Empty Smiles (Small Spaces, #4) by Katherine Arden

Empty Smiles (Small Spaces, #4) Reviews

• 
  Jess M

  This was my most disappointing read of the year so far...I LOVED this series so much and I really enjoyed the first 75% of this book but the ending felt rushed and left so many things unanswered and unexplored for me to be satisfied with the conclusion. I felt like she was in a rush to get it in to her editor and didn't write the ending that we deserved. This could have been longer and gone into the background of The Smiling Man more or given us some kind of closure...super bummed but overall this is a creepy and entertaining middle grade series.
• 
  Quill&Queer

  honestly, the worst cover of the series.
• 
  John Gilbert

  A fitting finale to this four book series. Book one was very good, but the next two did not make the grade for me, barely enough to keep me going. But the final book brought it all together into a fitting finish. Probably because Ollie was front and centre again, with Coco and Brian in solid supporting roles and their friend Phil bringing up the rear. I always found Ollie to be the most interesting and engaging narrator, while in the middle books, she took on a diminished role.
  
  Good fun, but quite creepy, more so than I usually like. Good on you Ms Adern, especially as it all happens in my beloved Vermont. 4 stars.
• 
  Jenny

  I am baffled by the ending of this????
  Up until the last 5? Pages - I was ready to call this the 2nd best instalment in the series (Small Spaces being first obviously)
  It built up to such an intense climax, it introduced so many new ideas and dropped so many little clues, and then out of literally nowhere, it just resolved everything within 2 pages, with no explanation, and wrapped the whole thing up.
  It was lacking emotion, it was rushed and honestly, the last few pages were kind of poorly written (waaaay more cheesy and juvenile than the rest of the series)
  I actually even double checked, because I thought it was a 4 book series, to see if I was wrong - surely they wouldn’t drop all those open ideas and leave them hanging unresolved? But nope, that was indeed the finale. It honestly read like the author herself had gotten as far as the final pages before getting kidnapped by clowns herself and having to wrap up the ending with minutes to spare.
  Super disappointed as I LOVE this series and again, up until the ending, this was easily one of the better instalments- it also felt like she knew her younger readers had grown a few years since the first book came out, and she was leaning into more mature writing and scarier horror sequences throughout the book, so it was even more of a bummer to have the final pages revert back to the most basic, cheesy, stereotypical middle grade vibes.
  Really let down by this one :( but still giving it 3 stars because up until those final pages I did love it.
• 
  H. Givens

  Y'all... I love this series. I waited for this book for months. I had it on my calendar and looked forward to it the whole time. And then, it's a good book for three-quarters of a book, and then it just... ends. Literally. I had a quarter of the book left, only to find that an entire. quarter. of this printed book is excerpts from the other three books, as like a "sneak preview" but "see where it all started." There is no closure. There is no explanation. There is no followup for anything that happened in this book. They get started on the game, and then... they win and go home and it's fine, in the space of a few pages. There is no final drama. There is no final anything. There is only three-quarters of a book. I don't know what happened in the background here to make this be the final product, but I'm honestly crushed. I was looking forward to it so much and then it's not like I finally got to read the end and it sucked, it's like I never got to read the end at all.
• 
  Christina Pilkington

  *3.5 stars*
  
  After being very disappointed with the third book in this series, it was nice to see Empty Smiles return to its spooky origins. After Small Spaces, this was my second favorite in the series.
  
  There were some truly creepy scenes in this book, right up there with some of the scarecrow scenes from the first book. I also liked some of the character moments between the friend group, too.
  
  But it was way too abrupt of an ending. This book was SO short! I think this series would have been much stronger as a trilogy.
  
