Today I am taking part in the blog tour for The House Of Ashes. My review is written with thanks to Tracy Fenton for inviting me on the tour and to the publisher for my copy of the book.

Blurb:

For Sara Keane, it was supposed to be a second chance. A new country. A new house. A new beginning with her husband Damien.

Then came the knock on the door.

Elderly Mary Jackson can’t understand why Sara and her husband are living in her home. She remembers the fire, and the house burning down. But she also remembers the children. The children who need her, whom she must protect.

‘The children will find you,’ she tells Sara, because Mary knows she needs help too. Sara soon becomes obsessed with what happened in that house nearly sixty years ago – the tragic, bloody night her husband never intended for her to discover. And Mary – silent for six decades – is finally ready to tell her story . . .

The House of Ashes is the stunning new 2022 thriller from the award-winning master of the genre, Stuart Neville – perfect for fans of John Connolly, Alex North and Brian McGilloway.

Review:

I’ve never read anything by Stuart Neville before but I feel that this will change in future. Neville is such a talented writer and I am in awe of the way he creates an oppressive atmosphere throughout this novel. I felt incredibly claustrophobic as I read about the way the women in this novel were treated and the conditions in which they were forced to live. It’s definitely not for the faint hearted as there is a great deal of violence, although it’s never included needlessly and it adds to the sense of foreboding that surrounds the house. 

Each chapter in The House Of Ashes is narrated by a different character and this allows Neville to link the past and present seamlessly. It also gives us insight into the way each character is thinking and feeling. The sense of helplessness in the women is almost tangible and I felt sympathy for them the whole way through. I will be thinking about them for a long time. However, it is not only the women who gave me strong feelings as I was reading. The male characters are very well written and they definitely got under my skin. I was constantly looking over my shoulder whilst reading. 

The tension in the novel increases dramatically as we reach the ending. I was desperate to know what would happen to the women and how their story would end. 

The House Of Ashes is available from Amazon.

You can follow the rest of the blog tour here: