This quiet horror mystery opens on Clare returning to her hometown after her childhood best friend, Abby, attempted suicide at a local haunted house. In the sleepy town of Sumner’s Mills in upstate New York, the Octagon House sits back in an overgrown section of woods all but forgotten by most of the town. In 1965, a man killed his family not long after moving in and the house has remained empty since. In 1998, Clare and Abby ventured into the house but when they came out again, they were never the same. Now, 20 years later, Abby returned to the Octagon House for reasons unknown and the last thing she said before losing consciousness was Clare's name. Clare never wanted to admit to Abby that she also felt changed after that night in '98 but now that she's back home, there's no denying the pull she feels to the house. Clare's life in Chicago is in pieces so she has plenty of time and need for distraction by investigating what lead Abby to return after so many years. But what Clare assumes started in 1998 may go back farther, past 1965, and to the original construction in 1936.
TW/CW: suicide, miscarriage, domestic violence
This book reminded me so much of Jennifer McMahon's The Drowning Kind (blog review here) - return to a quiet hometown after a tragedy, quiet supernatural horror elements, flashbacks to the past, very atmospheric. However, I did find Fawcett's debut novel to be a little messier in places but with a really solid foundation that kept me turning the pages. While I do think this book technically falls into the supernatural horror genre, it isn't as upfront and bold as it may seem. This certainly has more quiet horror elements and has a very strong themes of friendship and grief. It also, at times, reads more like a general fiction book than a horror book. The cover and synopsis made me think this was going to be much more of a straightforward haunted house type of story which isn't exactly what we got. I do think that may disappoint some readers but I enjoy these types of quiet horror books a lot.
I really enjoyed the multi-timeline elements in this story. I'd say the story is about 60% in the present day timeline, 30% following Clare and Abby in 1998, and the last 10% split between 1965 and 1936. I think having the 1965/1936 timelines was really smart because it let us find out information that Clare would most likely never be able to know from her investigation. It also let the reader into the lives of these past characters and fleshed them out a bit to make them feel real instead of treating them like rumors. The present day timeline is Clare struggling through her own personal trauma as well as her guilt for how she's treated Abby. Clare also spends time reconnecting with some of her other friends who still live in the area and whose daughter might be going down the same dangerous road as Abby. There's also some light mystery elements going on in the present day with Clare trying to figure out why Abby came back to the town. The timeline in 1998, however, did feel a little bloated. I liked how we got to see the events that present day Clare references but I felt there was a lot of extra things that we didn't really need. On paper, I can see how X leads to Y leads to Z in this past timeline, but I think the time and amount of development we get for X, Y, and Z doesn't make sense for the amount of payoff we get. I would have preferred if we kept all the past plot points, but got to them more quickly without a whole lot of extra fluff around them. Because of this slightly bloated narration, I did find myself getting bored at times with this 1998 events even though they directly impact the present day.
I loved the characters and thought Fawcett does an excellent job at matching up characters from past to present. It was the literary equivalent of casting directors finding the perfect child actor to match an adult actor. Obviously, a lot changes between Clare when she is 14 years old in 1998 and now as a 34 year old returning to town. However, the characterization doesn't change so much that the two timelines (child Clare and adult Clare) are unrecognizable. I could 100% see how 14 year old Clare grows up to be adult Clare and both have similar struggles but not exactly identical. I've mentioned before in a few reviews that I'm not the biggest fan of young children in stories, especially when we get their POV. I find it is really hard for me to be completely convinced of the character voice in those moments and the kids either come across as too old or too young. I think Fawcett does a great job at really capturing the essence of being a 14 year old girl and at that weird time where you feel both too childlike but also too adult. I also loved the friend group dynamic and how they were, technically, a group of 4 but they really were more like 2 pairs of friends. I completely remember having a friend group dynamic like that and I think most friend groups in real life act in the same way.
The tension, for me, was really uneven in this story and I think that has more to do with the horror elements often times taking a big step back and the more personal themes coming forward. When the story begins, the reader doesn't have a lot of information about the Octagon House and what connection Clare and Abby have to it. It felt like Fawcett wanted that to be a slower burn reveal where she sprinkled in some breadcrumbs in the story to try and make it sound very ominous. And while it is true that we don't find out exactly what happened until we're well into the book, the breadcrumbs Fawcett was leaving were big enough that I could more or less get the gist of what happened. Once I got that feeling, the more of these vague references we got to the past events were less tension-building and more annoying. Also, as mentioned above, I think we spent too much time in the 1998 timeline following some of the more mundane aspects of the story. There were also times where Clare felt drawn to certain places almost out of her control and I really wished those were built up and escalated as the story progressed. There was so much potential for this to be much creepier than it was, even if Fawcett doesn't go full haunted house with the story.
I did enjoy the horror elements in the story and how they tied the different timelines together. I don't think anyone would be surprised that a supernatural story would have connections to the past and while there might not have been anything super unique about the way the supernatural elements unfolded, they still worked really well. I was a bit worried for a while that we were venturing into the Indian Burial Ground trope but thankfully that was not the case. I do think the horror elements were used more sporadically than I would have liked. I do think the level of horror escalated with Clare's acceptance and realization of what happened in 1998 but it did take her the whole book to get there. I loved how dark the ending got when we finally got to put all the pieces together. Because of how dark the reveal gets, I was expecting the horror/supernatural elements to also be darker or more extreme than they were. I was left with some pretty specific questions by the end that aren't ever answered fully. In that way, the story was left a little open ended, but I think it ended in a way that was appropriate to Clare's journey. She got her answers and sort of shrugged off the rest. I think each reader may have a different interpretation of the events in the ending which will be interesting to see when the book is released. In the moment, I was a bit annoyed that we didn't get more information about the supernatural elements but after thinking it over, I do think the ending was appropriate for Clare's story.
Overall, I enjoyed this quiet horror read. I loved the characters and supernatural elements. The multi-timeline elements worked well, for the most part. The tension was a bit uneven and the ending left me with a few more questions that I would have liked, but this was still a satisfying read and I'd read more from Fawcett in the future.
Thanks to NetGalley and Atria Books for the ARC
Expected publication date is February 22, 2022
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