The Laws of the Skies

Written by Gregoire Courtois

Narrated by Daniel Matmor

Winnie-the-Pooh meets The Blair Witch Project in this very grown-up tale of a camping trip gone horribly awry.

Twelve six-year-olds and their three adult chaperones head into the woods on a camping trip. None of them make it out alive. The Laws of the Skies tells the harrowing story of those days in the woods, of illness and accidents, and a murderous child.

Part fairy tale, part horror film, this macabre fable takes us through the minds of all the members of this doomed party, murderers and murdered alike.

• Language: English
• Publisher: ECW Press
• Release date: Feb 15, 2022
• ISBN: 9781770567016

Gregoire Courtois

Grégoire Courtois lives and works in Burgundy, where he runs the independent bookstore Obliques, which he bought in 2011. A novelist and playwright, he has published three novels with Le Quartanier: Révolution (2011), Suréquipée (2015), and Les lois du ciel (2016). In 2013 he founded Caractères, an international book festival in Auxerre, which he continues to run. 

Reviews for The Laws of the Skies

[Solan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Amazing novel! The last chapter will have you squirming and wishing it over already. A rough, bleak, visceral read. Not a book you should read if you are struggle with scenes where children are physically, emotionally or psychologically harmed. Not sure it belongs in the "dark humor" category though as it's a lot more literary and heavy than that genre tag would suggest.

[Melissa Helm · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It's twisted and graphic. A pretty decent horror story, reads at a good pace without unnecessary excess.

[Ra Smith · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Absolutely disturbing!
I’m lost for any other words.

Except, definitely give it a listen.

[Heidi Sheehan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A camping trip goes horribly wrong in this book. It is extremely violent, brutal, and gory. Not for the faint of heart when it comes to gore and violence. This book was well done and the narrator did a great job.

[Trisha Bevard · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Dark but brightly engaging, this novel barely gives you a moment of respite from its horrors. It’s also tenderly human at times, and breaks the fourth wall intermittently to draw you in even further. It’s simply outstanding. (Also, the choice of narrator was impeccable. His reading was absolute perfection!)

[Nina Quartuccio · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Seriously well done for it's size. This was so interestingly well done by the narrator, he was telling the story instead of playing a roll. Suspenseful and tragic with great visual depictions, I was sadened and appalled but loving the matterafact narration so much that I found myself thinking, does the author have no boundaries? Great stuff!

[Mrs Henson · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Whew! Exquisitely written, perfectly narrated, and brutal from the get-go till the end.

[Nayah Wiley · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Think: Final Destination but with children and a dense forest

[Sarah · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Where do I start? I'm not sure. They all died. I've read some dark, fucked up shit in my time. Thing others puked over. Had nightmares about. That didn't phase me one bit. However this shook me a little, and to be a 100% truthful. I'm not sure if it was in the ways they died. Or the story the teacher told them before it all fell apart. The poor little mouse....

[Rebecca Wulff · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great descriptive writing for such a short book. Narration was superb. Be forewarned; disturbing material. Unfortunately, in this day, not hard to imagine.

[paul · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Well that was brutal. My mind can not grasp the image of 6 year olds accomplishing this but otherwise it is quite a twisted story

[Daisy Kirby · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Children in large groups, scary right off the bat, am I right?
I have no idea where the 'dark humour ' that Everand classified this story as, comes into it.
This story was tense and disconcerting all the way through, and the last act has me seriously thinking that there is actually something wrong with the writer. And it's the last act that dropped my rating down a full star.

[Reagan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Omg!!! This book is insane!! Talk about a creepy ass monster child! Wow! Couldn’t walk away from this one !! Amazing read!! Bravo!!

[Dara Parisi · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Essentially Final Destination but with kids! I find it a bit illogical that all these very unfortunate events would befall a group of 15 people so NONE of them survived in a matter of like, a 10-hour timespan…..that being said, all the deaths themselves, individually, were things I could see happening in this situation.

I can’t believe people leaving reviews are saying the deaths are “boring” ? After reading, I can understand where they’re coming from but….the fact that they’re dying is enough! ?Yes, it’s descriptive enough and yes, it’s horrible enough!

I obviously read this out of morbid curiosity and I can’t say I enjoyed it, but it had its moments.

I agree with many other reviews that say some of the 6-year-old thoughts don’t seem like they’re that of a 6-year-old….especially Enzo ? And the pov changes mid sentence and mid paragraph were wild! Had me doubling back and figuring out how to switch my brain gears! That was an odd choice from the author for sure.

I did like some of the writing other than that. I liked the way things were described and the super creepy story the teacher told them in the first part! That was almost sadder than the main plot tbh ? but the majority was difficult for me to follow easily and took me out of the creep!

The ending was as satisfying as it gets for me, but also illogical…I’ll keep this spoiler-free so I wont say why, but that also kind of took me out of it bc I was like ???

Recommended to those who will read things that everyone says not to bc it’s too gross/disturbing and who like a quick read!

[Andra · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Amaizing, amaizing, amaizing, amaizing, amaizing, amaizing,amaizing, amaizing, amaizing, amaizing ,

[Duane Harrison · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I think I missed the point in some way. Maybe it was a cultural thing, but the story seemed unnecessarily brutal. I think the underlying theme was the fragility of life or something similar, but it came across as an excuse to explore violence and gore. The author spent an entire chapter describing a boar eating a child alive from the child’s perspective. While the language used was precise and intelligent, the story itself was not.
I’d be pissed if I had paid for this book.