House of Hollow
Author: Krystal Sutherland
Pages: 296
Format: Paperback
My Rating ★★★★
Pages: 296
Format: Paperback
My Rating ★★★★
Dark, dangerous things happen around the Hollow sisters.
Ever since they disappeared as children – only to reappear a month later, with no memory of what happened to them – odd, eerie occurrences follow in their wake.
When Grey, the eldest goes missing again, Iris and Vivi are left to figure out the mystery – but they aren’t the only ones looking for her.
As they brush against the supernatural, Iris realises that the world that returned them then years ago might be calling them back. But just how much horror lies beneath the surface?
Ever since they disappeared as children – only to reappear a month later, with no memory of what happened to them – odd, eerie occurrences follow in their wake.
When Grey, the eldest goes missing again, Iris and Vivi are left to figure out the mystery – but they aren’t the only ones looking for her.
As they brush against the supernatural, Iris realises that the world that returned them then years ago might be calling them back. But just how much horror lies beneath the surface?
My thoughts:
Seventeen-year-old Iris Hollow has always been strange. Something happened to her and her two older sisters when they were children, something they can’t quite remember but that left each of them with an identical half-moon scar at the base of their throats.
Iris has spent most of her teenage years trying to avoid the weirdness that sticks to her like tar. But when her eldest sister, Grey, goes missing under suspicious circumstances, Iris learns just how strange her life can get: a horned man starts shadowing her, a corpse falls out of her sister’s ceiling, and ugly, impossible memories start to twist their way to the forefront of her mind.
As Iris retraces Grey’s last known footsteps and follows the increasingly bizarre trail of breadcrumbs she left behind, it becomes apparent that the only way to save her sister is to decipher the mystery of what happened to them as children.
Something lurks in the shadows unseen in this Grimm-inspired urban fairy tale you won't be able to put down. Trouble has always accompanied the ethereally beautiful Hollow sisters. It’s a strangeness that can be traced all the way back to their childhood and the start of one of the most famous unsolved mysteries of the past decade.
As Iris and her sister Vivi team up and start chasing the traces of Grey, they begin to discover the dark world of their sister, full of dangerous secrets which may be connected with their disappearance. As they being to unravel Grey’s secrets, the story becomes extremely dark and we see the girls dragged down a wild, creepy and shocking road.
Iris' voice was compelling, but this story is plot driven, so I never felt fully connected to the characters. I think that's intentional as these sisters are as much a mystery to themselves as they are to the world, so in a way, we as the readers are just along for the unnerving journey.
The magic in House of Hollow is as beautiful as it is dangerous and Sutherland is not afraid to reveal the rot that lies beneath a beautiful veneer. Having just finished reading, I’m still a little unsure how I feel about this one, but I do know that I couldn't put it down.
House of Hollow is a dark, atmospheric mystery/horror novel that’ll keep readers guessing. I may have figured out one of the twists before it was revealed, but the rest of this book kind of shocked me. Some answers left me impressed. Others left me a bit nauseous. I did find the overall underlying plot a tab predictable but it kept me intrigued throughout and was an interesting, modern new take on a classic fae storyline. The book as a whole is very entertaining and makes for a gripping read.
Overall reaction: