Thank you to Macmillan Audio and NetGalley who provided me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. The pictures, well, they didn’t work quite as well for me as I would have liked but I think that’s a technical issue related to the settings of my e-reader more than anything else so rather than having the shock value that was the aim I found myself having to piece things together a little bit.

Rekulak crafts a very solid mystery full of dead ends, red herrings, and a twist that upends expectations. Hidden Pictures isn't a ghost story, it's a scalpel that slices into our smug sense of self-satisfaction so deeply it hits bone. Then, Teddy's artwork becomes increasingly sinister, and his stick figures quickly evolve into lifelike sketches well beyond the ability of any five-year-old. I quite liked aspects of her character-- I was interested in her past and sympathised with her struggles to combat her drug addiction, and her narrative voice was easy to read and compelling --but she does and says some things that were just kinda stupid. Etsy’s 100% renewable electricity commitment includes the electricity used by the data centers that host Etsy.It’s a familiar story (nanny to a boy with strange powers) told in an unfamiliar way, and it will grip you. Since I predicted what would probably happen, it led to a very lame plot twist that I saw a mile away. I find that to be fluff and annoying since I want to progress in the story, not have it retold again since the main protagonist, Mallory Quinn, had to explain it again to another character. Again, I didn’t find this an issue, it may have lessened the ‘wow’ factor a little but in some ways having to root around and piece things together played into the mystery for me.

Whip-smart, creepy as hell, and masterfully plotted, Hidden Pictures is the best new thriller novel I’ve read in years.The haunted forest, the little boy helping the ghost to find closure, the history behind the pool house itself which seems to have something of a reputation and that strange sixth sense of something always watching. The way Rekulak built up the tension and then slowly revealed the truth behind what has happening at the Maxwells was really fun. Finance is provided by PayPal Credit (a trading name of PayPal UK Ltd, Whittaker House, Whittaker Avenue, Richmond-Upon-Thames, Surrey, United Kingdom, TW9 1EH). Hidden Pictures felt a bit like a young adult novel, told in the first person by the main character.