  Not sure I'd recommend it which is a shame because I love the author's adult trilogy and am anxiously awaiting for her next adult book.
• 
  destiny ♡ howling libraries

  Low-key devastated to have completed this series because I loved it SO much. This finale was delightful and I absolutely cried happy tears at the end. RTC!
• 
  Shane

  Book one was SOLID.
  Book two was AMAZING.
  Book three was as creative as the last two.
  Book four... it felt rushed. VERY rushed. It could have used another 50 pages of content.
  Overall, I think it's a strong series for the targeted age group, and I could see myself rereading the first two books eventually, probably not the last two.
• 
  rachel, x

  #1)
  Small Spaces ★★★★☆
  #2)
  Dead Voices ★★★★☆
  #3)
  Dark Waters ★★★★★

  
  
  this cover is genuinely terrifying 😰
  
  ➸ Trigger warnings for parental abandonment mentioned, trauma and nightmares, minor blood and physical injuries including mention of broken bones and sprains, death of a mother in a plane crash mentioned, the disappearance of a friend, child and daughter (theme), kidnapping and captivity of children, minor animal stampede (cows).
  
  ▷ Representation: Brian (mc) is Jamaican.
  
  
  Blog •
  Trigger Warning Database •
  StoryGraph
• 
  Steph ✨

  Oh no, I was truly disappointed with this one. Granted, the atmosphere was fantastic and I was creeped out due to hating clowns but the ending was sooo rushed, especially for the last in the series. I just think it could have taken another couple of chapters and it would have been much nicer for those of us that have truly enjoyed the series. What a shame!
• 
  Obsidian

  Sorry but this was just a solid 3 stars. I think the biggest issue is that Arden tried to rewrite The Smiling Man and based on the first book in the quartet it never squared. We also didn't get a lot of time with our trio of Ollie, Coco, and Brian together. The ending also just felt very rushed. Finally, the whole book was pretty short. I got to the 80 something mark and the remaining part of the book was excerpts from the first three books.
  
  "Empty Smiles" is the fourth and last book in the Small Spaces quartet. It's been a couple of months since Ollie did a deal with the Smiling Man and left her dad and friends. She's now on a train that never seems to stop with the Smiling Man and playing chess with him. When they do get to a stop, a carnival sets up that has dark secrets of its own. The Smiling Man keeps getting Ollie to agree to stay forever, but she wants to play the game with her friends getting a chance to save her. And back with Brian and Coco, all the adults believe that Ollie died. But Brian, Coco, and Phil, are at the ready to save Ollie when the chance comes. When a missing boy is found in water near them, it appears that The Smiling Man is setting up his final game for the kids to play.
  
  So I think if anything this should have been Phil's story. Instead we follow Ollie, Brian, and Coco. With Phil kind of there and jealous about the friendship of the other three. And the adults are done with the kids hiding secrets. And there is some movement there with that, but not enough for me to give this higher than three stars. Also, bad guys can just be bad guys. It's something Stephen King understands quite well. 
  
  The writing was fine, but the book felt a bit like I was reading in place. Nothing much happens. We are supposed to have feelings or something for The Smiling Man and I was like why. I think the first book in the series was the best and everything else has been not even come close. 
  
  I thought the creepy carnival with scary clowns was quite scary, but how does this even line up with the secret places we found out The Smiling Man was involved with in three other books? 
  
  Finally, the ending was what honestly made me drop this thing down two stars. There's all this build up with no explanation about anything. Who is The Smiling Man? Why did he want to play games so badly? Why was he so fixated on Ollie? What happens with the other places/people he kidnapped and turned into whatever he did? Why did everyone but just four of the kids forget everything? I just legit when bah when I finished this installment. I don't know if Arden just didn't know how to finish this or what, but honestly this was a big disappointment. 
• 
  Keisha

  It seemed like the ending was rushed. It was disappointing.
• 
  Emily

  ~ I am UPSET ~
  
  Can I update June’s answer for most disappointing read of the year? Because this would be it.
  
  Why, do you ask? Well, I will tell you that I have been looking forward to this book even before it was announced. The first book in the series, Small Spaces, was one of my favorite books of 2020, and I was so shocked that I liked it because it’s a horror (albeit a middle grade horror). I recommended it to everyone.
  
