| Title | : | The Day of the Door |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | - |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 228 |
| Publication | : | First published April 23, 2024 |
Now two decades later, Stella promises to finally reveal the truth of what happened on The Day of the Door. Accompanied by a paranormal investigative team, the Lasco family comes together one final time, but no one is prepared for the revelations waiting for them on the third floor.
The Day of the Door Reviews
-
Nothing New Under the Sun...
THE DAY OF THE DOOR
by Laurel Hightower
No spoilers. 3 stars. I'm going to disclose, right from the start, that I got 30% into this novel before it became a DNF for me.
There's an old proverb that goes like this:
There's nothing new under the sun. This saying popped into my mind as I tried to finish this novel because I've read variations of this plot many times before.
I realize that I'm an outlier here, but all I've read so far, at 30%, is another PARANORMAL ACTIVITIES story with unresolved family drama.
The mother is insufferable (which her character is meant to be), but her adult children willingly agree to become victims (again) to Mother's psychotic behavior.
I realize that it might just be me due to all the 5 star reviews, but I have to go with my honest opinion on this.
The story is about four children living in constant fear that their crazy mother is going to lose it on them, and she finally does (possibly) killing her oldest child.
The surviving family is dispersed by Social Services.
Years later, the children, now adults, are asked to make a documentary in the house where their brother was murdered and to reunite with their self-serving mother.
I just wasn't buying that three grown adults would agree to reunite and make a documentary with a mother that abused them and (possibly) murdered their brother, then allow themselves to become victims of her psychosis once again.
Some readers evidently liked this novel very much, so take that into consideration when you read this review, but I have an obligation to be honest with MY opinion.
BELOW by this author is a very good story. -
I think I have found my new favourite horror author in Laurel Hightower. I have several of her books on my list to read, but this was the first one I ever have, and it was EXCELLENT!!
Nate, and his sisters Aury and Katy, suffered years of abuse as children, by their mother Stella. Twenty years after Stella killed their older brother Shawn at just 17 years old, the remaining three siblings want the truth from her, once and for all…was it a supernatural force, which she has always claimed, or is she the cruel, evil abuser they remember.
This had me gripped from beginning to end, and although I wanted to know the truth also, I didn’t want the book to end. I shall definitely be moving the other books by Laurel Hightower, up my list…pronto!!
Thanks to the author and BookSirens for sending me this free ARC, of which I leave a voluntary review.
5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ -
I absolutley adore anything Laurel writes and this was surprise surprise no exception, right from the first sentence I was hooked like a little spooky fish and couldn't (didn't) wanna look away, for fans of A Head Full of Ghosts this was a tense psychological family drama with a supernatural backdrop that infuses every page with a visceral sense of unease and terror, my eyes bulged out my head reading some scenes, Laurel always writes incredibly unique multi layered stories that stay with me long after reading, the ambiguity of this story is something that I really enjoyed it kept me on my toes, if you love themes of ghosts, hauntings and possession you'll be right at home (but it might be haunted), well crafted characters whos pain is palpable made me all the more invested, Laurels writing is compelling and in my opinion she is one of the best storytellers today, all the stars!
-
This one hit home in all the right ways. If you grew up with a narcissist, you need to read this. Hell, read it anyway, but beware: it's potent and will make you feel things. Highly recommended.
-
In "The Sect of the Idiot," Thomas Ligotti wrote, "Life is a nightmare that leaves its mark upon you in order to prove that it is, in fact, real." While the unnamed narrator of his short story writes under the surveillance of a Lovecraftian Them and discovers the meaninglessness of life by way of madness, it's a sentiment that feels just as valid when applied to Laurel Hightower's The Day of the Door, even as her characters reach a more cathartic and far less nihilistic conclusion than Ligotti's own.
At the heart of The Day of the Door is familial trauma, shared tragedy, and psychic wounds that have been inflicted upon the Lasco children by matriarch Stella. The oldest of them, Shawn, died at 17, taken behind the door of a third-floor room of the family home by their mother. Only Stella emerged from that room to bury the truth of what occurred, the authorities ruling rebellious, trouble-making Shawn's death a suicide. Now, 20-years later, Nate and his sisters have reunited with Stella at the haunted home they grew up in to appear in a quasi-documentary being filmed by a ghost hunting crew in the hopes that they can finally wind up their narcissistic, abusive, and cunning mother enough to finally get the truth out of her.
