes, let's do it. All of this coming together—physically and emotionally—with a triad. A… holy trinity, perhaps?

Speaking of—this is very much an FFM triad romance. Honestly, I found it pretty ballsy for Hallow to start off with the established romance between Irene and Agnes juxtaposed to the longterm platonic/legal arrangement between Irene and St. John (who's also buddies with Agnes, on a lesser scale). There's a lot to balance here. Hallow has to maintain and strengthen the relationship between Agnes and Irene, while making Irene recognize something between herself and St. John she's perhaps avoided confronting, and taking Agnes and St. John's relationship to a deeper level. It's all rather fascinating, and the characters have great chemistry. If any angle seems less developed, it's perhaps that between Agnes and St. John, but I still really liked what they had going.

And the thing is… The three of them do feel kind of inevitable and right. This novel is, presumably, a standalone—and I still wouldn't quite call it a conventional romance, so there are a lot of things besides the love story going on. Basically, you aren't necessarily going to get the degree of relationship development that you would in a trilogy following a triad (a la Sierra Simone), and the characters themselves have to do a lot of work. I found them all quite likable for all their depravity, and compelling. They're morally gray in a way that isn't the standard operation of borderline villainy (the villain of this book is—whew, quite horrifically and undeniably villainous). Rather, all three operate outside of a standard societal morality, because the standard societal morality doesn't serve them. Are they wrong? Not really. But they get their hands quite dirty on every level, and they don't feel bad about it.

Which I fully support, by the way.

They seem made for each other, like puzzle pieces that just fit. Though I have to say—the eternal yearning that is St. John really got me. The fact that he's basically just there to happily serve Irene (and later Agnes) while expecting nothing in return, only to be gobsmacked with the reality that they want him back? Boy, did it work for me. That is a man who LOVES women and their wrongs.

All of this—the world, the obstacles, the creepiness, the sorrow, the immense and long-spanning backstory—comes together in a narrative framed by three different POVs. Who knew? Giving every lead in a complex emotional story is HELPFUL and does a LOT OF WORK.

The Sex:

Like I mentioned earlier—there isn't a lot of sex in this one (though you get multiple explicit scenes), but it is deeply erotic. In a weird way. If you're thinking fucking on top of a dragon is Peak Weird, I'm talking weirder. Which is a good thing! It's properly gothic weird, but not as far as a less romantic, more horrific book would take it. Like, they're still in love. They still have soft feelings. They can just be a little odd about it sometimes.

And if you've read this: Yeah, I count That Flashback with St. John and his abbott. I really do.

The Conclusion:

Atmospheric, unsettling, emotionally fraught, satisfying—I very much enjoyed The Halls of the Dead, and I'll definitely read whatever else S.M. Hallow brings to the table. It's quite stirring, and the sort of thing I'd like to see more of in this developing gothic space. What a treat just ahead of fall!

Thanks to Harper Voyager and NetGalley for giving me a copy of this book.

[august · Rating 5 out of 5]

thank you to netgalley for the earc in exchange for the honest review.

as a “gideon the ninth” fan, i saw sapphic necromancy and religious imagery and simply stopped asking questions. “the halls of the dead” by s. m. hallow is a gothic horror romance that stabbed my heart repeatedly both a knife and my own ribcage.

i mean honestly if your checklist includes:
- sapphic necromancers
- poly relationships (f/f/m, and the women's relationship is the center)
- cannibalism that somehow reads like a tender embrace
- chussy and stussy (this will make sense later)
- bringing someone back from the dead wrong trope
- gore hearty enough to make a butcher blush
- making out, and then some, while absolutely covered in blood
- religious imagery and allegories that hit like a midnight sermon
- killing all of the men who have ever done you wrong

then buckle up. this book will make your heart its plaything. the only thing to not like is that if you expected that this is about lesbian necromancers and then this random ass man comes into their relationship.

this book follows irene, a grieving woman who makes the extremely reasonable decision to resurrect her dead lover, agnes, using necromancy that is very much not approved by god, society, or common sense. agnes comes back wrong—but not unlovable—and their reunion spirals into a blood-soaked tangle of devotion, hunger, guilt, and religious horror. enter st. john, an unsettlingly charming third presence whose connection to death, desire, and divinity complicates everything further. set in a world steeped in gothic faith and rot, the story becomes less about cheating death and more about what it costs to love someone so much you’re willing to damn yourself for it.

the prose? gorgeous. like someone stabbed a quill into my chest over and over to make my heart leap and bound with every chapter. the writing is lyrical and lush, but also doesn’t shy away from the grotesque. it’s so beautiful and grisly you’ll find yourself composing haikus about entrails without meaning to.

irene, agnes, and st. john are three of the loveliest, most compelling leads i’ve read since “gideon the ninth.” agnes is effortlessly charming — the kind of person you want to protect forever, even after she comes back with a terrifying hunger and the emotional range of a cathedral storm cloud. irene’s development is slow and steady in the best way; i literally wanted her to obliterate every man who ever wronged her (fictionally or otherwise). and st. john? dear lord. a delightful undead companion who i wanted to hold in my arms and whisper that everything would be okay. the poly dynamic here actually works and brings a beautiful depth no one expected.

