herelieshenry 's review for:

The September House by Carissa Orlando

5.0

emotional hopeful medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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This to me is the quintessential modern haunted house novel, the perfect conclusion for the lineage of the genre through the early days of Gothic haunted houses with a heavy focus on women’s anxieties and agoraphobia, to the more contemporary haunted house novel post-Amityville with focus on financial instability keeping someone within the house and the looming presence of

domestic violence

throughout the stories. If one were to study the history of haunted house novels throughout the decades, this is the perfect one for the 2020s.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Domestic abuse, Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Child death, Gore, Murder

Minor: Alcoholism, Animal death, Cannibalism