Ghost Mother: A Novel
Kelly Dwyer
Aug 2024 · Union Square & Co.
5.0star
3 reviewsreport
Ebook
336
Pages
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About this ebook
Ghost Mother is a mesmerizing psychological ghost story that blurs the thin line between reality and delusion.
"Ghost Mother has so many pleasures: a gorgeous old wreck of a house, a charmingly flawed and sympathetic heroine, supernatural goings-on so real they feel historical, an incredible sex scene, no spoilers, and an enthralling story. It's the perfect summer book."
—Kate Christensen, PEN/Faulkner award-winning author of The Great Man and Welcome Home, Stranger
Lilly Bly desperately wants to have a baby. She is struggling with infertility and bad spending habits when her husband, Jack, gets a new job that moves them from Chicago to a small town in Wisconsin. Impractical Lilly falls in love with a decrepit mansion well out of their price range—she is convinced that she will finally get pregnant and have a baby in this house—and Jack reluctantly agrees to buy the wreck. But when Lilly learns that her dream house was the site of a gruesome triple homicide/suicide in the 1950s, she begins to experience strange occurrences that soon lead her to believe the house is haunted. Are her ghostly encounters real, or is this a cascading mental breakdown? As Lilly learns more about the deaths and her visions become increasingly vivid, her relationship with Jack deteriorates, leading to a dramatic and irreversible climax.
Perfect for fans of classic, gothic horror fiction, like Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw and Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, as well as contemporary suspense and horror fiction by everyone from Stephen King to Ruth Ware.
"Ghost Mother has so many pleasures: a gorgeous old wreck of a house, a charmingly flawed and sympathetic heroine, supernatural goings-on so real they feel historical, an incredible sex scene, no spoilers, and an enthralling story. It's the perfect summer book."
—Kate Christensen, PEN/Faulkner award-winning author of The Great Man and Welcome Home, Stranger
Lilly Bly desperately wants to have a baby. She is struggling with infertility and bad spending habits when her husband, Jack, gets a new job that moves them from Chicago to a small town in Wisconsin. Impractical Lilly falls in love with a decrepit mansion well out of their price range—she is convinced that she will finally get pregnant and have a baby in this house—and Jack reluctantly agrees to buy the wreck. But when Lilly learns that her dream house was the site of a gruesome triple homicide/suicide in the 1950s, she begins to experience strange occurrences that soon lead her to believe the house is haunted. Are her ghostly encounters real, or is this a cascading mental breakdown? As Lilly learns more about the deaths and her visions become increasingly vivid, her relationship with Jack deteriorates, leading to a dramatic and irreversible climax.
Perfect for fans of classic, gothic horror fiction, like Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw and Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House, as well as contemporary suspense and horror fiction by everyone from Stephen King to Ruth Ware.
Ratings and reviews
5.0
3 reviews
Andrea Romance
- Flag inappropriate
August 6, 2024
This is a compelling mystery with a (possibly) unreliable narrator. It’s never clear what’s real and what’s not. The story is atmospheric and emotional. I enjoyed the audiobook narration. CW: child death, miscarriage, suicide, suicidal ideation Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.
About the author
Kelly Dwyer, a graduate of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, published two literary novels back in the ’90s: The Tracks of Angels and Self Portrait with Ghosts. She’s also written plays that have been produced in New York; Boston; Madison, WI; and Glasgow, Scotland.
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