Hightower's latest is an empathic exploration of the relationship between a narcissist and her children and it's one I found uncomfortably accurate. Her depictions of what it's like to be raised by an emotionally unavailable parent with a very loose connection to reality is perfectly rendered and one I found intensely relatable. At times, her passages felt like a personal diary, like the worries the Lasco children possess of turning out just like Stella and how, because they could never understand her behavior toward them as kids, believe they're unable to have control over their own and refuse to allow anyone to become close to them. Or how Nate wonders how deeply they've all been programmed by Stella and how long it would take before pieces of her "stopped seeping from their mouths and minds?" Or how Stella is completely incapable of self-reflection and would "rather turn her back on the truth than for one second have to admit she wasn't perfection itself."
I could relate to Nate Lasco so easily because, in a lot of uncomfortable ways, I am him. My father was a narcissist and only grew worse as succumbed to dementia. He always believed himself to be the smartest man in the room -- nobody ever knew anything, everybody was an idiot and an asshole, and he rarely had a kind word to spare anybody. And, like Stella, if you ever called him out on his bullshit, you were the problem, you were the bully, and you needed to stop being so sensitive and emotional, not him. The world was locked in a massive conspiracy targeting him, and every inconvenience was the work of malign forces hellbent on disrupting his life, from the customer service operator at the cable company up to the President of the United States, except Trump who, naturally, he worshipped. Go figure, right? He rewrote his own reality when confronted with his cancer diagnosis, denying he was sick right on up through his final day, insisting it was COVID-19 and that he'd been infected by a coalition of Arabs and Chinese forces working to eliminate him because he knew too much. And like Nate, I spent an inordinate amount of my time vowing that I would never turn out like him and hating myself every time I heard his words coming out of my mouth or found my reactions to particular infractions mirroring his.
Reading about Stella was like being thrust back into the grandiose delusions of my father. I suspect some more fortunate readers might find Stella too inconsistent and too shallow a character, but I would argue otherwise. There's a deep layer of psychoses inherent in her, and Hightower captures it wonderfully. She's either done a remarkable job at research or invests Stella with her own lived experiences. If we're to take seriously the old adage about writing what you know, then Hightower damn well does know exactly what she writes in these pages, to an uncanny and intimate degree.
The Day of the Door is, obligatorily, about ghosts, but that's all just surface-level stuff. Once you scrape away the pond scum of literalness, it's really about the ghosts of us, living or otherwise, and the past that haunts us, the memories we hold onto and how and why we remember them. It's about the scars cut into our skin and soul by those who should have held us dear but who were too twisted by their own hauntings to do so. Because life is a nightmare, and too often that nightmare is right here at home with us. -
Nathan Lasco hasn't spoken to his mother Stella for twenty years, after suffering a childhood full of emotional and physical abuse that culminated in the horrific death of his older brother Shawn, who died after their mother dragged him into a room on the third floor of their home and locked the door. For two decades, Stella has denied all culpability in not only the death of her son but also the abuse of all of her children, and now blames Shawn's death on the influence of an evil entity in the home. When Stella is approached to be the star of a ghost hunting series, she can't resist the opportunity to once again be the center of attention. With some convincing on the part of his two sisters, Nathan reluctantly agrees to participate and return to the home of his nightmares, in the hopes that shedding light on what really happened to Shawn on "the day of the door" will enable the three remaining Lasco siblings to finally move past the childhood that still haunts them all.
The Day of the Door, if it wasn't already obvious, leans heavily into some tough issues. Hightower doesn't hold back on the physical and emotional abuse inflicted by Stella Lasco on her children, and even though we don't see most of this abuse unfolding in the present narrative, it's still pretty tough to read at times. The book also looks at how a childhood spent at the mercy of an abusive and mentally ill parent can manifest in those children as adults. Stella Lasco sort of gave me vibes of Toni Collette in the last half of the movie Hereditary, but Stella was just that f'd up from the get-go.
The supernatural elements in the book are impossible to isolate from the themes of trauma and abuse, and there are times when the reader is lead to wonder if there really is anything supernatural going on at all, but there are also some really creepy scenes and a good dose of outright gore that definitely make this a horror novel.
This was an easy and unsettling read. The last chapter makes me think Hightower might be planning a sequel, and I would definitely be on board for that. -
The Day of the Door is an engrossing tale of family drama, childhood abuse, addiction and the supernatural.
Hightower is a gifted storyteller blending mystery into the plot making you want to read just one more chapter. The characters are wonderful with our protagonists dealing with the lifetime consequences of horrific abuse and the death of a sibling at the hands of their own mother? Was it her or something else?
