Who can you trust, if you can’t trust yourself?
Alice Hunter, grieving and troubled after a breakdown, stumbles on the body of her friend and trustee, Harry Rook. The police determine he has been ritually murdered and suspicion falls on the vulnerable Alice, who inherited the place known locally as The Witch House from her grandmother, late High Priestess of the local coven. When the investigations turn up more evidence, and it all seems to point to Alice, even she begins to doubt herself.Can she find the courage to confront the secrets and lies at the heart of her family and community to uncover the truth, prove her sanity, and clear herself of murder?
💜💜💜💜.5
Hi and welcome to my review of The Witch House! Huge thanks to Red Dog Press for my spot on this ginormous tour and for the eARC!
The title intrigued me, I loved the cover and the blurb sealed the deal: I simply could not walk away from The Witch House. And my incapability to walk away paid off bigtime! The Witch House is a beautiful tale that has a little bit of everything, but always in a controlled fashion, the plot thickens quite a few times, but it never gets muddled.
Twenty-two year old Alice Hunter has just left the psychiatric ward only to come across the body of Harry, an acquaintance who might have become a dear friend if not for his untimely death and incidentally also the trustee of the estate her grandmother left her.
Alice clearly has issues, and that makes her the perfect narrator. On the one hand, she’s this vulnerable young woman you can’t help but feel for, seemingly innocent, called a Satanist mainly because her grandmother dabbled in Wicca, referred to as doolally. On the other hand, she’s not even sure she trusts herself, so how is the reader supposed to trust her? Is she a reliable narrator or an unreliable one? I was on the fence about that for quite some time!
Regardless, it soon becomes clear that when grandma died, she took a bunch of secrets with her to the grave, and one or two of those might even have contributed to Harry’s death. Although technically not even an actual character, she’s omnipresent, her past still reverberating through the lives of her offspring, and even the townsfolk.
The Witch House touches upon a few tough subjects, but Alice’s dry, dark and often self-deprecating sense of humour always manages to lighten to mood and even made me snort occasionally (yes, I’m quite the lady).
Mystery, family, police procedural, love and loss, history and mental health, The Witch House brings it all together in an atmospheric, bordering on Gothic, manner, weaving a riveting tale that captured my interest from the start, entertained me throughout and had me nailed to my seat for the super suspenseful finale. Recommended.
The Witch House is out tomorrow! Get it directly from Red Dog Press here.
I just started it today and so far I love it – GREAT review, Kelly.
Thanks Jules 💜 Enjoy!
Great review, Kelly. The protagonist being so young probably would’ve put me off, but your review has moved it to a “maybe”. 😉
She comes across as mature and not at all like a young brat, if it helps 😂 I never really mind the protagonist’s age, I still read YA 🤷♀️