Books to Read on Your Deep Woods Camping Trip

by  MK French

We might be heading into "beach reads" season, full of feel-good stories, but if that's not your thing, I have you covered with today's reviews. Perhaps you are heading into the woods for a camping trip this summer - these books would be great for reading around the campfire. 

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The Collioure Coincidence by Mark N. Drake

March 2026; Indie; 979-8252370996
ebook, print (302 pages); horror

Jack Glennison and Josine Young escaped the last disaster, but their friendship is fractured. A small French artist's colony named Collioure is somehow linked to Darkisle, the King in Yellow and an upcoming archaeological dig. 

This is the sixth Darkisle novel, and it definitely helps to have read those novels first because we meet some of those characters again, and we have deepening clues regarding the Church of Shadows. The coincidence of a former client had a friend at the artist's colony and Deverby buying a seascape painted in the colony bothers Jack, especially with the client and artist having involvement with the King in Yellow, who is somehow associated with the book Liber Umbrae. He's hired on to protect an archaeological team hoping to excavate at a circle of standing stones, with time to investigate the artist's colony beforehand. Josine comes along with him, and a death from a wild animal greets them when they arrive. Though Jack and Josine aren't there to solve that death, it adds to the coincidences involved in this book. Tracking down a painting is far more dangerous than you would think, and the dig at Darkisle is exactly as dangerous as all other Darkisle cases tended to be.

Each half of the book has a distinct but intense mystery to solve. At first, it's the artist's colony and painting that Deverby has been looking for from the beginning of the series, and in the second half is the archaeological dig. The painting is important in the overall scheme of things, and there continues to be a creeping sense of unease on Darkisle tied to Elder Gods and the plan to reshape the world. Jack doesn't have all the answers, but he has connections and his dogged determination to track down the truth. We gain some information, but the Shadows remain a step ahead. Coincidences mount up from the start, and even by the end of the book, there are still questions left.

Buy The Collioure Coincidence at Amazon

Mrs. Jekyll by Emma Glass

April 2026; Union Square & Co.; 978-1454965909
audio, ebook, print (176 pages); Gothic

Rosy Winter is dying, and her husband Charlie is as kind and supportive as he can be. His sister Sally can't help, distracted by her husband's behavior. Between various remedies and family duties, Rosy is determined to live as long as possible.

The story is influenced by Stevenson's Jekyll and Hyde, which immediately drew me to it. Written in short, punchy first-person POV chapters, we're in Rosy's head as she goes through life. Some chapters are like lyric poetry, and we move back and forth through Rosy's thoughts and memories as she deals with the fear of cancer, still working as an elementary school teacher, and trying to still do the usual events with family and friends. Her cancer takes on a life of its own, literally, filling in gaps that Rosy can't fill. This is much like the original Jekyll and Hyde; the scientist didn't acknowledge emotions or physical lust, so Hyde did that for him. Rosy's alternate doesn't acknowledge the cancer or anticipated loss, and is the embodiment of "live a little." The people in her life don't understand what is happening, since everyone experiences illness differently. Ultimately, Rosy's life and death are outside of their control, or even hers.

Buy Mrs. Jekyll at Amazon

Japanese Gothic by Kylie Lee Baker

April 2026; Hanover Square Press; 978-1335001559
audio, ebook, print (352 pages); horror

In October 2026, Lee Turner killed his college roommate and has no idea why he did it. Fleeing New York City, he hides in his father's new home in Japan. The house is creepy, and he sees a woman in the yard at night. In October 1877, Sen is a young samurai in exile, willing to do anything to please her father. She fears soldiers may come to kill her family when she sees a foreign man in the yard. Something is hiding in the house, and there might have been a good reason for it.

Lee is odd and unsettling, even to his own father. He can't recall why or how he killed his roommate, but is sure he must have done it because he recalls cleaning away blood in the stairwell. In the same house he escapes to, but in a different time, Sen is trained by her father in the way of the samurai. He is pitiless, and we see how this shaped who she is and how she sees the world. The trauma of her early life is seen as acceptable to toughen up and be a true samurai despite the Meiji outlawing them, and she would do anything to maintain her father's approval. The two see each other through the closet sliding door and are able to interact and talk, each sure the other is a spirit.

Both Lee and Sen carry the ghosts of their parents' generation. Lee's mother went missing years ago in Cambodia, and his father keeps him at a careful distance. Sen's father rebelled against the Meiji and returned home instead of committing seppuku, training her in cruel ways to be a samurai. The connection between their timelines occurs at odd hours, but they feel seen and understood. The truth of the situation is just outside their grasp; it's only at the end that we find out, along with them, what happened. The truth of their lives and their endings is unsettling, and gothic in that sense: the truth sets them free, but that doesn't make it a happy ending. 

Buy Japanese Gothic at Amazon

Born and raised in New York City, M.K. French started writing stories when very young, dreaming of different worlds and places to visit. She always had an interest in folklore, fairy tales, and the macabre, which has definitely influenced her work. She currently lives in the Midwest with her husband, three young children, and a golden retriever. 

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