This was a perfect Halloween read that put me more on edge as I continued to read.
Nell, her husband Chris, and his daughter Maude return to Nell's hometown to attend a family party and have a break after Maude got into some trouble at school. Nell doesn't seem to have any fond memories of the area and is instantly anxious when they arrive. this feeling of unease is made worse by the holiday let they have rented, Elder House. Elder House is a looming character in this book, a malevolent building that seems to be alive. It has varying effects on the family, all of them disturbing. Chris has to leave to deal with a work issue, leaving Nell and Maude alone for most of the book. Their fractious relationship is tested more and more as events take a turn for the dark.
The descriptions in this book are excellent. I could visualise the house and its imposing presence, as well as the stark landscape of a windswept seaside town. The psychological impacts that the characters experience were vividly shown to the reader, and the local people that form the wider cast are all slightly off, with some being revealed as more than slightly as the story progresses!
The unsettling tone of the book keeps increasing as the situations ramp up, until I found myself unable to stop reading - I had to know how this was all going to end!
A really good read
Nell, her husband Chris, and his daughter Maude return to Nell's hometown to attend a family party and have a break after Maude got into some trouble at school. Nell doesn't seem to have any fond memories of the area and is instantly anxious when they arrive. this feeling of unease is made worse by the holiday let they have rented, Elder House. Elder House is a looming character in this book, a malevolent building that seems to be alive. It has varying effects on the family, all of them disturbing. Chris has to leave to deal with a work issue, leaving Nell and Maude alone for most of the book. Their fractious relationship is tested more and more as events take a turn for the dark.
The descriptions in this book are excellent. I could visualise the house and its imposing presence, as well as the stark landscape of a windswept seaside town. The psychological impacts that the characters experience were vividly shown to the reader, and the local people that form the wider cast are all slightly off, with some being revealed as more than slightly as the story progresses!
The unsettling tone of the book keeps increasing as the situations ramp up, until I found myself unable to stop reading - I had to know how this was all going to end!
A really good read