  And then I got MORE excited because it was part of a seasons quartet, where each of the four books in the series was based on a season. Obviously, the fall one was my favorite, but the winter one was still good! And then spring happened and it just felt like a setup for book 4. So I sat there, not so patiently waiting to see how everything would tie together.
  
  And then I sat on my couch, signed copy in hand, and read the summer conclusion. And the first 80% of it was amazing. Even scarier than the previous ones. Felt like everything was coming together.
  
  And then when it did, it came together in 3 pages. Literally, it’s like the printer ran out of paper and she had to fit the story on 2 sheets of paper. WAY too rushed. Which is the biggest shame ever because all the building blocks were there! Super lovable characters! Spooky premise! Lots of unsolved mysteries from the first three books. And then…just nothing. Nothing.
  
  Truly, I don’t even know how to rate this book. For awhile, I really thought it might be 5 stars. And then the end happened. Can I give it both 5 stars and 1 star at the same time without it averaging to 3? Because it’s not 3. 3 is forgettable. I won’t forget this.
  
• 
  Ari

  The ending was a little abrupt, but overall I really enjoyed this finale to the Small Spaces quartet. The clowns were creepy (very enjoyable), I found the role that the carnival played in the story and its workings very interesting, and seeing the kids working together was as much fun as ever. I'm gonna miss the bunch of them.
• 
  Krasi Karaivanov

  Заради финала, мога с чиста съвест да взема една звезда, но си напомням, че въпреки стреса който ми причини тази книга, тя е насочена към деца. Ако изключим последните две глави, за мен това е най-страховитата книга от поредицата. Много ми хареса, как Катрин Арден е решила да държи читателя под напрежение. Обожавам поредицата и силно препоръчвам ♥️
• 
  Mel (Epic Reading)

  From five stars in books 1 and 2; four stars for book 3, and now 3 stars for book 4, what a sad disappointment for what started out so strong and could/should be an amazing series. We know Katherine Arden can write well; so it begs the question, why wasn’t didn’t she properly finish this book? Was it time? The publisher? Lack of inspiration? Whatever the reason the end of Empty Smiles has totally soured this whole series for me.
  
  The reality is the ending is a total rip-off, it abruptly stops about 100 pages before it should (they padded the book with about 100 pages of snippets from the previous ones). I feel cheated and am shocked that didn’t play out the final stages and step to finding the keys. I mean finding key three takes two sentences. Literally, two sentences. Our wrap up with our characters is 6 pages?! A whole four book series with three (arguably four) main characters plus their parents, siblings, lived through traumas, etc; and all we get is 6 pages! It’s so sad. Arden has an opportunity to really punch home her friendship and loyalty message in the end; and yet, instead she just lets it hang and the reader absolutely salivating for more.
  
  The rest of the book doesn’t even matter in light of this sad, pathetic ending. I really wanted to gift this series and recommend it to a bunch of middle graders (and adults) in my life; but now I’m totally unsure about that. Maybe if I tell them to stop at book 1 or 2? It’s just so unfortunate that somewhere along the way the last ~100 pages of the story are missing. What a disappointment to what starts off as such a powerful, creepy, and well-written series.
• 
  jocelyn

  Katherine Arden is about to make all my dreams come true, finishing her horror series with a carnival story.
• 
  h o l l i s

  I honestly thought this would edge out DEAD VOICES as my favourite of the series. Until the story wrapped in the span of ten pages and the book abruptly ended out of nowhere. And when I say out of nowhere I mean it because there were sixty plus pages of previous-instalment excerpts at the back of the book. Which I definitely thought would be plot or reveal or explanation related.. but no. Just filler.
  
  I am.. disappointed. I feel like we're left with more questions than we started with because we had so much unexpected smiling man character reveal over the course of the book four and yet it turned out to just be a tease. And all that beautiful tension, the creepiness, the clowns!, it all just fizzles out and poof, the end.
  
