Review by Booklist Review
One stormy night on Marrowstone Island, a sinister house washes up on the beach, elderly Mrs. Culpepper keels over, and her grandson, Simon, disappears after messaging his childhood friend Melissa that his grandmother died of fright. Melissa and their other old friend, Leo, head to Marrowstone to look for Simon, only to find that a long-buried horror is awakening, and they are the only ones who can stop it. Smartly paced, with plenty of action, this genre-bending novel moves between past summers of the trio as kids and teens and the present as Melissa and Leo navigate their uneasy friendship, search for the man they both love, and try to stop the apocalypse. It features stellar characterization, particularly of ambitious Leo, who can see ghosts following a near-death experience as a child, and some fun plot twists that wouldn't be out of place in the soap operas Mrs. Culpepper famously loved. Though the horror elements drive the plot, genuinely scary moments are few and far between, making this a good choice for the horror-curious thriller reader. Recommend to readers who enjoyed The Good House (2003), by Tananarive Due, The Shining Girls (2013), by Lauren Beukes, or Mexican Gothic (2020), by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Library Journal Review
When a storm washes a house up onto the beach, Simon's grandmother, who recognizes the house from her nightmares, rushes into the rain. She subsequently dies on the beach, with her fears and warnings unspoken. Then Simon disappears. His two childhood best friends, Melissa and Leo, go looking for him, hardly able to make sense of--or even fully remember--the uncanny things Simon's grandmother would say and do, but they'll need to if they want any chance to rescue Simon and save the world from something unfathomable. Actor and narrator Mara Wilson delivers Priest's detailed prose with well-enunciated pleasantness, which creates an effective dissonant crash against the slowly rising tension. As she did in her prior novel, Cinderwich, Priest ensures listeners truly know her characters before she unleashes eldritch horror upon them. Alongside this, Wilson knows how to narrate the calm before the storm as well as she later amps up the panic and tension. She's especially skilled at adding age to her characters, whether it's the trio of friends as preteens, a nearly 100-year-old woman, or any age in between. VERDICT A haunting and eerily atmospheric story of regrets, missed opportunities, and the terrible things the tide brings in.--Matthew Galloway
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