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A review by ellelainey
The Hollow and the Haunted by Camilla Raines
5.0
** I WAS GIVEN THIS BOOK FOR MY READING PLEASURE **
Copy received through Netgalley
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The Hollow and the Haunted, by Camilla Raines
★★★★★
384 Pages
3rd person, single character POV
Content Warning: mentions of anxiety, grief, loss, death of a parent (off-page), violence, implied homophobia, possession, family feud, panic attacks, visions, family curse, ghost attack, premonitions
Themes: rich boy x poor boy, privilege, enemies-to-lovers, psychic abilities, close knit community, hurt-comfort
The Hollow and the Haunted, by Camilla Raines is – for me – The Frighteners meets Sixteen Souls. It is everything that I wanted Cemetery Boys to be!
Full disclosure: I didn't know this was part of a series when I requested it or read it. It does end on a cliffhanger, but that didn't dampen my enjoyment of the book. In fact, this is one of my Best books of 2024.
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The Hollow and the Haunted is a brilliant YA PNR story with an MM romance. It's got everything I could have asked for – romance, intrigue, ghosts, a haunting, feuding families and enemies to lovers, and cursed family heirlooms.
The book started with an incredible opening of a teen MC – Miles – grave digging! However, instead of having nefarious plans, Miles is there to return an item to the deceased woman, as his family have been hired to resolve a haunting. Things don't quite go to plan...and then Miles sees a strange boy in the mirror – bloody, dead and asking Miles to 'find me'.
Miles doesn't know what to do with the warning, until he meets the boy – alive and unaware of the threat. To his dismay, Gabriel Hawthorne is the son of the Hawthorne family, the arch-nemesis of Miles' family!
When it comes to characters, I LOVED Miles: the happy-go-lucky, well-meaning, hard-working teen who just wants to do his family proud, and use his gift for good; and Gabriel: the grumpy, rich boy with an ego and a habit of dismissing others, having learned to be cold from his distant mother. Between the two of them, their amazing chemistry and their witty banter, they make an incredible couple as well as great main characters.
The secondary characters are brilliant too: their mothers, Felicity and Sarah, have some of the best insults and banter in the book. I loved the relationship dynamics in the novel: Miles and Charlee's friendship, despite being cousins; Gabriel's protective instincts for his brothers; Bram and his clever cat; the chemistry between Miles and Gabriel. The relationships ranged from family to friendship to romance, and each one was completely unique and well-explored in a natural, organic way.
Miles is the only POV of the novel, but he's the perfect choice. He's a surprisingly level-headed and smart teenager; instead of screaming and throwing tantrums (like some teenagers in YA books lately), he's quietly disappointed in people, more frustrated with being hurt or getting mad rather than the person he's fighting with.
There are a wide range of psychic abilities explored throughout the book, in various ways. There's a wide network of witches/magical families in the community so there are a lot of ways to explore the magical gifts in this world. There's lots of teen life, anxiety and shenanigans throughout, family issues and in-the-closet drama.
The pacing was great, the plot clever and well-explored, with false leads and twists, so many suspects and problems to creep in.
Although I knew there would be a cliffhanger by around 60-70% – because there was so much story left to tell – this is a duology and it ends on a huge cliffhanger that sort-of resolves the plot of this book while leaving plenty more for the next to settle. This cliffhanger was a real surprise, leaving us with one heck of an ending.
I'm really looking forward to Book 2, and I hope it will be in Gabriel's POV, so that we can see more of his side of events.
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Favourite Quotes
“Fate had made their families enemies, bound by death and tragedy. As surely as it had placed Gabriel in Miles's path, it would take him away. One way or another.”
“Gabriel hesitated. “It's...home. The only place I've ever lived.” He watched the flames. “It's also cold sometimes, empty. Hollow. I have all this space, but nothing to fill it with.” His eyes flicked over to Miles, there and gone. “Sometimes, I feel like a ghost living here. Invisible. Intangible.”