Author: Andrea Portes
Genre: psychological horror
Similar books: The Glare by Margot Harrison
The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein by Kiersten White
Rating:
Summary (provided by publisher): I am not welcome. Somehow I know that. Something doesn’t want me here.
Daffodil Franklin has plans for a quiet summer before her freshman year at college, and luckily, she’s found the job that can give her just that: housesitting a mansion for a wealthy couple.
But as the summer progresses and shadows lengthen, Daffodil comes to realize the house is more than it appears. The spacious home seems to close in on her, and as she takes the long road into town, she feels eyes on her the entire way, and something tugging her back.
What Daffodil doesn’t yet realize is that her job comes with a steep price. The house has a long-ago grudge it needs to settle . . . and Daffodil is the key to settling it.
My opinion: First, let me say that this plot is more unsettling than truly frightening. The tone is one of wrongness rather than fear. The set-up is standard horror fare - a teen on her own for the first time, running from her past, spending the summer alone in an isolated mansion. It should come as no surprise that practically as soon as the homeowner leaves weird things start to happen, things that suggest a haunting or a curse, especially once we learn that the house was the site of a tragedy. There is a point about halfway through the novel where there were enough questions, enough possibilities, that I was really into the book. It was only when Portes really committed to the truth of the events, when things took a particularly strange turn, that I began to be less invested. Events stopped making sense. I found them less unsettling and more tiresome. It's certainly a unique approach to the plot but it simply did not land with me.
More information: This is Not a Ghost Story releases November 17.
Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley.
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