A review by books_brownies_etc
The Cottage by Lisa Stone

2.0

“Newly unemployed and single Jan moves into a secluded cottage, wedged between a sleepy town and a thick, dark forest. A break away from everything she knows and to spend time alone with her thoughts, Jan is disturbed by shadowy movements and strange noises in her garden.”

A spooky premise and an archetypal horror setting sets this thriller up to be a fast paced and compelling read - one that I was quick to jump into… however I did find that though the premise was far fetched but exciting, the book became a little absurd and failed to deliver it’s promise.

While the prose continued to be addictive, it did become very repetitive and the use of language felt clunky, the character arcs a tad inane. The overall theme of the book is pretty easy to spot from about a third of the way in and while it is a fascinating twist to the story, I feel that it wasn’t handled particularly well and that the discussion around this topic was flippant and the research flimsy.

I read this book as part of a buddy read and lots of my fellow readers really enjoyed it, isn’t that the beauty of reading? One book can evoke such a range of emotions from readers and leave starkly different impressions.