Books: House of Hollow ~ Krystal Sutherland

 

 

Title: House of Hollow
Author: Krystal Sutherland
Series: Standalone
Publisher: Hot Key Books
Publishing date: 06th of April, 2021
Number of pages: 292 p.
Languages: English
Age Category: Young adult
Genre: Horror, mystery

About House of Hollow

Seventeen-year-old Iris Hollow has always been strange.
When Iris and her sisters Vivi and Grey were children, they disappeared from the world. They re-appeared a month later, butt naked in the middle of a street, with no recollection of where they have been.
When Grey goes missing Iris and Vivi set out to find their sister but what else will they find along the way?

My thoughts on House of Hollow

I watch a lot of booktube, so in one of my sprees on Youtube I came across a description of House of Hollow, pretyy much like I have written above. I was sold right away, also on the cover as it is so pretty. This book is perfect for Halloween, it will definitely give you the creeps. I love the mystery of what happened to the Hollow sisters, but also the mystery surrounding the oldest Hallow, Grey, which in my opinion is the weirdest name ever. Not that Vivi is much better, that kind of reminds me of a dog. Don't get me wrong, I like that they are different from popular names like Elena. At times, the name Grey was a bit confusing though. 

The story is told through the perspective of Iris, the youngest sister, the only one left at home.I think that Iris is the most normal one of the three. All Iris wants is to forget the mystery that surrounds her family, and live a normal live. This is not as easy as it seems when you are a magnet to all the people around you. Iris is not entirely what you would call a normal person. She has some kind of power over her, a power she herself cannot explain, and she does not like using it either. Iris tells us that about her sisters, that they never finished school, left her alone with her mother. 

Through Iris eyes we learn that Vivi is a rock and roll star and that Grey is a supermodel. Then Grey goes missing, Vivi and Iris set out to find her, but they stumble upon many mysteries, as Grey keot a lot of secerts. What I liked about how the story was written, is that they search for Grey, and when they could not find her, they returned home, and involved the police, to help find her. I also thought it was a really realistic way to deal with the situation. We see a lot of these cleaver scenes like that one, that are so normal, you are forgetting that you are reading a story containing supernatural elements.

This book is not overly scary, it is more a tale with dread building up, a mystery that needs to unravel. There was one scene though that really freaked me out, at that is more that I have a huge disliking of ants than that is was scary. It was more gross than scary, it did freak me out a bit. And I loved the book for it, great that they managed to do that.

There were a few surprises, aspecially the ending was definitely not what I had expected. I am not going to put spoilers in but I was surprised it ended the way it did. We also find out what happend all does years ago, when the Hollow sisters first disappeared. Trust me when I say, it is original and it is a really good ending.

Conclusions

This is a compelling story, very beautifully written, full of mystery and some horror elements. It is not overly scary, if you are a beginner in the horror genre I think this would be a good place to start. The ending was a surprise, very satifying and it kind of leaves room for a next installment? I am not sure if it was meant to be a standalone or not. I am curious to see if this author will remain on this path with her books. One can only hope, we need more books like this to be around!

"What you don't understand," she said to me once when I told her how dangerous it was, "is that I am the thing in the dark."