  But.. for 80% of this? Solid. Eerie. Fun. So I won't round down but just.. brace yourself.
  
  Also, I know I hinted at it (and I mean, the cover is r i g h t t h e r e), but seriously, if you fear or have an issue with clowns? Middle grade or not, this might legitimately terrify you because some of those scenes? Oh yeah, they were creepy.
  
  I definitely see myself rereading these, maybe next year for a spoopy readathon or something. They weren't brilliant but they were a good time (and had some good spooky moments!) and, as I've said a million times, nostalgic for those of us who lived through the Goosebumps era of storytelling.
  
  ---
  
  This review can also be found at
  A Take From Two Cities.
• 
  b. ♡

  very easy to finish in one sitting, but definitely at the expense of a fleshed out ending
  
  four books in and i was teased with what i thought would be some very interesting character development for the main antagonist, only for the conflict to end abruptly - SUPER easily- and i’m left with so many questions on what could have been
  
  i was having a great time about 80% of the way through, but when i realized how close i was getting to the end and how many little plotlines weren’t going to be resolved, my excitement started to dwindle ;-;
  
  i need a novella or SOMETHING about the smiling man… why was he so invested in ollie staying? was he lonely? is he also trapped by the same magic he wields? what made him afraid of the funhouse if we’re assuming he made it himself?
  
  sigh, rushed ending aside however, i love the cast of characters so much and i will surely miss them <3
• 
  Robin

  This cover legitimately terrifies me.........
• 
  DivaDiane SM

  I really enjoyed this whole series and this final installment was a fitting end. I won’t spoil it!
  
  I will say that I appreciate all the gray areas of characterization that Catherine Arden gives her characters. The good guys/protagonists make mistakes and the bad guys have Motives and History. This is good. It gives the whole story more nuance and depth.
  
  I think I’ll try something she wrote recently for adults now.
• 
  Shauna

  I am a big Katherine Arden fan, so I had high expectations for this book. Sadly, the ending felt rushed and incomplete. The copy I read had an excerpt from Small Spaces in it and I didn't realize that fact. Here I was completely absorbed in what was happening, thinking that things seemed to be wrapping up quickly when it felt that I had about 50 pages left, and all of a sudden it was over. That is when I found the excerpt and my disappointment settled in. The plot ended with a simple fix and the Smiling Man just let them walk away? What? I have to wonder if that was how the end was meant to be written.
• 
  Rebecca

  I don't think I've been this let down by a book/series for a while. I really liked the first and second books. I had some issues with the third, but this one did not live up to the promise of the story at all. First, the last 60 pages are "sneak peeks" of the first three books. SIXTY PAGES. Things were starting to sort of resolve and I was waiting for the twist to get things really good and instead it just ended. With a definite fizzle. Everything in this book was way, way, way too easy. The conclusion was not satisfying at all, and all of the little hints and mysteries around the Smiling Man were not handled well. At all. There's a sort of kind of vague explanation that doesn't actually explain anything and then it's just ... over. And there are gaps in the narrative. Just exactly how do Coco and Brian get from the haunted house to the fun house? The scariest it gets is when the clowns are chasing them on the way to the carnival and then again in the haunted house and then... they just magically get to the fun house - the one place the Smiling Man would have been trying to keep them away from - with no problems. And they just immediately find the second key? and get to the entrance without being chased or running into any other obstacles? And the Smiling Man just stands there while the keys join and they leave? What?!
  I love Arden's style. I was fascinated by the world she built here. But this final book was a let down in almost every way from the characters not really getting to shine to the plot falling flat to the conclusion being supremely dissatisfying.
  
