Rainforest by Michelle Paver

 

Rainforest by Michelle Paver.

Published 9th October 2025 by Orion.

From the cover of the book:

The jungle watches. The dead remember.

The virgin rainforest seems a paradise to Englishman Simon Corbett. A last chance to salvage his career. A final refuge from a terrible secret.

But the jungle is no Eden. It hides secrets of its own. It does not forgive.

As Simon is drawn deeper into its haunted shadows, he learns to his horror that the past will not stay buried. For there are places in the forest where the line between the living and the dead is thinner than the skin of water.

A terrifying supernatural tale from Sunday Times bestseller Michelle Paver, author of Dark Matter, Thin Air and Wakenhyrst.

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Tortured by the death of Penelope, a young woman he was obsessed with, entomologist Simon Corbett heads to the Mexican rainforest to lose himself in his work. This is his last chance to save his career, and he hopes to win tenure by finding a new species of mantid.

When Simon arrives at the archaeological site exploring ancient Mayan ruins that has agreed to host him, he realises the professor in charge expects him to pull his weight on the dig. Frustrated that he is unable to follow his own agenda, and uncomfortable with the presence of the natives employed on the venture, Simon succumbs to the weight of the secrets he is keeping. His ghosts have followed him into the heart of the rainforest, and he is willing to risk anything to free himself from their presence...

I adore a good ghost story, and Michele Paver's unsettling creations are among the best I have ever read - especially the hair-raising Dark Matter, which tops my poll as the scariest horror yarn of all time. Back on the ghost trail, Paver now heads to the steamy wilderness of the Mexican rainforest, with a tale that ventures into delicious fever dream territory.

The story is set in the 1970s, and unfurls through the eyes of Simon Corbett, a man recovering from a breakdown, and desperately trying to get back to his twisted idea of normality. For the most part, his narrative takes the form of journal entries, which he fills with an erratic mix of his version of current events, and his reflections on the past. From the beginning, it is clear that Penelope died under circumstances which he believes he may have been responsible for, and as past and present weave together, the guilt he feels over his stalkerish ways feeds into a new obsession - the need to summon her spirit for a reckoning.

The claustrophobic rainforest back drop is an atmospheric delight - especially given the dig's location amongst Mayan ruins steeped in blood, and the presence of an indigenous population who believe in the power of magic. Simon's paranoia overwhelms him, and soon he is upsetting the 'natives', his compatriots, and his own sanity, as he relentlessly searches for elusive mantids at the same time as a way to connect with Penelope beyond the grave. Reality bleeds into the supernatural as Simon calls something from beyond the veil, and Paver hits her discomfiting stride to perfection once again as you become lost in deciding how much is real and how much is madness.

Thought-provoking themes abound. Simon's views on the indigenous population, and women, are uncomfortable, but they offering interesting insight when it comes to the prevailing attitudes of time and place. There is lots of fascinating context about Mayan history, local beliefs, flora and fauna, and there are heartrending references to exploitation too.

Shades of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness pulled me in completely, and I absolutely consumed this story from cover to cover. Spot-on for spooky season!

Rainforest is available to buy now in hardcover, ebook and audio formats.

Thank you to Orion for sending me a proof of this book in return for an honest review, and to Random Things Tours for inviting me to join this blog tour.

About the author:

Michelle Paver was born in central Africa and came to England as a child. After gaining a degree in Biochemistry from Oxford University, she worked as a solicitor before giving up the law to write full-time. Her books include the internationally bestselling Wolf Brother series for younger readers, and the acclaimed supernatural novels Dark Matter, Thin Air, and Wakenhyrst.