Atmospheric: I’m both a mood reader and a seasonal reader, so now that summer is coming to an end where I live, I was hoping to find a book that was summery, woodsy, and just like a summer night. So, as I was trying to pick out my book for my Book of the Month subscription, I read the description of this book and thought it would be perfect for an August read. And it was; I LOVED this book. Like, LOVED it. I always wanted to have the summer camp experience that you see in movies like The Parent Trap, but I never went to one (I was/am way too introverted and too much of a homebody to go!). This made me feel like I was there in the woods, smelling the campfires, going into the wealthy family’s house and trying not to touch anything. Just an all-around summer camp feel, with a touch of missing person. 

Unpredictable: To me, the plot was unpredictable in the best way, and Moore developed it really well. You keep thinking you know what’s going on, but then something happens that makes you think differently. This is true all the way through to the end. 

Character Development: Character development is so important to a story, especially when you have multiple POVs like The God of the Woods. There are several characters to juggle, but they all felt distinctive, with personal histories that influenced their actions and reactions. I only got mixed up once or twice; otherwise, I was able to follow all of the POVs easily.

Dual-perspective: This is a dual-perspective narrative and I don’t know about you, but those can sometimes read as if there’s only one true voice. Not The Teacher. Eve and Addie’s voices are inherently different, which  should be a given considering one is an adult and the other is a fourteen-year-old high school student. Logic, reasoning, thought processes, etc., all read in an age-appropriate manner. I could truly imagine Addie as a young teenager who’s been through a rough time and just wants to be as inconspicuous as possible in her school. This is definitely one of McFadden’s strengths in all of her books: she really brings characters to life and that makes the story engaging, despite being somewhat predictable.