It’s October and, seasonally, one of my favorite times of the year. The air is chilly, you see hints of winter around the corner, and it’s pumpkin everything. Just in time for this season, I get to share a fantastic book with you called House on Linden Way.
Before we get to my review, here’s a bit about the book:
While passing through her hometown a decade after she left, Amber Blake impulsively revisits her old house on Linden Way. She only means to stay a moment, to show her three-year-old daughter Bee the place where she grew up. But when the kindly new owners invite them inside, Amber cannot resist.
Soon Bee is missing, the owners have disappeared, and Amber finds herself in a houseful of ghosts. Time takes on new meaning as she loses herself in living memories and a past that does not wish to be forgotten.
As Amber fights the powerful lure of a childhood she’d long left behind, her tenuous hold on the real world slips further from her grasp. Is it merely nostalgia she’s battling, or something far more menacing? Who haunts the house on Linden Way, and where are they hiding her child?
My Review:
As much as this hinted at being a ghost story, it struck me more as being a walk through someone’s past. When Amber loses her daughter in the house where she grew up, she is held in place by her own memories, the loss of her brother, and guilt she’s never been able to release. What becomes just as important as finding her daughter is learning how to let go of the past that brought her to the house at all. Otherwise, she’d never be free from it.
Amber is a rich, complex character who runs into all sides of herself, including her own destructive side, throughout her journey in her own mind. I loved the pushes and pulls of memories that feel so achingly real to her but impossible to change.
It is an absolutely exciting book that kept me captivated the entire time. A great read for an October night!
You can buy a copy of the book on Amazon.com or add it to your GoodReads reading list.
About the Author
Elizabeth Maria Naranjo is the award-winning author of The Fourth Wall (WiDo Publishing, 2014). Her short fiction and creative nonfiction have been published in Brevity Magazine, Superstition Review, Fractured Lit, The Portland Review, Hunger Mountain, Hospital Drive, Reservoir Road, Literary Mama, Motherwell, and a few other places. Her stories have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best American Essay, and Best of the Net. All links to Elizabeth’s work can be found on her website at elizabethmarianaranjo.com.
You can also follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/emarianaranjo.
So glad you enjoyed it, and thank you for the review!
Terrific review.