Reviews

A House with Good Bones by T. Kingfisher

Only show reviews with written explanations

batty_and_bookish's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous inspiring mysterious tense fast-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

4.75

blackenedwhiplash's review against another edition

Go to review page

mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.5

The plot at first feels like a generic, predictable haunted house story but at the end it throws in some curveballs that makes it stick out, and even then some said curveballs don’t fully make sense or fit in with the story at least in my opinion. The main character Sam is pretty annoying, she is sarcastic in a bubbly, quirky, nerdy, juvenile, very white girl millennial way that makes me think of Jess from the show New Girl (there’s a reason she was one of my least favorite characters in that show). Now, I like sarcastic characters, but when they’re more of a snarky, take-no-shit way like in Rachel Harrison novels. Around halfway through the book, though, Sam’s personality becomes less juvenile as the situation gets more serious so by the end, her personality isn’t so obnoxious. (Gotta say, the whole “this is why entomologists drink” part made me roll my eyes the whole time). All the other characters I liked, though. Especially Hermes the vulture.

I feel like this author read “American Psycho,” didn’t realize the chapters where Bateman starts reviewing pop albums or the sections where he’s talking about brand names were supposed to be commentaries on materialism, consumerism, vanity, and toxic masculinity and just thought they were in there for fun and decided to emulate that in this book by having short chapters be like excerpts from biology textbooks. There’s no need for that in this novel and as someone who really is normally fascinated by science and wildlife and biology, even I had to roll my eyes during those parts too.

Why does all this happen 20 years after the grandma dies? There is no motive behind the “villain” and there seems to be no good reason for anything that happens. Maybe if it happened right after the grandma died it would be easier to suspend disbelief. Perhaps this could have been a better short story than novel. There are some cool scenes here and there but many things feel thrown in to pad time. The ending was cool and creepy, but again, there didn’t seem to be a good reason it happened. I guess the “villain” did things just to see if he could, but that motive is weak, dude. I would expect a story from the 1800’s to have that trope, not a modern story. All in all, I have conflicting feelings on this novel.

justlurkin's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark emotional funny mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

Nice easy listening experience with nicely developed characters and a gripping mystery all the way till the ending.

nut_megg's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

kflinn182's review against another edition

Go to review page

4.0

A House with Good Bones isn't scary. It's not terrifying. It's eerie, sure. But scary, this is not. However, I still loved this book! The plot was somewhat predictable (you knew generally what was going on in the first 1/3 of the book), but the ending held a fun twist that added more depth to what would have otherwise been a fairly standard haunted house story.

The ending/wrap-up was a tad rushed and I felt some of the ideas and plot devices introduced could have been explored a bit more, but overall I loved this book. It was a quick and easy read, I loved the characters, I loved the writing style, and I enjoyed the themes this book presents. Highly recommend to anyone looking for a spooky book that's not super scary.

4/5