the worldbuilding is excellent. nothing is dumped on you all at once—instead, tiny details stack up over time, and it’s incredibly satisfying to piece everything together, especially if you enjoy engaging with religious allegory. the way faith, guilt, devotion, and resurrection intertwine felt thoughtful and deliberate. i loved slowly realizing how much the book trusted the reader to connect the dots.

and the gore. oh, the gore. this book isn’t shy about showing you the bloody underbelly of its world, and it does it with flair. kissing while smeared in blood? yes. cannibalistic hunger mixed with tragic love? absolutely. resurrection gone terrifyingly sideways? chef’s kiss. it’s gruesome, yes, but always in service of the story and emotional stakes — not just shock for shock’s sake. i’ve never been happier to see people carved into strands.

overall, this was lush, brutal, tender, and deeply unsettling in the best way. a love story wrapped in blood and belief, with characters i cared about intensely and prose that refused to let me go. five stars, no notes—except maybe a warning that this book will crawl inside your ribcage and rearrange things.

[J. L. R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Halls of the Dead, the debut novel of S. M. Hallow, is a romantic horror fantasy about trauma, grief, historical preservation, and, as you might guess, death. It takes place in an alternative Victorian London, in a timeline where magic is real and highly regulated by the church and state. It’s a lush, Gothic novel with the angst and melodrama ratcheted to the top, with an interesting magic system, take on the afterlife, and compelling romance, though it loses some tension near the end. Like many of the books I’ve been reading and reviewing lately, it should easily be placed into the romantasy genre, though I don’t think it’s likely to be marketed alongside the Sarah J. Maas and Rebecca Yarros’s of the world.

I could see this book making the transition to stage play - albeit one with great special effects - since it takes place almost entirely within the confines of one London manor home, owned by an immortal illusionist filled with grave dirt and bugs named St. John, and his necromantic protege, savant, and wife Irene. The two have been in a lavender marriage of sorts, giving Irene the ability to practice her forbidden necromantic arts without having to subsume her will and goals to live as a conventional housewife. At the beginning of the novel, we discover that Irene’s lover (and St. John’s friend) Agnes has died, having been executed for her magical murder of her abusive and controlling brother. Irene, already traumatized by the events of a mysterious trial of her own, kneels before Agnes’ grave, stabs a knife through the center of her palm, and begins to cast a spell.

In this world, necromancy allows the magician to reanimate, manipulate, and prolong the “life” of a corpse, though “true resurrection” has not been achieved since Jesus resurrected Lazarus. Irene aims to be the next. And she succeeds, though Agnes is not entirely as she was before…

Everyone has their favorite fictional tropes and motifs, and one of mine is characters making terrible arcane sacrifices to resurrect a loved one. It’s the premise of many of my favorite stories, including the novel I’m revising at the moment. Most of these stories present this Faustian bargain as a mistake; death is inevitable and irreversible, they say, and the mature and healthy thing to do is learn to move on. True resurrection is impossible, or else comes with a cost too terrible to bear. The Halls of the Dead seems to follow in this mold at its beginning but eventually takes a refreshing turn away from the pat moralizing. St. John’s perpetual existence as a living record of the forgotten necromancers offers a counter to the necromancy-as-evil narrative. Yes, he’s something of an abomination, yes, he’s filled with writhing bugs, and yes, he has no internal organs, but he’s lived through centuries of trauma and stayed a good and selfless person. And Agnes’ terrifying new condition may not be all it seems.

While the love triangle between Irene, St. John, and Agnes takes up a lot of its page count, the most unique and interesting part to me was its approach to necromancy and the afterlife. I won’t go into details here, since the book’s gradual unspooling of this element is really fun, but I was particularly drawn to the history of the necromancers as one of constant death and rebirth. These are people whose love drives them to break the laws of man, church, and nature, who must hide their practices from prying eyes, who try to build up communities and records while fleeing from destruction every few generations. I can sense echoes of queer history and religious minorities here; people related not by blood but by practice, losing access to the knowledge of their predecessors but trying to reconstruct all they can.

I had a good time with this book, but I ultimately found the ending a little pat. It gave me what I wanted in my immediate, fan brain, but as a writer and lover of storytelling it felt like an easy way out, where I wanted more complexity. But ultimately, I think this is a great pick for fans of Gothic romance who can stomach a lot of descriptions of guts and rotting flesh and many, many, grave bugs.

Rounded up from 3 1/2 stars.

The Halls of the Dead is set to publish August 18, 2026.

Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts expressed are my own.

[Skyler · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thank you so very much to S. M. Hallow, Avon and Harper Voyager, and NetGalley for offering me this eARC in exchange for an honest review. This novel is described as a queer, gothic horror romance set in 19th century London, However, I do not believe that this is quite an accurate description.

The Halls of the Dead follow a trio necromancers--Irene, Saint John (her husband), and Agnes (her wife)--as they attempt the greatest form of necromancy: a True Resurrection. After Irene's lover is hanged for witchcraft, her and her remaining lover enter the Halls of the Dead to go to the end of the earth to bring back the one that they have lost. With a unique story told from three different POVs, S M Hallow is definitely ambitious in the story that they want to tell. A mix of love, death, and revenge is something that almost everyone can relate to.

