The Cult of the Spider People: Bone Chillers #1
Heddy Johannesen
Bone Chillers (October 25, 2024)
Reviewed by Nora B. Peevy

Heddy Johannesen’s first standalone title is a creepy web of worldbuilding sending shivers down young adults’ spines. Piper’s mother is dead, and her father is hiding a secret, but she doesn’t know what it is. One day Piper and her boyfriend, Cory, go through the black door in the basement she is forbidden to go through. They find themselves in an odd world where H.R. Giger, Stephen King, or The Human Centipede would feel right at home.

What would you do to save the people you love and what part of you identifies you as human? These are two of the biggest philosophical questions Johannesen tackles in this teen horror book with grace and suspense. I can imagine discovering her book right next to  Christopher Pike’s when I read YA novels. I am captivated and waiting for the sequel to come out. Johannesen has left enough unanswered questions to warrant a sequel, and I look forward to losing myself in her next book.