I particularly loved Carrie and the final chapter and her conversation with Nate. It was heartfelt and profound and I've been thinking about her words and how it's relevant to my own life. Beautiful, violent, tense and scary.
Another hit for Laurel Hightower definitely one to read. -
The not knowing. That’s what really got to me. I had to find out. What happened? What’s going to happen? I couldn’t/wouldn’t stop. I started the day at 40% and I plowed through the rest in a reading frenzy. There was no way I could go to sleep without some resolution. I did not want those dreams.
-
Truthfully, I wasn’t sure how much I’d enjoy this story; it sounded more like psychological horror with a complex grief based plot. Sometimes these type of stories can get a little bogged down in my opinion. However, I know what an incredible author Laurel is, and knew I had to take a chance on this book.
Thank goodness it was up the author’s usual high quality of work. I actually enjoyed the emotional rollercoaster the characters went on, empathizing and sympathizing with their struggles. There were some genuinely scary moments, and the book was hard to put down.
There are supernatural elements, the narrator’s traits and traumas are dissected, and everyone involved (author, readers, characters) battle for a resolution to what happened in the house the Lasco’s lived in.
“The place had bad energy; even he could feel that. He stood unmoving, his eyes locked on the door that changed everything.”
Thank you to the author & BookSirens for a copy. -
The family trauma that pervades THE DAY OF THE DOOR is horrifying enough, but coupled with the intensely creepy events that occur, this story encapsulates "HORROR" in a masterful, terrifying way. Laurel Hightower has written a beautiful, dark story about the Things that haunt our hearts.
-
Hightower Rules!
A new favorite. THE DAY OF THE DOOR is riveting, beautifully written, and absolutely creepy. If you haven't read Hightower, you're missing out on one of the best purveyors of modern fiction. Highly recommended! -
This is the story of Lasco’s family: four siblings and their mother living in Harper Lane house. In a devilish night, Shawn the eldest brother died in a violent way behind that closed door.
Was it accidental? What happened in there? An evil force or a human being?
The only thing that Nathan Lasco knows for sure is that he will never forgive Stella, his mother.
Twenty years later the whole family gathers together in Harper Lane, because finally the truth needs to see the light. Helped by a paranormal team which wants to film a documentary about the events that occurred in that fateful night, the party begins 😈 👥: Shadows, candles, possessions, séances, Jacob’s Ladder and many more to come…But, who really killed Shawn? Were they be able to find the truth?.
An eerie psychological horror story which plays with the ambiguity of earthly and spiritual world. That whole first chapter is crazy insane.
For sure, you readers, are going to have a magnificent time reading this.
I want to thank Laurel for sending me a digital copy of the book, thank you for the trust 🖤🩶. -
*Huge thanks to Laurel for sending me a digital ARC!*
When one of your favorite authors announces they have a book coming out, you get excited, you preorder it and then you patiently wait for the release day to devour it. In this case, I was lucky enough to jump the release day window when Laurel kindly sent me an ARC (though to be fair, I kind of subtlety whined about it on FB, when I said I was jealous a buddy of mine had already read it and Laurel DM’d me! And I stand by jealousy from that time, HA!!).
Everything about this one screamed to me that it would destroy me. Trevor Henderson cover. Check. A sibling dying under mysterious circumstances. Check. Laurel Hightower writing it. Check. Everything Laurel writes is gold, but sometimes, like in this case, its gold wrapped in golden gold. What I mean is, this one was solid gold.
What I liked: The story that unfolds within focuses on Nathan Lasco and the surviving siblings who have lived all these years after their brother died. While nothing had ever been confirmed, they all believe it was their mother who killed him, behind that closed door, though she’s always insisted a malevolent entity was behind his death.
When Nathan finds out that a film crew wants to get them all back together, the kids and his estranged mom, he hopes things will finally come out and a confession can be obtained.
It’s from this point on that Hightower gives us one of the most infuriating, gas-lighting and self-centered bitch of a character you’ll ever read. Not since Caitlin Marceau’s ‘This Is Where We Talk Things Out’ have I been this frustrated and a big part of that is just how fucking accurate the depiction within of the mother is. She’s one of those people who suck you dry, slurp the energy from the room and somehow make you feel bad and that you’re the one who did everything, not her. Time and time again, literally in every single paragraph that she appears in – and many where she’s being mentioned – this character ignites a fury in the reader and will piss you off so much that you want to just scream at the top of your lungs for somebody to walk over to her and just smack the shit out of her.
