{I've Been Reading} The Last House on the Street

The Last House on the Street by Diane Chamberlain 

In 2010, Kayla Carter and her young daughter move into the house where her husband died. The two of them designed their dream house together, at the edge of a new development. The large is huge, filled with trees that now seem oppressive and foreboding. She's heard that the woods are haunted and something about the lake behind the house frightens her. Even before the vandalism starts, Kayla is nervous.

In 1965, Ellie Hockley defies her parents' wishes to spend the summer volunteering as a civil rights worker, helping to register black voters. She's been thrust into an unfamiliar setting and is starting to discover just how sheltered her life has always been. 

Chapters alternate between the two women and I definitely found Ellie's story more interesting. 

This book is nothing like the other domestic thrillers I've been reading. It packs a heartbreaking emotional punch and I stayed up hours later than I should have because I couldn't bear to put it down and not know (even for a few hours) how it was going to end.

 

All I Want by Darcey Bell 

A married couple fall in love with a Victorian mansion in upstate New York and decide to buy the dilapidated old place. It needs a lot of work, but it's structurally pretty sound. It has its own theater right there in the house, built back when it was a dry out clinic where Broadway stars could retreat to sober up. They joke about the old movies they used to watch together, about houses with walls that drip blood, but they're not scared. Ben will come up from the city on weekends and Emma will live alone in the house for most of the week, overseeing the renovations and looking forward to the birth of their baby. Everything is almost perfect...at first. 

I absolutely loved the first three quarters of the book. After that, I was still hooked even though I didn't care for the direction the book was going in...and then there was the last chapter. I don't even know what to think about that ending, except that I didn't like it at all. 

Disclosure -- This post contains affiliate links. The publisher provided me with an advance review copy.