This month, I thought I’d focus my pleasure reading on haunted house books—but only those that have the word “house” in the title, just for fun!
A House with Good Bones by T. Kingfisher (2023)
Samantha Montgomery is an archeoentomologist—in plain language, someone who studies ancient bugs (think the mosquitos in amber in Jurassic Park). She plans a brief visit to her mother, Edith, who has inherited Sam’s grandmother’s house. Yet when she gets there, she notices that Mom is acting oddly—displaying art that Gran Mae loved but Mom hated, obeying rigid rules of the house that were expected only in Gran Mae’s day. Worse yet, Sam is disconcerted by the vulture that perpetually sits on Edith’s mail box—sometimes not just one bird, but three or four of them.
Yet nothing disturbs Sam more than the lush, expansive rose garden in the back yard—a garden Gran Mae tended for years, more lovingly than she ever tended Edith or her grandchildren, to whom she was verbally abusive. It’s not the rose garden itself that is disturbing—in fact, it’s quite beautiful. What is disconcerting to Sam is that there are no insects anywhere on any of the plants, despite Edith claiming she leaves the garden entirely alone. To Sam, this lack of animal life is chilling, because she cannot account for it, especially since Gran Mae’s gardening nemesis—a neighbor named Gail who lives nearby—has a garden full of the normal insect life one would expect.
When Sam starts experiencing nightmares involving Gran Mae, followed by thousands of ladybugs invading Sam’s bedroom, Sam knows something is very wrong at Gran Mae’s house. Soon, neighbor Gail and Edith’s handyman, Phil, become involved in solving the mystery of a series of frightening events that culminate in a rose-haunted denouement.
Where do you go as an author when you start a haunted house book with the full blown haunting already underway—bleeding walls, ghostly children, and a helpful ghost servant?
Turning the typical ghost story plot on its head, Orlando gives us, right from the start, every detail of the murdered spirits haunting Margaret and Hal’s lovely Victorian home. But then she introduces their unknowing adult daughter, Katherine, into the mix—a young woman who had distanced herself from her dysfunctional family and so had never visited the haunted home Margaret and Hal had purchased a few years prior.
We quickly learn that Hal has recently left Margaret, unable to bear the hauntings any longer, which peak to horrific levels every September. Since leaving, Hal has failed to contact either Margaret or Katherine. His complete disappearance convinces Katherine that something unfortunate must have happened to her father. Katherine becomes determined to visit Margaret and solve the mystery of Hal’s vanishing—but she insists on arriving in September, right when the hauntings are at their most obvious and terrible.
Orlando sustains much of the tension of the first half of the book through Margaret’s attempts to keep Katherine from finding out about the many ghosts who flit through the lovely Victorian’s rooms. When Katherine discerns from her mother’s behavior that something’s amiss, Orlando uses a series of red herrings to sustain the tension further. Whether or not Katherine can find her father—and in what manner he will be found—keeps the reader wondering until the end. Be forewarned: The ghosts in Orlando’s novel are particularly violent, leading to dozens of blood-and-gore filled scenes.
Want some more ghostly fun from house-titled books? Check out the following:
- The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley JacksonThe classic tale of timid Eleanor Vance and her fateful visit to a monstrous house.
- House of Leaves by Mark Z. DanielewskiAs much fascinating textual puzzle as haunted house tale, Danielewski’s book contains clues within its pages that paint a chilling portrait of a house gone mad.
- This House Is Haunted by John BoyneA British nanny, two children, and a large empty mansion—we’re familiar with this scenario, but not with the twists author John Boyne (The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas) introduces.
- The Shunned House by H.P. LovecraftTwo intrepid paranormal investigators decide to spend the night in an abandoned house where dozens of people have died mysterious deaths. A classic haunted house tale by master-of-horror Lovecraft, included as a novelette in some of his short story collections.