Hightower nails this character, and typically, knowing how she operates, this character is based off someone specific, which ramps up that fury and passionate dislike even more.
Nathan himself is a very complicated character, one who you both feel for but also wish he’d get things together. He comes off as a guy who is willing to try and turn things around, but not willing to go all the way, other than his firm belief that nothing paranormal occurred all those years ago. That is, until the repressed memories start to return and we get snippets of a darkness that walked the hallways and lurked in the corners.
Between the anger that the mother creates in the reader and the sheer terror Hightower creates throughout, this novel had me hooked and hooked hard. It was something that called to me when I wasn’t reading it and I love when a book does that.
The ending of the events and the revelation of what really happened was both cathartic and horrifying and really worked well to show the bond of the siblings, who they themselves were solid, if not secondary characters, but to also answer the question about whether this was a haunting or not.
What I didn’t like: While Nathan’s boss/crush was a solid character, I wasn’t really sold on her ending aspect within the novel. I can’t share more than that, for spoilers, but her role was great otherwise, I just don’t know if it was a way to try and utilize her in the future for a second book, which it kind of felt like.
Why you should buy this: Hightower never holds back from unleashing terror and this is yet another reason why she’s a must-read author for me. From start to finish this rips along and as the lights dim and the stairs creak, she does a wonderful job of scaring the shit out of the reader. All while making them want to slap that person who gaslights them in real life, because we can’t slap this fictional mother.
Which is such a shame. -
Surprisingly, The Day of the Door is neither a gripping tale of carpentry nor a DIY guide to home improvement. Nope. It is, instead, one of the best horror stories I read this year.
It works on all levels that count (for me) in horror - it ties tight plotting with strong character work and good pacing. The story revolves around a dysfunctional family. Lasco siblings, raised by narcistic Stella, share childhood trauma. They meet again, this time with their mother and a paranormal investigative team to discover the truth about a hellish night that ended their childhood. One thing is sure - their eldest brother Shawn died violently after being dragged behind closed doors. But how, why, and by whose hands? Stella claims she was a victim, too.
The book opens with a brutal scene and has a shocking end. Everything that happens in between feels perfectly timed, well-thought-out, and true to the narrative and circumstances. Unresolved family trauma and a history of abuse tie siblings. Their shared dislike (hate even?) for their mother results in an interesting family dynamics. And I get it - Stella is a terrible person with no redeeming qualities. And that’s what elevates The Day of The Door above most horror novels that use the trope of a film crew in a haunted location. I mean, it’s clear bad things will happen and we’ll get jump scares, but Hightower gives us much more.
As the sibling slowly discover the truth, we get a glimpse at what impact trauma has on family and its members individually. It’s the story about the kids and we spend enough time in their heads to make their responses to events authentic. The scares are real, too.
The Day of the Door is an excellent, often terrifying psychological horror that got to me. Also, this cover is nuts! -
Omg, what a roller coaster ride of grief and familial abuse! First of all, this cover is incredible, Trevor Henderson can do no wrong in my eyes! Next, this story was so fantastic!! Four siblings go through years of abuse from a narcissistic mother until one night something horrible happens behind the door. Years later ghost hunters want to do a show on the family and the house they lived in. Laurel creates a a suffocating atmosphere where you’re afraid to breathe!! So much sadness and grief, but a buildup that you won’t want to take your eyes off of! A terrific ending, and characters that I felt so much for. This is one I will be definitely recommending!!
-
Eyes. Teeth. Fingers. Oh my!
This was a slow-burning grief horror ghost story that really had me gripped. Each turn of the page, pulled me deeper and deeper into the mystery of this tale. So deep, that when the terror hit, it hit hard.
Oh, my poor emotions!
Although this is a short review, it comes with huge stars.
Loved it very. 🖤 -
The Day of the Door is ABSOLUTELY terrifying!!
Laurel Hightower knows how to deliver a punch to the gut with her writing! In The Day of the Door, she gives us the haunted house I'm going to have nightmares about for months. This story follows a family traumatized by possession and death. However, when they get the option to revisit the sequences of that day with a paranormal investigation team, secrets are revealed and the truth is deadly!
I was shocked by how quickly I devoured this story! I really loved the way that this was written and was quickly enraptured by the story and characters. Nate in particular had such a witty (and pessimistic) way of thinking that I felt like it really pulled me in to start, but stayed because all the other characters had me hooked. Also, when the plot thickened and the reveals started happening my jaw was on the ground. Especially with the last chapter?!? Literally such a fantastic book! -
So, this was my second Laurel Hightower novel and man oh man did I enjoy this one.
