A Story Soaked in Dread, Memory, and Old Sins: A Review of Simon Meredith’s Footprints
(By Olive S. Stevens / for Just Reading Nook)
Edited by Gaius Konstantine
Footprints by Simon Meredith is a supernatural mystery set in the fading town of Hawthorne and split across two timelines. In 1928, Cassie Reilly and her friends find a strange, wet paint palette on the floor of the abandoned Smithson Meat Packing Corp.—known locally as the Meat-Works, or the Slaughterhouse. When they touch the paint, it becomes moving boot-prints that summon shapeshifting shadows tied to an ancient evil. In 1986, teenager Tessa Martin arrives in Hawthorne after her father loses his job. Her younger brother digs up an old wooden box beneath their backyard oak, and with help from an elderly Cassie and the “Library Legion,” Tessa pieces together newspapers, tunnel maps, and town records. What they uncover is a conspiracy among Hawthorne’s leaders, buried deals, and a looming force called the Harrower.
Meredith writes a genuinely spooky, engaging horror novel, and he uses visual art techniques—impasto, stippling, scumbling—as more than flavor. They shape the story. The standout idea is living paint as a conduit for fear and memory: an original, unsettling hook. The dual timelines also work well, pairing the childhood terror of 1928 with the teen-detective energy of 1986.
The book does stumble. The middle sags when it lingers on archival research or drops in long stretches of newspaper clippings and journals verbatim. Characters sometimes stop the action to rehash secrets or sort through decades of conflicting town aliases, and the unreliable-narrator device—local leaders cycling through different names across generations—can get convoluted. That’s a lot to track, and it drains momentum just when the story should tighten.
Footprints is a well-crafted supernatural thriller with strong atmosphere, memorable characters, and a genuinely fresh concept. The midsection pacing keeps it from being a knockout, but horror and mystery readers will still find it creative and gripping.
Rating: ★★★★☆ Strong
Footprints (2026)
YA Mystery Thriller
Available in Kindle and Paperback
Olive Stevens is an agency copywriter and managing editor of Just Reading Nook. She also writes book features and news articles.
You can follow her at x /@olivesstevens