  I'm just super disappointed.
• 
  Amy

  Clowns peeking in your window? Clowns in the basement?? Clowns under the bed???!! This book was TERRIFYING! This quartet of books is a great one, and the final book did not disappoint!
• 
  Madison

  I love that Katherine Arden gets to the heart of what really scares kids, and doesn't shy away from those darker elements. It would've made me feel seen and heard as a kid, and I really respect it. This was delightfully frightening, as always, but the ending was SO abrupt.
  
  Maybe it's because the hardcover version of this book has 50+ pages of extras at the back (which feels like too much), but by the time I hit the end of the book I was like, "What?? That's it??" For the last book in a beloved series, it was a pretty big letdown. There's no big final showdown with the smiling man, no surprise at the end, no real peril at all. And when they get home, there's about a page tying everything up. I was gonna give this book four stars, but writing it out now, I'm giving it 3. The quick end is a huge, huge bummer.
  
  
• 
  Mimi

  I'm well past my mid-twenties and yet I nearly shat myself reading this in the dark because the clowns were so creepy
• 
  Jonathan Koan

  Each book in the Small Spaces Quartet has been a light horror book for kids with a different season as the theme. Small Spaces kicked off with scary Scarecrows in Fall. Dead Voices had scary Ghosts in Winter. Dark Waters had scary fish (and other elements) in Spring. This book, Empty Smiles, has scary clowns and carnivals during the summer.
  
  In terms of being a horror novel, this book is quite successful. It has quite a lot of excellent scenes that are really creepy and might even be scary for some kids. And the atmosphere has always been Katherine Arden’s strong suit as a writer, and she uses it fantastically here.
  
  This book also has to answer questions like where is Ollie and how can the gang get her back? These questions are more mixed in their answers, as some of them were very satisfactory and some of them were not.
  
  One issue I had with the book was that it has 2 major directions it tries to go in. It tries to bring in the parents after they’ve been largely absent for the last 4 books and make them a part of not only the story, but part of the solution to the problem of the Smiling Man. I thought that idea was great. However, at one point, Arden abandons this idea and returns to just the kids figuring out the solution, like each previous book has been. I don’t mind either direction (would have preferred the first, but would have been fine with the second). My ish is that Arden didn’t commit to one and it just felt off.
  
  My biggest problem with the book is the denouement. It is way too fast and doesn’t take the time it needs to take to finish out the story. Has Arden taken another 10-15 pages near the climax and denouement to wrap up the questions from the entire tetralogy, it would have been a fantastic book overall.
  
  I did like some of the really minor ideas and themes in the book about children trusting parents and communicating with them, and I appreciated the ideas between Coco and Mr. Adler developing a bond like a parent might. But these were really quick and minor themes.
  
  Overall, I enjoyed the book and it fulfilled its duty to be creepy and scary. I have some problems with it, but I enjoyed the experience of reading it. 7 out of 10.
  
• 
  Anna Evans Eklund

  Welp.
  
  I didn't think I was afraid of clowns. I DAMN WELL AM NOW. Holy shit.
  
  As I've delved further and further into the realm of horror, I've remained firmly convinced that some middle grade novels are actually the most terrifying (not necessarily the most horrific, but definitely the most terrifying) that I have read, and Katherine Arden's Small Spaces and its sequels remained at the top of that list. Empty Smiles, as the series closer--and as a book that riffs on clowns and creepy dolls--does not disappoint as a finale.
  
  Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be turning all my lights on, thanks.
• 
  CozyReaderKelly

  This installment in the series had me legitimately creeped out! I was really compelled by the story all the way until the very end. But I agree with many other reviewers that the ending was too abrupt. It could have used just two more chapters to make the climax really fantastic. As it was, I still really enjoyed this series and recommend it for those who like spooky books that aren't overly scary.
• 
  Amanda

  I felt the mystery of this book was good but compared with
  Small Spaces, each book was less successful and entertaining. The book ended much more abruptly than anticipated and I was surprised to how many pages were devoted to a "sneak peak" of
  Small Spaces, a book most readers of the series will have already read. A strange choice for editors to end the series on.