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"The buzz...is real. I've read it and was blown away. It's a true nerve-shredder that keeps its mind-blowing secrets to the very end." —Stephen King Winner of the British Fantasy Award for Best Horror Novel! A World Fantasy Award Finalist! An Indie Next Pick!A LibraryReads Top 10 Pick! A Library Journal Editors' Pick! STARRED reviews from Library Journal and Publishers Weekly! Named one of the "50 Best Horror Books of All Time" by Esquire! "Brilliant....[a] deeply frightening deconstruction of the illusion of the self." —The New York Times Catriona Ward's The Last House on Needless Street is a shocking and immersive read perfect for fans of Gone Girl and The Haunting of Hill House. In a boarded-up house on a dead-end street at the edge of the wild Washington woods lives a family of three. A teenage girl who isn't allowed outside, not after last time. A man who drinks alone in front of his TV, trying to ignore the gaps in his memory. And a house cat who loves napping and reading the Bible. An unspeakable secret binds them together, but when a new neighbor moves in next door, what is buried out among the birch trees may come back to haunt them all. "The new face of literary dark fiction." —Sarah Pinborough At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Reread for a horror book group, and definitely found revisiting it to be worthwhile. Not a ton of forward action theoretically but Ward puts so much craft into her work that it still manages to be affecting. ( )
This is the second book that I have read from Catriona Ward. She writes in the same style. You never know what to expect. She primarily writes thriller/mysteries; however, she always has some form of fantasy in her stories as well. This book revolves around a missing little girl, Lulu, her sister, Dee, a man named Ted, his daughter, Lauren, and his cat, Olivia. Ted is very secretive. His windows are covered with plywood. He hardly ever leaves his house or talks to anyone. He doesn't take Lauren out either and she is homeschooled. Dee is searching for Lulu, and feels Ted may be the suspect. She continues to stake out Ted to find the truth. It was really good. The only thing that bothered me was Olivia, who has a POV in the book. She is a very smart kitty. She talks about religion, birds, television, etc, but then she doesn't know what humans and dogs are and calls them Teds & brouhahas, respectively. It is still worth reading. ( )
This was a very entertaining read…a true page turner…
I think different people may get different things from the readings….I realized part of what was going on after the first few chapters. I think this is because the author tried to be very fair about the whole thing.
After about a hundred pages…. I went a little further and had decided they were all the missing girls sister…This was caused by the music box Ted had with the broken ballerina… I felt like the author was trying to clue people in to the fact that the speaker was really the girl whose dance school dreams had been ruined….
Anyway…book can be read for the story,, enjoying the twist….or red knowing what she is doing and seeing how she hints at it throughout.
For my nephew River Emanuel Ward Enoch, born 14 August 2020
First words
Today is the anniversary of Little Girl with Popsicle. It happened by the lake, eleven years ago - she was there, and then she wasn't.
Quotations
Anyway the trick to life is, if you don’t like what is happening, go back to sleep until it stops.
The air smells strongly of cleaning products, a chemical impression of a flowering meadow. At some point in the future, I guess, almost no one will know what real meadow smells like. Maybe by then there won’t be any real meadows left and they’ll have to make flowers in labs. Then of course they’ll engineer them to smell like cleaning products, because they’ll think that’s right, and it will all go in a circle. These are the kinds of interesting thoughts I have while in waiting rooms and at crosswalks or standing in line at the grocery store.
Dee only ever reads this one book. She likes to read, but you never know what books are going to do to you and she can’t afford to be taken off guard. At least the people in Wuthering Heights understand that life is a terrible choice, which you must make each day. Let me in, Catherine pleads. Let me in.
Last words
The sky and trees are flooded with birds. The song flows and ebbs around us, on the air. Lauren gives a little sign as the sun warms our skin. "Now," I say. "We eat."
"The buzz...is real. I've read it and was blown away. It's a true nerve-shredder that keeps its mind-blowing secrets to the very end." —Stephen King Winner of the British Fantasy Award for Best Horror Novel! A World Fantasy Award Finalist! An Indie Next Pick!A LibraryReads Top 10 Pick! A Library Journal Editors' Pick! STARRED reviews from Library Journal and Publishers Weekly! Named one of the "50 Best Horror Books of All Time" by Esquire! "Brilliant....[a] deeply frightening deconstruction of the illusion of the self." —The New York Times Catriona Ward's The Last House on Needless Street is a shocking and immersive read perfect for fans of Gone Girl and The Haunting of Hill House. In a boarded-up house on a dead-end street at the edge of the wild Washington woods lives a family of three. A teenage girl who isn't allowed outside, not after last time. A man who drinks alone in front of his TV, trying to ignore the gaps in his memory. And a house cat who loves napping and reading the Bible. An unspeakable secret binds them together, but when a new neighbor moves in next door, what is buried out among the birch trees may come back to haunt them all. "The new face of literary dark fiction." —Sarah Pinborough At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
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▾Library descriptions
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▾LibraryThing members' description
Book description
In a boarded-up house on a dead-end street at the edge of the wild Washington woods lives a family of three.
A teenage girl who isn’t allowed outside, not after last time.
A man who drinks alone in front of his TV, trying to ignore the gaps in his memory.
And a house cat who loves napping and reading the Bible.
An unspeakable secret binds them together, but when a new neighbor moves in next door, what is buried out among the birch trees may come back to haunt them all.
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Wikipedia in English
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J'ai apprécié au début de ma lecture l'originalité de la narration mais le manque de repères spatio-temporels ont commencé à avoir raison de moi tout comme l'alternance de protagonistes. 400 pages pour naviguer dans le flou, dans des souvenirs et des ressentis c'est un peu trop. Finalement l'intrigue principale est assez mise de côté pour entrer dans la psyché des personnages et cela en pâtit forcément sur le rythme et l'action.
J'ai trouvé les plots-twists assez convenus (beaucoup d'indices disséminés au fil des pages).
Le point positif réside dans l'ambiance du livre, glauque à souhaits entre cauchemar et réalité.
Si vous cherchez une lecture oĂą vous acceptez de ne pas tout comprendre au premier abord avec des narrateurs singuliers et de baigner dans une brume opaque de souvenirs et de ressentis alors peut-ĂŞtre que vous y trouverez plus d'attrait que moi.
Bref une lecture un peu poussive que j'oublierai rapidement. (