A review by accidentallyinspace
The Death of Jane Lawrence by Caitlin Starling

challenging dark mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

If you read these reviews, you'll see two kinds of people: the people who liked the first part, with the romance and light spooks, and the people who liked the second, with the horror. I am in the second camp, for full disclosure.

For the first 30% of this book, I assumed I wouldn't be finishing it, as the trappings of a traditional romance novel were more overt than I liked. I assumed the supernatural element would be little more than the elements in the original Haunting of Hill House, which (very slight spoilers for that) 
felt very lackluster in haunting details compared to more modern haunted house stories.
  However, partially through the book the supernatural aspect has the volume raised from a 3 to an 11, and the story begins to echo The Yellow Wallpaper combined with some body horror and a truly harrowing (if a tad long-winded) ritual experience. The ending leaves some questions unanswered, at least to my dense mind, and I'm not wholly convinced the whole thing wasn't just
an allegory for pregnancy and miscarriage. There's a strong theme of Jane doing the proper thing repeatedly, as a wife and host, and the concept of shame being something that dark forces feed on is made entirely explicit. Between all that, the ectopic pregnancy earlier in the book, and Jane growing what is ostensibly a magic tumor baby (seriously) while slowly unraveling in both body and mind while her husband is absent... I dunno, that makes sense to me.
. 

I'd recommend this if you've got a medium-strong stomach for handling gore and self-flagellation, and are okay walking away with a few "huh" moments towards the end. 
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