Rating - ⭐⭐⭐1/2
"Having met and outsmarted the smiling man in Dead Voices but fearful of when he'll come again, Ollie, Brian, and Coco are anxiously searching for a way to defeat him once and for all. By staying together and avoiding remote places, they've steered clear of him so far but their constant worry and stress is taking a toll on their lives and friendship.
So when Ollie's dad and Coco's mom plan a "fun" boat trip on Lake Champlain, the three are apprehensive to say the least. They haven't had the best of luck on their recent trips and even worse their frenemy Phil is on the boat as well. But when a lake monster destroys their boat, they end up shipwrecked on a deserted island.
This isn't just any island though. It's hidden from the outside world in a fog and unless everyone works together to find a way to escape, they won't survive long."
Dark Waters is the third novel in the Small Spaces series by Katherine Arden.
This was an overall okay story. It didn't recapture how I felt reading the first book and it didn't step up its game, but I wasn't bored while reading it at least. Because of how short the book is, I won't go into extreme detail and will just give a general overview of what I thought of it.
This was a bit of a step-up compared to the last book as it was more interesting and more atmospheric. It jumped right into the story and moved quickly, again probably because of the length of the book. There were, however, a lot of bad decisions made in this book. I get that they are young, but they made some very obvious mistakes that put their lives in danger.
In terms of the characters, there were things I did and didn't like. I did like how the story expanded to include more characters this time around to show how widespread the smiling man's influence is, and I liked how this book focused more on Brian. What I didn't think was done well, however, was Ollie. Due to things that happened in the book that I will not spoil, I felt like her character just got pushed to the wayside and barely had a role in the story and had almost no development as a character.
All things said, I will continue reading this series to see what happens next.
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