{I've Been Reading} We Went to the Woods

We Went to the Woods by Caite Dolan-Leach

Five twenty-somethings step away from the lives they know and move into the empty buildings on what was, a century ago, a failed commune. Their story is told by Mack and we know from the first pages that whatever happened at The Homestead ended badly. 

Mack knows little about her new companions, but she's hoping to escape her own past so she doesn't ask a lot of questions. The residents of The Homestead are really just playing at living off the grid. They're not going to starve if they don't grow enough food or freeze if they run out of firewood. These aren't the sort of people I'd want to spend any actual time with, but they were intriguing to read about and I've always been a bit curious about communes and cults.

The promotional materials that motivated me to pick this one up compared it to The Beach and maybe it was that comparison that had me expecting a much darker ending than the book delivered. I liked this one a lot. It's more literary than most of what I've been reading lately and has a slower pace. I found myself stopping now and then to look up the details of the Oneida Community and some terms I hadn't previously stumbled across like "complex marriage" and "male continence."  That sent me down some rabbit trails that I plan to follow deeper.

Disclosure -- The publisher provided me with an advance review copy. This post contains affiliate links.