I received this book for free from the in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Bloom by Delilah S. Dawson Published by Titan Books on October 3 2023
Genres: Adult, Horror
Pages: 240
Format: ARC
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The nitty-gritty: Cottagecore turns bloody in this uneven slasher/romance.
I’ve been looking forward to another book by Delilah S. Dawson ever since I read and loved The Violence. Bloom seemed promising, with it’s beautiful but disturbing cover, but unfortunately this was just OK for me. Maybe the novella length had something to do with that, but I found it underwhelming and strangely jarring and over the top in places.
The story revolves around two characters. Rosemary “Ro” Dutton is a twenty-seven year old literature professor who is trying to bring some magic into her ho-hum life. She decides visiting the local farmer’s market is just the thing to raise her spirits, so one Saturday she heads out, looking forward to buying fresh fruit and flowers. When she comes upon a booth selling cupcakes, soaps and houseplants, Ro meets Ash, who tempts her with a cupcake sample. Ro is overcome by how delicious Ash’s bakery goods are, and she’s also oddly attracted to the petite young woman. “Oddly” because Ro has never been attracted to females before, but there’s something about Ash that draws her in.
Week after week, Ro returns to Ash’s booth at the market, and the two women grow closer and closer. Eventually Ash invites Ro to her house, where she lives alone and runs her business. But when Ro starts asking too many questions, Ash firmly tells her that she has boundaries, and that some parts of her life and house are off limits. Ro thinks this is a bit odd, and she agrees to Ash’s terms. But Ro’s curiosity gets the best of her, and you know what they say about curiosity…
I’ll start with the things I liked about Bloom. First, Dawson’s sumptuous descriptions of Ash’s food, especially her cupcakes and home made bread, were simply mouthwatering. Even better, I loved Ro’s reactions to eating her food, which bordered on sexual gratification. It definitely made me wonder what was in those cupcakes!
I also loved the creeping sense of dread as Ro starts to sense that all is not quite right with Ash. Dawson drops hints about what might be coming, and I had a few theories in mind before we eventually find out at the end. Ash is described as “fae-like,” and that brought to mind that eating food in the fairy realm is dangerous for humans. Because Ro is obsessed with Ash’s cupcakes, I wondered if there was some kind of enchantment going on (I was wrong!)
Despite these positives, though, I found most of the story to be kind of a slog. The first 80% deals with the odd and uncomfortable relationship between Ro and Ash: Ro goes to the farmer’s market, sees Ash, tastes some cupcakes, lots of flirting, then she goes home and thinks about Ash. Rinse and repeat. The story is told from Ro’s point of view, and she’s sort of a mess. She doesn’t really know what she wants, she’s alarmed that she has feelings for another woman, and despite several warnings from Ash, she continues to stalk her, going to her house uninvited, snooping around once she gets inside, Googling her name, etc. Ash doesn’t have any social media accounts and likes her privacy (you’ll understand why once you learn her secret), but Ro is determined to uncover the truth. Also, Ash seduces Ro, so she’s obviously sending mixed messages. I didn’t care for either of them, to be honest.
So up until about 80%, the story is pretty slow and tame, except for a few spicy scenes between the two women. But when Ro learns the horrifying truth about Ash, Bloom suddenly becomes a hard core slasher nightmare. The shift from happy, delicious cupcakes and bread goodness to bloody horror was extremely jarring, and while I would normally love this type of horror, as disturbing as it was, in this case it struck me as disgusting and Evestomach churning. The ending was over-the-top horrific and came across as almost silly, unfortunately.
Even though this didn’t quite work, it won’t stop me from reading Dawson’s other books.
Horror that’s disgusting and stomach churning probably isn’t going to end up on my TBR list I don’t think.
Hope you’re enjoying your current read a bit more 😀
Luckily the two books I’ve read since this one are great:-)
Well too bad it was of uneven quality. But by now you know that slasher stories are not my jam ❤️
I know, you should definitely stay away from this…
I am sorry that this one didn’t work out for you! I hope your next reading would be more satisfying!!
Thanks Susy!
I think I’ll get this one from the library. I had some issues with The Violence and this one sounds like it might give me some trouble too.
Laurie | Bark recently posted…Little Eve by Catriona Ward | Book Review
I’d love to hear someone else’s thoughts on this!
I have only read this authors middle grade horror but they have been really good. To bad this wasn’t as good as you would have like.
Stormi recently posted…Two Bloggers One Book ~ Scritch Scratch
It’s probably a blip, I loved her last book.
It looks as if those cupcakes ended up leaving you with a revolting aftertaste…. I’m sorry this proved to be such a disappointment!
Maddalena@spaceandsorcery recently posted…IN THE GARDEN OF SPITE (a.k.a. Triflers Need Not Apply) by Camilla Bruce
LOL I was salivating over the cupcakes at first…
Too bad this wasn’t a winner for you. I trust your judgement so I will skip this one if I would ever come across it. Also, when you don’t care for the characters much it’s hard to like a book in general but I get it. Thanks for sharing!
I’ve enjoyed books in the past when I don’t like the characters, but in those cases the story was really good. Unfortunately the story didn’t work either.
Funny enough, even though I have loved several of Dawson’s books in the past, this one just did not call to me. This is a thing that happens sometimes, and oddly enough, I usually end up feeling like I made the right choice (in this case, because a trusted reviewer- you- didn’t love it heh). Yeah idk how one makes the transition from “really tasty cupcakes” to “slasher horror” in 200 pages- and it sounds like not well. And if you didn’t like the characters either, yeah, seems kind of like a dealbreaker to have both characters AND the story not work. Sorry it wasn’t a huge win, but glad it at least had some redeeming points!
Shannon @ It Starts at Midnight recently posted…Reviews in a Minute: First Batch of October
That was part of the problem for me, that transition was so abrupt it threw me off, lol.
For some reason, the mention of the cupcakes reminds me of an asian horror film I watched that started as a short in a horror compilation and was later expanded to a full length film. It was called Dumplings, and there was something special about those dumplings, but also fairly gruesome. Otherwise, though, this sounds like a very different sort of horror story than the movies.
Yes, the cupcakes end up being very gruesome!
Oh wow, sorry this one seemed to go off the rails at the end but I’m glad it didn’t put you off this author’s books entirely.
Hmm, I still have this on my list but with so many books on my TBR this month, I probably won’t rush to it! I wish it had been better for you!
That’s a shame but at least you’re going to press on with the author.
Lynn 😀
Lynn Williams recently posted…Booking Ahead/Weekly Wrap Up
Sorry this one didn’t live up to what you’d hoped. It sounds like a good premise, and that cover is great like you mentioned. I do love when descriptions of food in books make me hungry. Great review!
Lisa Mandina (Lisa Loves Literature) recently posted…Dicussion Post: Dancing With Myself or How Many Bookish Friends Do You Have In Real Life or Outside of the Book Blogging World?