Review: When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy

Whoever recommended When the Wolf Comes Home to me… I’m sending you my therapy bill.

Jess has had the worst day of her life when she finds a young boy alone and shaking outside her apartment. Shortly after, a naked man appears, arguing with her neighbors. Is he the one the boy has been hiding from? When the man disappears, something far more dangerous takes his place, and a monster begins hunting the boy, leaving destruction behind.

What follows is a relentless flight for survival against things both known and unknown. Fiction begins to bleed into Jess’s reality as she does everything she can to keep the boy safe, even as the world around her stops making sense.

This book is marketed as horror, and while there are moments that are genuinely disturbing, that label never quite worked for me. At its core, this is a story about the human condition. It’s about parenting, about becoming a parent, and about the difficult realization that our parents are fallible. Capable of love and protection, but also of failure.

More than anything, this story explores the complicated and ever-changing bonds we have with our caregivers. Those relationships shift under pressure and responsibility, and that emotional thread mattered far more to me than the moments meant to shock.

I especially loved the relationship that develops between Jess and “the boy.” Watching them navigate fear, trust, and responsibility felt honest and grounded, and their growth never felt rushed or sentimental.

If you’re going into this expecting a traditional horror novel, you may be surprised. But if you’re drawn to emotionally driven stories with speculative or sci-fi elements and strong character work, this is absolutely worth reading. Calling it a sci-fi thriller feels far more accurate than the genre it’s been given.