From Below

“If we die down here, our bodies may never be recovered.”

I really enjoy books that have a sense of claustrophobia – that trapped feeling. This book has that and then some! Deep in the Ocean’s depths, there is no one around to help you if something goes wrong. If you run out of oxygen, it you come up to fast, if you get stuck, if you can’t find your way out, then you are doomed!

The SS Arcadia vanished without a trace while on a routine voyage. An emergency message was sent, but the ship and its crew were never seen again. Well, that is until sixty years later when its wreckage is found. It appears the SS Arcadia went off course, and now lies on the Ocean’s floor.

Cove and her team of divers have been tasked with exploring Arcadia’s wreck. To document, film, and hopefully discovered why it wrecked. Easier said than done! On their first dive, things seemed strange, eerie, and pricked up the hairs on the back of their necks! Were they seeing things? Was it the cold deep depth playing tricks on them? Nothing can live this far down, where oxygen does not exist and yet, what was that out of the corner of their eyes?

“There’s writing on the wall.”

Claustrophobic and eerie, From Below, takes not only the divers but readers, deep below the Ocean, to a wreck, that has hidden its dark secret for sixty years. Like the Ocean waters, it is chilling and dark. As fear envelopes them, my heart was pounding as hard as theirs was!

Darcy Coates created atmosphere in this creepy setting. The ship itself is very much a character in this book. I enjoyed the other characters as well. We get to know some more than others, but that didn’t hinder my enjoyed of the book. I enjoyed the sense of unease, the dark eerie setting, the spike of fear this book evoked.

I recently discovered Darcy Coates – no I have not been living under a rock- and have enjoyed the books I have read by her. I also enjoyed the two timelines in this book where we are given more and more information as the book progresses. This piqued my interest and kept me invested. I did enjoy the current timeline slightly more. Another positive is that although this book is eerie and chilling, it is not horrific in the horror sense. Which I believe will make it more appealing to many readers. Fans of Coates will enjoy this, and this is a good start if you have not read her books before.

The only downside for me was that there were some sections that felt slow but the overall sense of unease and tension, helped me to overlooks this.

Chilling, eerie and dark!

Thank you to Poisoned Pen Press and NetGalley who provided me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All the thoughts and opinions are my own.