3.5 Stars
Let’s start off by addressing the giant pink elephant which will make this book be a failure for many. As the blurb says, the story here is about a young couple who “abandon the comforts of suburbia and their teaching jobs to take up residence on forty-four acres of rural land where they will begin the ultimate, aspirational do-it-yourself project: building the house of their dreams.” What it doesn’t tell you is these two are literally building the house. Alone. Just the two of them. From watching You Tube videos . . . . . .
Seriously, this may be the most I ever had to suspend disbelief in my entire reading life. Not only is it completely unrealistic that a couple of schoolteachers (neither of whom taught some sort of VoTech subject) would be able to build a house – oh and dare I forget, not just a little shanty either, but . . . . .
FFS. Yeah, a SALTBOX because that's the fucking easiest design plan in the books just adding to the WTFery of this whole plotline . . . .
Grrrrrrr, but I digress. The thing that really irked me was that part of the story wasn’t even necessary. The rest of the plot is about digging into the creepy history surrounding the family tree that sprouted from this plot of land a long, long time ago. But all of the hinkyness of the past? It came in the form of either the goings on at the property itself or via discovered artifacts. Why couldn’t they just have remodeled an existing structure or had enough money to hire builders so I didn’t get my resting bitch face on every time they talked about framing and roofing and other completely unbelievable things that made me feel like stabbing someone??????
The second thing you need to know if you have this on your TBR is that despite this being marketed/shelved as horror . . . . .
This is NOT a horror. Sure, the premise automatically calls to mind other houses with dark pasts from the recesses of one’s mind . . . . .
And there most definitely is a little bit of is everyone going crazy????? If so, how far will it go . . . .
But at the end of it all . . . . .
“First, we’ve got a witch ghost, now there’s a buried treasure? Is this Scooby fucking Doo?”
I assume this will be a mixed mag of reactions. I know I have one friend who was reading it at the same time I was and had to abandon ship because the house building was so absurd. I have no clue how I was able to ignore it, but somehow I did. I also knew right away this would end up being more of a paranormal mystery rather than a horror (which is my personal preference). It probably also helped that it rained for 172 days straight where I live either and I read this curled up basking in the gloom of both the weather and the story.
1 Star for the idiocy of the house shit, 4 Stars for the page turnability = 3.5 Stars.
ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Seriously, this may be the most I ever had to suspend disbelief in my entire reading life. Not only is it completely unrealistic that a couple of schoolteachers (neither of whom taught some sort of VoTech subject) would be able to build a house – oh and dare I forget, not just a little shanty either, but . . . . .
FFS. Yeah, a SALTBOX because that's the fucking easiest design plan in the books just adding to the WTFery of this whole plotline . . . .
Grrrrrrr, but I digress. The thing that really irked me was that part of the story wasn’t even necessary. The rest of the plot is about digging into the creepy history surrounding the family tree that sprouted from this plot of land a long, long time ago. But all of the hinkyness of the past? It came in the form of either the goings on at the property itself or via discovered artifacts. Why couldn’t they just have remodeled an existing structure or had enough money to hire builders so I didn’t get my resting bitch face on every time they talked about framing and roofing and other completely unbelievable things that made me feel like stabbing someone??????
The second thing you need to know if you have this on your TBR is that despite this being marketed/shelved as horror . . . . .
This is NOT a horror. Sure, the premise automatically calls to mind other houses with dark pasts from the recesses of one’s mind . . . . .
And there most definitely is a little bit of is everyone going crazy????? If so, how far will it go . . . .
But at the end of it all . . . . .
“First, we’ve got a witch ghost, now there’s a buried treasure? Is this Scooby fucking Doo?”
I assume this will be a mixed mag of reactions. I know I have one friend who was reading it at the same time I was and had to abandon ship because the house building was so absurd. I have no clue how I was able to ignore it, but somehow I did. I also knew right away this would end up being more of a paranormal mystery rather than a horror (which is my personal preference). It probably also helped that it rained for 172 days straight where I live either and I read this curled up basking in the gloom of both the weather and the story.
1 Star for the idiocy of the house shit, 4 Stars for the page turnability = 3.5 Stars.
ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Thanks, NetGalley!
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