A review by ceallaighsbooks
She Is a Haunting by Trang Thanh Tran

dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

“I know this is a dream because I am not afraid of my father. In his hands, the ax catches sun.”

TITLE—She Is A Haunting
AUTHOR—Trang Thanh Tran (they/them)
PUBLISHED—2023
PUBLISHER—Bloomsbury

GENRE—YA horror
SETTING—Đà Lạt, Vietnam
MAIN THEMES/SUBJECTS—complicated family relationships, (semi-closeted) bisexual, Vietnamese-American MC, haunted house, inherited trauma, ecology, botany, entomology, & mycology, father-daughter relationship, interior design & hotelier, tourism & colonialism, bugs like so so many bugs, *fantastic* & gruesome horror imagery

WRITING STYLE—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
CHARACTERS—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
STORY/PLOT—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

BONUS ELEMENT/S—The bonus element for this book is simply a) that I was clever enough to preorder it 😂 and b) that it arrived at my doorstop right as I was in the middle of reading and rereading a bunch of incredible haunted house trope  books. 👀

PHILOSOPHY—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
PREMISE—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
EXECUTION—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

“Understanding someone’s core, or guessing at it, is a thrill. Getting it right brings you too close, and that’s fucking scary. It’s like cupping the only water you have in your hands in the middle of a desert. Drop it and you’re done. Wait too long and it’s gone.”

My thoughts:
Oh wow. Wow wow wow wow. This book was kind of a masterpiece. I’m not overly familiar with YA books so I feel like my early struggles with the writing style and characterization was fully a product of that because by the end of the book pretty much every choice by the author made perfect sense and wrapped up into just a fantastic overall read.

The setting of the macabrely haunted French colonial mansion in the Đà Lạt forest was 👀incredible—and so stunningly and perfectly gothic. Every time one of the characters started to set off into the woods I immediately sat up straighter. The motorbike rides into the town, the facetime phone calls and wifi lightbulbs all acted as the perfect modern contrast that gave the story a profoundly unsettling dynamic. And the themes and deeper philosophy… 😚👌🏻

Pro tip: By page 310 you need to be ready to sit down and finish the book in a place you’re comfortable ugly crying in so also please just be aware of that. 👀

“Why is Đà Lạt not raining? Why does it not pour, as Ba says it does in July? Does the sky not know we are hurting? How can it not hear the tenor of my scream?”

This book is best read after eating because this book will a) make you hungry with all the incredible food descriptions but it will also b) make you lose your appetite because ***bugs*** 🤣

Final note: I am really going to need publishers & blurbers to stop comparing every book to REBECCA. It is absolutely getting out of hand. thx. 🙏🏻💕 (Especially when MEXICAN GOTHIC and WHITE IS FOR WITCHING are *right there*. 👀)

“In this house of dreams, I can have anything I want.”

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

CW // body horror!!, racism, colonialism, Vietnam war brutality, and if you have entomophobia: don’t even *think* about picking up this book 👀 (Please feel free to DM me for more specifics!)

Further Reading—
  • Lee, Wen-yi. “The Resonance of Hunger: Food, Family, and Colonialism in Trang Thanh Tran's She Is a Haunting.” Tor.com, 15 Mar. 2023, https://www.tor.com/2023/03/15/the-resonance-of-hunger-food-family-and-colonialism-in-trang-thanh-trans-she-is-a-haunting/
  • MEXICAN GOTHIC, by Silvia Moreno-Garcia—a must read if you especially loved this book
  • WHAT MOVES THE DEAD, by T Kingfisher 👀
  • WHITE IS FOR WITCHING, by Helen Oyeyemi (themes & sentient haunted house)
  • TELL ME I’M WORTHLESS, by Alison Rumfitt (sentient haunted house)
  • THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE, by Shirley Jackson (sentient haunted house)
  • BABEL, by RF Kuang (themes)
  • THE CRAFT (1995 movie)—I pictured the house in the book looking like the house in this movie 👀
  • BEETLEJUICE (1988 movie)
  • A LESSON IN VENGEANCE, by Victoria Lee (vibes)
  • HIGHLY SUSPICIOUS AND UNFAIRLY CUTE, by Talia Hibbert (themes)
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