‘And he shall appear’ by kate van der borgh

When I went to Barnes and Noble to pick out a book to read during that in-between time after Christmas but before New Years, I was on the hunt for something that felt like it was The Secret History by Donna Tartt (please note that I have already read If We Were Villains by M.H. Rio, otherwise I would’ve obviously gone that direction first.) I was looking for something with a dark academia feel that would make it easier for me to romanticize the fact that the sun has been setting at 4 P.M. and it’s 15 degrees outside. Truth be told, I had given up my search for this exact genre when I stumbled upon And He Shall Appear. The cover caught my eye, and I can openly admit that there are times when I will judge a book by it’s cover. One of the reviews on the back described it as a mesh of Tartt’s TSH and the 2023 film phenomenon Saltburn.

Despite the fact that I was not the biggest fan of Saltburn, I was already sold on giving the book a chance. Done, sold, added to cart.

But even just a few chapters in to it, I knew that this book would not be winning any originality points from me. It’s another book about a middle class, or lower-middle class, student getting the opportunity to attend a Shakespearean and prestigious school where they become entranced by this charismatic and shadowy boy, who essentially runs his own cult. Except for all intents and purposes they don’t call it a cult, it’s more of like a posse of admirers.

In this instance, Mr. Cult Leader, is a magician. Well, his estranged father is a magician and he is attempting to follow in his footsteps.

Which definitely caused me to lose major interest in the book for 30 seconds since I somehow managed to skim over that part of the book description. However, I was able to overlook this extremely important element of the plot and still enjoy the mystery of it all.

Arguably, it was less “magic”-y and more eerie and spooky. There were definitely moments of this story that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, but all in all, it’s not a story that will stick with me. I was easily able to close the book and go to sleep for the night. There was no lingering feelings of creepiness and it wasn’t “haunting.”

Unfortunately, it’s also not a book I’m probably ever going to think about again. It’s extremely similar, as they mentioned on the back cover, to The Secret History. Now, because that was what I was looking for, I was still able to enjoy this book. I got exactly what I went to Barnes and Noble for.

While the characters and setting are very pretentious, the writing is not. I felt like this book was well-written and it wasn’t too full of itself. I especially enjoyed that halfway through the book I found myself thinking, “Wait, what’s this guys name?,” referring to the narrator. I proceeded to flip all the way through the pages that I had read and still couldn’t see to find a name for this guy. That’s when I realized that, again in the back cover description of the book (…huh, it’s really starting to feel like I didn’t read anything in that excerpt at all…) the author calls him “the unnamed narrator.”

While I’m not entirely sure what purposes this serves to the story, if any, it was definitely a lightbulb moment for me and I thought it was a little bit cool and different.

When it’s all said and done, I’m going to give this book a 3.5 out of 5 stars. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great. I don’t think I would recommend it to someone unless they were also looking for something very similar to The Secret History and If We Were Villains.