I received a copy from Netgalley.

The synopsis of this one caught my attention when browsing Netgalley. I usually like small town haunted houses with a secret and especially ones where someone’s coming back to a childhood home.

The novel started out interestingly enough. However, it felt very long winded and over written after a while and failed to keep my attention from about half way through. I did find myself skimming over the latter parts of the novel as I was mildly interested in how it all concluded. It took forever for anything to remotely happen.

The story stars with the heroine Kris going back to her hometown with her daughter after losing her husband in an accident, Kris appears to be a workaholic vet and the daughter has withdrawn and seems to be struggling to cope. Kris feels a fresh start will help them move on.

Arriving at the house they find it overgrown and the estate agent lied about the condition of the house  - it’s got a bit of a reputation in the town. It’s so slow and boring as Kris and the daughter start to clean the house and Kris finds mementos of her childhood and starts remembering things she’d forgotten. Creepy things start happening.

Whilst visiting the local town Kris learns about a series of murders and missing children. The daughter starts talking to someone who isn’t there – an invisible friend. More creepy things start happening. Kris remembers more stuff from her own childhood and her own creepy invisible friend. Who may or may not have been real.

Interesting concept but the execution didn’t really work for me at all. I didn’t connect to the characters, I didn’t feel any emotion whilst reading other than just wanting to get this book over and done with. Disappointing as I usually like this kind of story. Not for me.

Thank you to Netalley and Inkshares for approving my request to view the title.

Violet is a great follow up to Kill Creek but it is a very different book and I think that is a beautiful thing. Kill Creek featured many characters creating all sorts of chaos and mayhem while Violet is much more of an intimate read about grief, trauma and the danger of burying memories so far inside that they begin to leak out in the most dangerous of ways.

You’re going to have to be in a certain frame of mind to read this one. It is a slow burning, atmospheric read, very detailed, character oriented read and it takes its own sweet time building up the scenes and the characters and slowly revealing all of its secrets. This worked well for me because I had some time on my hands and I was ready for some creeping dread and Violet delivers.

After a life-altering, trauma causing event, Kris returns to her childhood lake house hoping to help her daughter heal emotionally and find her way back to being a happy child again. Kris has only fond memories of the summer home that helped her family through her mother’s losing bout with cancer. But memories are tricky things . . . The house in serious disarray when they arrive because it has been left to rot. There’s a reason for this, of course, but I am not going to tell you what it is. Kris begins to restore things to their previous glory, keeping herself and her daughter busy, but as she starts chatting up the locals, she soon learns that something very unsettling has been happening in the idyllic town and she realizes that bringing her daughter here wasn’t such a great idea.

“The house looked like a crumbling headstone on a forgotten grave.”

If I had one word to describe this story it would have to be unnervingly-heartbreaking. Okay that’s two words connected by a dash but it’s my review and I will always do what I want, haha. Eerie moments fill this book and create a sense of unease that builds and builds until you just might be seeing dark things in the corner of your room, under your bed or in the closet. Seriously, read this with all the lights on because it creeped me out in a way that most things don’t. I think it was because of the slow, slow build and the tiny terrible moments that kept occurring in-between the daily grind of refinishing a home. It gets under your skin after a while.

If you’re in the mood for a character driven, spooky story and have some hours free, give it a go. It has a little mystery, a lot of emotion, characters that feel like real people and some very haunting imagery.

4 1/2 Stars

Content warning behind the spoiler tag:

Source: Book received for review consideration.

Audience: Adult

Format: Audiobook/Owned

"No house is born bad."

- first sentence

I listened to this book for Halloween Bingo at the end of September. I've been swamped with school, work, and trying to get settled in my new house so I haven't had time to write any reviews.

I enjoyed this book. It was a slow build and I kept thinking something was going to happen, but the story kept taking unexpected turns. After all this time, that's all I have. *shrugs*

How many ghost stories have I read where a group of people are invited to spend the night in a supposedly haunted house? Well, I don’t know, but it seems like about a gazillion. This one, though, was just different enough to thoroughly enjoy the modern twist where the guests are all horror authors – although each of very different and distinct styles – and the host is a celebrity producer of viral internet marketing schemes. While each character is a Type, they are not caricatures, and even the most dislikeable ones are still sympathetic in some way. The story is a bit of a slow burn, where there are merely hints of the unexplainable through the first half, but there will be plenty of graphic blood and gore by the end, with a final twist that took me by surprise.

I read this for the 2018 Halloween Bingo square Modern Masters of Horror: horror published in or after 2000. Kill Creek was published in 2017.

Audiobook, via Audible. I really enjoyed the narration by  Bernard Setaro Clark.

Previous Updates:

10/16/18 – 19%

Sometimes an author creates awful characters and clearly relishes that. Highsmith did that. Most crime novelists do I suppose, either as victim or criminal. Harris' Hannibal Lector is another. What's noir but sexy awful people doing one another in?

These main characters are not awful But it feels as if Thomas is filled with contempt for them. There's fat shaming and slut shaming and flyover shaming: what possible horrors can the house hold compared to these?

Library copy