Shawn, Nate, Aury and Katy Lasco, grew up in a volatile and tumultuous environment with their mother Stella. After facing years of abuse, one-night things take a turn for the worse when their eldest brother Shawn is brutally murdered. Stella swears she didn't kill Shawn, some unknown malevolent force is responsible. No one knows the truth, no one knows what really happened behind that door on that fateful and gruesome night. Twenty years has passed, and the remaining siblings still harbor guilt, resentment, hatred, trauma and are still struggling to cope with the loss of their brother. When Nate is approached by his youngest sister Katy, who along with their estranged mother, wants to hire a paranormal investigation team to enter their childhood home and finally uncover the evil that lurks and resides there.
Is there mother telling the truth? Is some unknown entity responsible for the death of their brother. Or is the true evil their own flesh and blood?
I loved this book so much that I binged it in one day. I could not look away from this dysfunctional family and found myself completely engrossed in this story. The book is fast paced, spooky, has an overwhelming sense of foreboding and lots of family drama. I loved the characters and the whole gothic feel of this one. There seriously was never a dull moment and I was transported onto the pages of this book and with these characters. I felt every bit of fear, grief, anger and frustration they felt along the way.
Laurel skillfully and beautifully intertwines childhood trauma and grief into this spooky read without ever taking away from the true storyline. This book has so many layers to it, and I loved every minute of it. That ending was so intense and suspenseful, yet simultaneously poignant and beautiful as the Lasco siblings finally got vindication for their brother and closure for themselves.
The Day of the Door skillfully combines the psychological thriller genre with the supernatural horror one and will captivate you from beginning to end. A very enjoyable few hours were spent reading this one and it was a solid five star read for me.
Thank you to Booksirens, Ghoulish Publishers and Laurel Hightower for eARC of this book. All opinions are my own and I am leaving my review voluntarily.
-
A family gathers at their old house to get to the bottom of the death of the eldest son, which might have been caused by some paranormal entity or just by their abusive mother, all while a film crew is following them, catching images for their low budget supernatural show.
I got this book in advance in exchange of an honest review, and here it is: This is a great horror book. It's not hard to think of Paul Tremblay's A HEAD FULL OF GHOSTS by reading the synopsis alone, and it does share some plotlines, but this is its own work. A fast read, with good dialogue on most occasions (especially between our protagonist Nate and his mentor), and a genuine creepy vibe. A solid, honest to god scary book.
My only complaint: I'd love for it to be longer, with Stephen King-style extended flashbacks, to sell us the family's previous life more thoroughly, but that's just an style preference; the actual content is great.
So yeah, I fully reccomend this book for anyone into spooky stories and family trauma to iron out. -
This below is from my blurb. Loved this book. Shadows look different to me now.
"The Day of the Door by Laurel Hightower is a sparking crucible of family strife from its brutal opening scene to its shocking end. Three adult children, whose lives have been shattered by the trauma of their brother's death, finally get to confront the person responsible: their mother Stella. But that isn't the whole story, is it? The Day of the Door is a propulsive, often terrifying read that diced my nerve endings. Take a deep breath before you dive in because Hightower always holds you under."
Read it. -
That was really creepy and atmospheric.
-
I wouldn’t say this book was a bad book or not worth reading. It just wasn’t for me. I was thinking it would be more of a supernatural thriller but it had a very long work up to a not so great ending. It just wasn’t my jam. I would give this author another chance though.
I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. -
A violent, abusive mother drags the oldest of her four children into a room and locks the door. Shortly thereafter, he is dead.
Twenty years later, the surviving children decide to confront their mother in the house where the tragedy occurred. She claims her son's death was an accident, and that furthermore, some kind of dark energy that dwelled in the house caused all of the violence. Her three other children want her to own up to what she had done, how she abused all of them.
Horror works well as an allegorical device. Is the mother at fault if she had a mental illness? If she were "possessed" by emotions she could not control? Is she at fault if she were "possessed" by a ghost? There's layers of trauma, of grief, of anger, for the now-adult kids to peel back and process, all inside a very spooky, potentially haunted, house, with a deeply unlikeable narcissist of a mother. (Seriously, she is awful. I loved how much I hated her.)
Very scary imagery, too - just check out that cover! -
I enjoyed this, but I think this really would have benefited from being a little longer and a dual timeline setup where we see the story from the kids’ perspectives in the past and their current storyline as adults. Kind of like Dark Places, where you know the bad thing & that it’s coming and that’s what makes it even more tense.
