The Confessional by Paige Hender

The Confessional by Paige Hender

200 pages

⭐⭐⭐⭐.5/5

Synopsis (from Goodreads)

New Orleans, 1922. Cora Velasquez lives with her sister and her own haunted memories in a speakeasy run by a vampire coven. Unable to bear the weight of her damned soul, she turns to Father Orville Thibodeaux, a charismatic priest and the object of her hidden desires. Their veiled courtship becomes deadly serious when he discovers her nature, and proposes a way to both slake her thirst and save her soul. So begins the charged dance between an all-powerful but unsure young woman, and the mortal man who claims to hold her fate in his hand.

What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher

What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher

Sworn Soldier #1, 165 pages

⭐⭐⭐/5

Synopsis (from Goodreads)

When Alex Easton, a retired soldier, receives word that their childhood friend Madeline Usher is dying, they race to the ancestral home of the Ushers in the remote countryside of Ruravia.

What they find there is a nightmare of fungal growths and possessed wildlife, surrounding a dark, pulsing lake. Madeline sleepwalks and speaks in strange voices at night, and her brother Roderick is consumed with a mysterious malady of the nerves.

Aided by a redoubtable British mycologist and a baffled American doctor, Alex must unravel the secret of the House of Usher before it consumes them all.

My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier

 387 pages / 11 hrs, 57 mins

"Orphaned at an early age, Philip Ashley is raised by his benevolent older cousin, Ambrose. Resolutely single, Ambrose delights in Philip as his heir, a man who will love his grand home as much as he does himself. But the cosy world the two construct is shattered when Ambrose sets off on a trip to Florence. There he falls in love and marries - and there he dies suddenly. Jealous of his marriage, racked by suspicion at the hints in Ambrose's letters, and grief-stricken by his death, Philip prepares to meet his cousin's widow with hatred in his heart. Despite himself, Philip is drawn to this beautiful, sophisticated, mysterious Rachel like a moth to the flame. And yet... might she have had a hand in Ambrose's death?"  --from the publisher

I was hooked from the beginning, and the story will stay with me for a long time. It is a masterfully written, haunting tale of foreboding and intrigue. I give it four out of five stars.

Arrowood by Laura McHugh

Arrowood by Laura McHugh – 270 p.

Iowa native Arden Arrowood returns to Keokuk to claim her inheritance – the grand family manse above the Mississippi River. Arden remains haunted by the long-ago disappearance of her toddler twin sisters. She reconnects, for better or for worse, with old friends and acquaintances as she searches for answers, and gradually teases out the dark, tragic secrets of her family. An absorbing gothic read.

The Au Pair by Emma Rous

The Au Pair
by Emma Rous
358 pages









Seraphine Mayes and her twin brother, Danny, were born in the middle of summer at their family’s estate on the Norfolk coast. Within hours of their birth, their mother threw herself from the cliffs, the au pair fled, and the village thrilled with whispers of dark cloaks, changelings, and the aloof couple who drew a young nanny into their inner circle.

Now an adult, Seraphine mourns the recent death of her father. While going through his belongings, she uncovers a family photograph that raises dangerous questions. It was taken on the day the twins were born, and in the photo, their mother, surrounded by her husband and her young son, is smiling serenely and holding just one baby. 

Who is the child, and what really happened that day?

Bellman & Black by Diane Setterfield

Bellman & Black by Diane Setterfield --- 328 pages

I remember spending a sunny Sunday afternoon sitting on the couch and reading Henry James' The Turn of the Screw for my high school English class. Totally mesmerized, and so scared I didn't dare take my eyes off the page, for fear of what I might see lurking in the corners of the room. Now that's my idea of a Gothic tale!

Diane Setterfield's Bellman & Black is, to my mind, just such another unsettling tale. Her premise is simple: a young boy's careless act affects the whole course of his life and inflicts a remorseless penance. The working out of this --- self-inflicted? --- curse is rendered in carefully chosen detail. Setterfield wields language like an artist wields his brush. One reviewer suggested that this book is Setterfield's homage to Charles Dickens and the Victorian preoccupation with death and mourning.

Reviews have been mixed. This is Setterfield's second novel; her first, The Thirteenth Tale, a re-imagining of Jane Eyre, was hailed as a modern masterpiece. Fans of that book have been waiting seven years for Setterfield to repeat herself.  Bellman & Black, if it was judged on its own merits and not by comparison, would I think have fared better. The book has certainly generated a lot on conversation among book bloggers.

Click HERE to read a review of Bellman & Black.

Click HERE to watch a great trailer for the book!