Published By: Magpie
Pages: 368
Released On: 30/01/2025
Clara Woods has a secret. At the bottom of the garden is a flowerbed, long overgrown, where her murdered husband rests in peace – or so she always thought. Then the girls arrived.
Lily and Violet, her adolescent nieces, are recently orphaned and in urgent need of care. Raising teenagers is certainly not what Clara had envisioned for herself, but they come with a hefty sum attached.
There is only one problem: both girls are untrained witches. Lily can literally see how people feel. And young Violet can see the dead man wandering at the bottom of the garden. In fact, she can see all the dead and call them back.
Soon, Clara finds herself surrounded by apparitions – and two girls who know far more about her dark past than they should. A war is waging in this house, and only one side can win…
*****
Thanks to Anne at Random Things Book Tours for the gifted copy of this title in return for an honest review.
I’m not going to lie, this sounded terrifying, and I am a complete wuss. I love thrillers but I don’t do horror, and I was concerned this would be more horror than thriller but I wanted to give it a go. But sadly, this did not hit the mark.
It wasn’t as gripping as I wanted, especially at the start. I remember getting to about 100 pages in and thinking…is this it? There was no fear, very little trepidation. I was hoping it would get a more exciting and quickly, as it was starting to lose my attention.
I didn’t find the characters overly interesting. You’ve got teenager Lily who tries to be this responsible figure but she felt naïve and rude, and kept ignoring her sister’s concerns like she was being silly and immature. Violet is the younger sister, 9 years old, and bizarrely was probably my favourite character because she was so young. She was innocent and more likeable. She was probably the saving grace of this book for me and why I didn’t give up. Aunt Clara…oh how I wanted to like her but I couldn’t stand her. I found her beyond redeeming. She was selfish and rude and careless.
It splits between the points-of-view of Clara and both girls. I liked this way of reading the story as we got three completely different perspectives of what was going on which was interesting.
The synopsis had me thrilled and excited and I was expecting to be dazzled and frightened. But it did nothing of the sort. It was slow, haphazard, monotonous, and a let down. It was meant to be about the supernatural, seeing the dead and whatnot, but that almost seemed like an afterthought.
I know I said I dislike horror stories, and I do, but I’d have given anything for this to have had me on the edge of my seat, rather than looking to see how long I had left to get through. Sadly not for me.
I haven’t read any of Camilla’s other books before, but I know she does have a big fan base. But this one hasn’t really got me interested in looking at her other work. But I won’t completely write her off as it may just have been this story that didn’t fit with me.
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