Would’ve loved to have gotten to know Shawn more and see how the characters have changed since the tragedy happened. -
This was INTENSE! What a creepy exploration of the effects of having a narcissistic parent. The way this was tied with the supernatural elements gave me CHILLS, but at the same time gut punched me with all the complex emotions. The atmosphere of this was unsettling and intense! I didn’t want it to end but was gripping to find out what actually was the cause for the day of the door. This will be a book I won’t forget!
-
I can’t gush about this book enough! It was, by far the best horror that I have read in awhile, and I give it all the stars!
Never having read Hightower, I didn’t know what to expect. Her characters are raw, the setting was so unbelievably real that I felt like I was right there with them. I enjoyed every page and soaked it all up and I almost cried at the end because I knew that that was the end of a book that I can’t read all over again without remembering so well.
Just know that when you start reading this book, you won’t want to stop, you can’t look away, it is that good. The way that the family is portrayed is so vivid and true to life. It’s also heart wrenching. Nate and Carrie are my favorite characters in the book and you will understand why.
This needs to be turned into a film immediately. Anyone who is reading this review is going to see this book posted on many other Bookstagrammer’s posts, I believe in it that much!!!!!! 👏👏👏
📚 Book Pairing- A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay -
2.75
The horror bits: great
The family drama: AAaaAAAAaAAAAAaaAAaaa (I couldn’t stand anyone, sorry) -
I read this entire book in one sitting in about two hours and found myself unable to tear my eyes away. The book drew me in immediately and kept me engaged and guessing at what the true story behind the family's loss was. This has everything I could have hoped for: ghost hunters filming a special, a séance, family drama, a therapist who moonlights as a connection to the spiritual realm. Every character in this feels fully fleshed out, and you feel for them as if you know them yourselves.
I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. -
I was really hoping this wouldn’t be the middle of the road for me. But I knew pretty early on that this would probably be a three star. Which makes me sad because I liked ‘Below’ by this author a lot. I will probably still read crossroads!
Don’t get me wrong. This book was fine. It had aspects that I liked. I really love familial drama in horror. I also liked the deeper tones of this book and the impact and uncertainty that an abusive relationship with a parent can cause. I was for the most part really drawn in to what happened to this family in the past.
I also did think it had moments of some really spooky scenes. There was definitely an atmosphere around the setting that I liked. I also wasn’t sure where this was going the entire time, so it kept my interest.
With that being said, a lot of the book also just really drug for me. It was like everything was being said, and nothing was being said at the same time.
The author made the choice to make the siblings not very close in adulthood, and to me that made very little sense, and made it hard to root for them or believe their bond. The emotions I was expected to be feeling did not pack the punch they should have.
I also felt like the storyline of what happened to their brother was not as developed as it could have been because a lot of it didn’t make sense . Especially when we get to the part where police were involved when they were younger. The more they talk about how that played out the less realistic it is. A lot of suspension of disbelief is required. And I just couldn’t do it for some of the book.
And I’m completely unsure of how I feel about the ending. Choices were definitely made, and I’m not sure if I like them or feel they were cheesy. But I will say a lot of it felt like a plot hole. Just didn’t make the most sense.
It wasn’t horrible, but definitely not this authors strongest work. -
Oh, I LOVED this!! Thank you to the author for an early digital copy to read - I kept seeing people post such glowing reviews of this and it sounded so interesting, so I was very excited when Laurel asked if I wanted to read it!
This was a wild reading experience for me, because on the one hand I really love stories with "bad moms" and abusive family situations (I find them super relatable), but I've never had one come as close to my actual experiences before this. Despite being solidly within the paranormal realm of things, this book had so many things that felt applicable to real life, specifically to my own. It's probably TMI that I saw a lot of my own mom in the mother character here, but I'm saying it because I want to make it super clear how realistic the portrayal of an abusive, toxic, narcissistic mom is -- and how that sort of upbringing can shape you, causing you to actively fight against your learned behaviors toward something that's a bit more healthy and stable.
I loved the inclusion of therapy here, enjoyed all the different characters, and honestly just couldn't put it down. Laurel absolutely nailed the horror & creepiness in this one, but she also really nailed the heart: healing from trauma is never linear, and sometimes the people closest to us can do the most damage.
A new favorite for sure. Highly recommend!
___________________________
Find me outside of Goodreads!
Substack |
Instagram |
YouTube
