Book Review: The Women in the Walls by Amy Lukavics

 

Synopsis (from Goodsreads):

Lucy Acosta's mother died when she was three. Growing up in a Victorian mansion in the middle of the woods with her cold, distant father, she explored the dark hallways of the estate with her cousin, Margaret. They're inseparable—a family.

When her aunt Penelope, the only mother she's ever known, tragically disappears while walking in the woods surrounding their estate, Lucy finds herself devastated and alone. Margaret has been spending a lot of time in the attic. She claims she can hear her dead mother's voice whispering from the walls. Emotionally shut out by her father, Lucy watches helplessly as her cousin's sanity slowly unravels. But when she begins hearing voices herself, Lucy finds herself confronting an ancient and deadly legacy that has marked the women in her family for generations. 

My Thoughts:

I have really mixed thoughts about this book so this may be an interesting review.  I have not read this author's first book but it is definitely on my list after I have finished this one.  This book sucked me in from the very first page with Walter's suicide and kept me intrigued and not able to put the book down until I finished it, which took about 10 hours.  

Lucy is seventeen and lives in a huge, old house with her father, her aunt and her cousin, Margaret.  As the book starts, Lucy has found one of their workers who had hanged himself.  That starts a series of events that changes Lucy's life.  First, her aunt goes for a walk in the woods and never returns.  Lucy questions her father as to what he is doing about it and her father assures her that he is doing everything possible to find her aunt and yet Lucy has seen no police or anyone other some some men from the County Club looking for her aunt.  Then Margaret starts to lose her mind.  Margaret is pulling away from Lucy and claims she is hearing voices in the walls.  She does some horrible and disgusting things and Lucy is very worried about her.  After another crazy event (that I don't want to spoil for you), Lucy thinks she is going crazy as well.  She has only the new girl, Vanessa, to confide in.  Her father doesn't seem to care and Vanessa's mother, who has taken over Lucy's aunts responsibilities, has her own issues to deal with.  

I love a scary, creepy story and this definitely fits that description.  The house is huge and full of secrets.  I only wish we were able to get a better sense of the house and grounds.  I would also have liked for the girls to have explored the cemetery a little more so you could get a better feel for it.  I wasn't really sure if the house was modern or stuck in older times, other than the description of the wallpaper.  

Lucy and Margaret were both difficult to relate to.  They were seventeen but other than at the beginning when Lucy talked briefly about a homeschool project, there didn't seem to be a lot that the girls did.  They had no hobbies and really no interests.  They have no friends because Margaret got easily jealous.  It talks a bit about why they left public school but I really didn't even know where they lived or what time period they lived in.  I wasn't sure if they lived in the country, in the city, in a small town and I couldn't tell if it was current times or in the past.  The only clue we got to the time period was that there was Google.

I also was not satisfied with the ending.  The description of the "Mother" character was not appealing for me.  I don't want to give anything away but I didn't like what she was.  If she had just been some supernatural being without all the weird appendages then I would have liked it better but that just didn't make any sense to me.   

I thought the whole "Club" thing was not really explained well either.  I am still not sure what the "club" was or what exactly happened.  I know what happened to Clara but it just didn't explain why the grounds were sacred and who exactly the "Mother" was or what her part in all this was.  I was left questioning the point of the men in the "club" and why the men thought the grounds were so important (maybe just for the wealth and prestige??).  

Those were the things that I had some issues with but even with all that, it was a really fast read.  I could not put the book down and wanted to know what was happening and who the voices were.  It was a very creepy book that keeps you guessing until the end.  Just be prepared to be a little confused and have questions that aren't answered.

*Book provided by Around the World ARC Tours for review*