THE HOUSE IN THE HILLS
ROWAN HANLON
*
When Harmony and Marc find their fantasy dream home for a steal of a price they buy it immediately – but why was it so cheap and what secrets does it hold within its walls?
One of the reasons I love reading for NetGalley is how many 4 and 5 star books I have been introduced to across all genres. However, I have yet to find a horror story on NetGalley that I have given over 3 stars to. I have found most of the horror books I have read to be cliché and disappointing and I’m very sorry to say that ‘The House in the Hills’ is just another to add to the list.
Where to start? This book is already past publication date so I feel that I can add some basic errors and formatting problems which I usually hold off on for books that have a while until they are published. The whole thing needs a drastic edit – there’s mistakes like ‘have to make due’ (instead of do) and sentences like ‘mesmorised by all of the pretty’ which make no sense. The writing style is very immature – it feels like the author is trying to write in a style that they think will appeal to teenagers and misses the mark. Some of the characters speech patterns change mid-way through a sentence and there’s pages and pages of dialogue that just feel like repetition.
The characters themselves are just as immature as the writing style, Harmony comes across as a very unsympathetic character from the outset; controlling her husbands money, starting petty arguments for no reason or feeling no remorse after an affair. All of the characters seem to have personality changes half way through the chapters – with marital arguments starting out of nowhere and the relationship of the two main characters just seems toxic. Although in real life arguments do tend to be very repetitive, one argument goes over 6 pages with both characters just making the same two viewpoints in (very) slightly different wording - it’s not interesting or engaging.
The plot itself is an incredibly slow burn, with all the usual tropes of a haunted house story but with no conclusion. The story starts to get interesting at around 90% (no exaggeration) and then finishes so quickly I actually thought I was missing part of the book as my kindle counted down the percentages until the end.
Overall I am crying out for a good horror story and The House in the Hills definitely did not deliver for me I’m afraid. Thank you to NetGalley and Reverberator Books for a copy of the ARC in exchange for a (very) honest review!
https://www.amazon.co.uk/House-Hills-Gripping-Paranormal-Supernatural-ebook/dp/B07DK1LN8F
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