Home Before Dark - Riley Sager

Thriller/Mystery

Rating: 9/10

Question: Who needs a tightly wound, brilliantly paced mystery that is also a haunted house/ghost story? Answer: umm…everybody! Buckle up if you choose to go on this ride.

Twenty-five years ago, Maggie and her parents fled the house they had been living in for only two weeks in the dead of night.  The culmination of an ordeal, rife with ghostly encounters and malevolent spirits, that her father later recounted in a horror memoir.  A monumental and enduring bestseller that Maggie feels sure is nothing but lies. After her father passes away and she inherits the house, she sets out to prove it.  And things don’t exactly go according to plan.  To say the least!

I loved that this book kept me guessing on the “who done it” through to the last twenty pages.  And just when I thought I had it figured out…the rug was once again pulled out from under me! This was a perfect summer read for a girl like me, full of palpable ambiance and great characters.

If you have yet to try a Riley Sager book, of which there are now four, I cannot recommend strongly enough that you do so. They are clever, fresh, suspenseful and wildly satisfying!

Footnote: The author’s dexterous switching between Maggie’s real time narration and excerpts from her fathers’ book, aptly titled House Of Horrors, created the effect of reading a book within a book. As a booklover, what more could you possibly ask for?