Just Like Home

I did enjoy the descriptive writing in this. It really set the scene for a spooky tale. However, the conclusion fell flat and felt forced. The shift to the supernatural toward the end of the book took away from the earlier psychological elements that I wanted more of.

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Vera Crowder hasn’t been home in years. Not since her father was hauled away to jail and her mother pushed her out on her own. Trying to escape the past hasn’t been easy when her family name and house are so recognizable for the horrors that occurred there. When Vera’s dying mother calls her home to take care of the house and make arrangements, she doesn’t have much of a choice but to obey.

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Dual timelines explore what happened in the Crowder house when Vera was a child and in the present. When Vera returns home she wants answers about all those years ago, but knows more than she lets on. Haunted by the ghost of her father, an artist living in the garden shed who seems determined to reveal all of Vera’s secrets, her dying mother in the dining room, and something under the bed, Vera can’t outrun the past when she’s living in it. Will the Crowder house ever really let her go?

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This is another suspense book that employs a lot of traditional scare tactics for shock value, haunted dreams, flashbacks that don’t reveal too much, mysterious messages, and strange happenings in a dark house. But they ultimately don’t have much of an explanation or purpose, except to spook the reader and generate confusion. The book is more about creating a sense of mystery and suspense rather than revealing what actually happened in the house or exploring the actions of the characters. Just when you think you’re going to get an explanation, it’s skimmed over in just a few lines, which made it all feel hard to believe.

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I did appreciate the blurred lines between the main character’s emotional trauma and psychological reasoning with what was actually happening. Overall, I had the distinct feeling that at some point during the book we’d get the “it was all a dream” explanation. 

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I do also think this is an excellent book for a spooky book club discussion though! There are a lot of ambiguous details that are left up for interpretation and that always makes for good conversation.