A Darker Act by Amy Goldsmith – at a glance
The School Reading Lists’ five word review: moorland legend hunts amateur actors.
YA book title: A Darker Act.
YA author: Amy Goldsmith.
Genre: Young Adult / Horror / Folklore / Romance fiction.
Published by: Ink Road.
ISBN: 9781785308895.
Recommended for children aged: 14+.
First published: September 2026.
This YA novel is ideal for: teens and young adults who enjoy horror (not the fast, gory type), folklore and legends with a touch of romance. Ideal for fans of Amy Goldsmith’s other novels Those We Drown and Predatory Natures or authors such as Kat Ellis, Rory Power or Maggie Stiefvater.
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Our review:
Hazel Fletcher is the model student: head girl, high achiever and always looking for something new to strengthen her college applications. In her final year of high school, she joins the Edgemoor Players, a gifted but secretive drama group known for keeping to themselves. To her delight, Hazel lands the lead in their boldest show yet, a tragic love story based on local tales of a menacing huntsman said to have once roamed the surrounding moors. Starring opposite her is Roman Cavalero, the group’s enigmatic star, whose talent is matched only by how little anyone really knows about him. As rehearsals intensify, so does the spark between them, but Roman throws himself into his role with an unsettling devotion until Hazel can no longer tell where the character ends and the boy she’s falling for begins.
But the production ends in disaster. Its final night goes catastrophically wrong after a string of unsettling events, and afterwards the cast stops speaking to one another, refusing to mention the play ever again. Months later, Hazel joins a weekend camping trip in the hope of boosting her grades, only to find herself thrown back together with her former castmates, Roman included. When they become stranded in the icy woods and one of them is hurt, the group seeks shelter in a deserted church, where the distant howling of dogs, the remains of a sacrificed deer and a hidden crypt beneath the floor warn them that something dark is waiting.
Told in three acts and drawing on the age-old myth of the Wild Hunt, A Darker Act blends heartfelt romance with creeping dread. As strange charms appear hanging from the trees and the sense of being stalked closes in around them, Hazel and her friends must face a terrifying realisation: whatever they unleashed on that stage never went away. Something on the moors has been woken, and it won’t stop until it has claimed its prey.
Our verdict:
Amy Goldsmith’s A Darker Act is an incredible folk horror, as cleverly crafted as it is chilling. The novel is split into three acts, mirroring the three acts of the doomed play the troupe stages, and Goldsmith makes brilliant use of withheld information.
Rather than starting at the beginning, she drops us in after the disastrous performance, as the friends reunite for a weekend away in the woods, and lets the backstory trickle out through flashbacks. These movements between past and present are handled skilfully, keeping the tension taut while answering questions at just the right moments and tracing how Roman became slowly consumed by his role until the line between actor and character all but vanished.
Hazel makes a compelling, sympathetic lead, and her bond with Roman gives the book real emotional depth. Their connection grows organically even as the eerie events escalate, and the reader finds themselves deeply attached to them both by the final pages. The conclusion is tender and devastating in equal measure, yet it feels like the only fitting end to their story. Eerie, immersive and frequently frightening, this is a book that lingers long after the curtain falls, and one that any lover of folk horror should seek out.
Teaching points and book club discussion ideas:
Identity, performance and the self
- Roman’s gradual absorption into his role raises questions about identity and the masks people wear. This links well to discussions of method acting, peer pressure and how people perform different versions of themselves at school, online and at home. Where does a role end and a real person begin?
Structure and dramatic form
- The novel is told in three acts, mirroring the play at its heart. Explore how the three-act structure (setup, confrontation, resolution) shapes pacing and tension, then compare it with other plays students have studied, such as Macbeth or An Inspector Calls. Why might an author borrow a theatrical structure for a novel?
Non-linear narrative and withheld information
- The story opens after the disastrous performance, using flashbacks to reveal what happened. Explore how writers build suspense through dual timelines, foreshadowing and delayed revelation. Have they read other novels or plays of this nature . Students could consider the rigidity of the probation service, ankle monitors and sentencing, and whether the system is effective in rehabilitating young people or constrains and penalises them.
Folklore and the folk horror genre
- Drawing on the legend of the Wild Hunt, the book is a strong starting point for exploring how myths are adapted in modern fiction. Students could research the Wild Hunt or a local legend, identify folk horror conventions (isolated landscapes, rituals, ancient forces, the past returning), and write their own short story inspired by local folklore.
Book Club Questions
- The novel draws on the legend of the Wild Hunt and is steeped in the landscape of the moors and woods. How important was the setting to the story’s atmosphere? Could it have worked anywhere else?
- The Edgemoor Players are a close-knit, secretive group who stop speaking after the disastrous performance. How did guilt, loyalty and secrecy shape their relationships with one another? Which character’s response to the events of that night did you find most understandable?
- How did the romance between Hazel and Roman affect the horror elements of the story? Did it heighten the sense of dread, offer relief from it, or both?
- The ending is bittersweet and heartbreaking. Did it feel like the right conclusion for Hazel and Roman’s story? How would you have felt if Goldsmith had chosen a happier or darker ending?
Many thanks to Ink Road for the review copy.
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