Special thanks to NetGalley and Brigids Gate Press for the ARC copy they provided.
From the very beginning when I saw April Yates’s City of Snares on NetGalley, it gave me Sunset Boulevard vibes. A fading actress claims a young, blossoming, rising star, and twisted horrors ensue. Sunset Boulevard gave me nightmares when I was a child, and I went looking for that dark, looming terror in City of Snares.
I was not disappointed.
April Yates delivered in every possible way, even including a not-so-subtle nod to the movie that I was convinced I’d made up in a grim part of my own haunted imagination, until a friend pulled it out and about gave me a heart attack when I realized Sunset Boulevard was in fact real.
City of Snares delivers that same suckerpunch effect.
You know what’s coming. Right from the beginning, you know what’s in store for the unfortunate heroine, but you go on hoping she’ll get away, all the same. And when the end you always knew was coming sneaks up and slaps you in the face, all you can do is sit back and take it in.
If you love the old, black-and-white film aesthetic, and how creepy classic films can be, you will love City of Snares. April Yates’s writing is clear and clean, and yet still manages to make you FeEl things you weren’t expecting to experience. Affection, loathing, hero worship, the glitz and grime of a time long past.
Add all that to a queer narrative, and City of Snares becomes a read you simply can’t put down. I reached the end of the book, and wanted the story to go on. I don’t think anyone can ask for more out of a book.