To begin, I love the setting that Hallow has imagined for us. A gloomy Victorian tale is something that I knew I would love to read about. Horror and its oftentimes metaphorical themes always pique my interest, which is why I felt so drawn to read this story.

However, I have difficulty describing this story as a romance because I simply did not feel the romance of it all. In my opinion, the characters lacked chemistry. I will note that the story starts in media res, meaning that we as the reader are thrown into the story practically halfway through the plot. The plot itself happens at a very leisurely pace. I would say that it is a bit uneven, as things only really started to pique my interest when the plot ramps up around the 70% mark. The story takes its time to be told, though I appreciate the way that questions that I had in the present would then be answered via flashbacks later on.

I will note that I was a bit frustrated at the beginning as I felt thrown into this world. Hallow writes as if we know something that they do (I don't). This is where I felt a bit of a disconnect. Since we get to know the characters through their actions only, I didn't feel a deep connection with any of the characters in the novel. It was hard to root for anyone since things are left unexplained at times. The romance in particular felt very shallow. It seemed as if a polyamorous relationship was portrayed for the sake of being different rather than feeling like something that would occur naturally in the context of the story and its characters. I wish these relationships had more time to develop so it would feel less like insta-love.

In regards to the writing: While Hallow's writing was poetic and macabrely flowery in some places, I found that when it wasn't, the writing came off as incredibly clunky. It took me longer than usual to finish this novel, and I believe that this clunkiness may have contributed to that. Perhaps this writing style was not for me. I believe that the author attempted to emulate the verbiage of the time period in which the story takes place very well. However, this does not translate well to the ease in which the story is told (if that makes sense?).

The world building is very ambitious; so ambitious that I found myself confused at times. I wish there was more clarity in the history of necromancy and the mechanics of the many "Books" shown throughout the novel. Terms and histories are alluded to or briefly mentioned, but never really gone into in depth. I would have loved to learn a bit more about the world and its magic if it were a bit easier to understand.

Overall I really loved the ideas that Hallow has brought to life, I just wish that the execution was a bit better and more nuanced. For those looking for a spooky read to set the tone for spooky season, this may be perfect for you!

[Heather Pacella · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the Victorian London of The Halls of the Dead, many types of magic are accepted and revered - all except necromancy, which is punishable by death. And, in fact, that is exactly what has happened to Agnes Driscoll, hanged at the gallows for using witchcraft to murder of her brother. The book opens on both her love and close friend, both fellow devotees, attempting something that has long been considered impossible: a resurrection. But Irene Haley is a necromancer of the utmost skill, and her husband St. John is an ancient being with generations of knowledge.

Though they are successful in bringing Agnes back to life, there are unintended consequences. For this Agnes is not the Agnes of before - she now hungers for flesh, with a craving to bring to justice those that have harmed their kind. As Irene and St. John attempt to return things to how they were, they must avoid the increasing attentions of Sir Silas Underhill, the Chief Justice intent on ending them once and for all - before it’s too late.

*World-building/Plot: Though the book only took course over a few days within the confines of the Hasley’s house, the magic system itself was very rich and complex. I absolutely loved the idea of necromancers turning themselves into spell books and passing on their knowledge to the next generation, and the rituals throughout the story were very well-done/believable. The afterlife concept here (the titular Halls of the Dead) was also super interesting. The plot was high-stakes, with all three characters suffering deep prejudice and persecution because of their practices. Most of these experiences were exposed via flashbacks, which while effective were a bit unsatisfying - I think that a longer book going into more detail about their pasts (in a more linear timeline) would have done a great job of showing off the world created here. As-is, the place setting was claustrophobic enough that I was left wanting more.

*Character Development: There are three different POVs included in The Halls of the Dead: Irene’s, Agnes’, and St. John’s. This was definitely a case where rotating the POVs works very well - not only do we get to experience the deep love that all three feel for each other, we get a glimpse of their lives through their flashbacks, where we learn about their relationships with their families and experience their very personal journeys that lead to their love of necromancy. This book had a ton of emotional heart, with the particular standout for me being the relationship between Irene and her sister.

*Pacing/Writing Style: Overall, the pacing is rather slow, which, while not my favorite for fantasy books, really serves to highlight how beautiful S.M. Hallow’s writing is. What I would consider the first real piece of “action” didn’t occur until 75% into the book, and much of the story was told through flashbacks (with the outcome already having been revealed beforehand). Because of this, what is a high-stakes story feels somewhat routine - so much time was spent jumping back in time that any conflict in the current-day had to be resolved rather quickly (by the end of the chapter) to enable another flashback and/or POV jump. However, the gothic vibes were immaculate, so for readers who prefer setting/character-driven storylines, this probably wouldn’t be an issue.

For readers who aren’t put off by a bit of gore (or insects, or grave-digging…), The Halls of the Dead is a quick and atmospheric read perfect for a stormy night by the fireplace.

Thank you to NetGalley and Avon and Harper Voyager for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!