{Review} HOUSE OF FURIES by Madeleine Roux

O P E N I N G   L I N E:

  MY NAME IS Louisa Rose Ditton. I work and live at Coldthistle House, a house for boarders and wanderers. A house owned by the Devil.

The usual reaction, and my own once upon a time, is to give a gasp of outrage if you are one of the moral persuasion, a guffaw of skepticism if you're of another. But I assure you—promise you—that it is so. The Devil owns this house and all of his who live and work within it. The walls are his, and the gardens. The food we eat for sustenance and the sweets we have for pleasure—everything belongs to him, and he gives it to us at his leisure.

(pg. 1, US Hardcover Edition)

“ Ah. Well. That is how rats like Mrs. Eames feel, Louisa, only toward this place. They are drawn here. Compelled." He leaned toward me and placed his palms on the desk, his smile crooked and cocksure. "They do not know why they come, but they do, and once they step through the doors, their fate is sealed. They come here because they are evil. Irredeemable. They come here to die."

~Mr. Morningside, HOUSE OF FURIES

My bookworm instinct told me I was going to love this book the second I touched it. I've read some of Madeleine Roux's Asylum series and adored them, but oh my god, my feelings for HOUSE OF FURIES goes past adoration to straight up obsessive devotion. To me this book feels like a cross between The Adams Family and Dexter and, ugh, the inky blue color scheme throughout this mixed media beauty will steal your soul. You'll be totally okay with it too.

Our main character, Louisa, has been an outcast all her life. People are offput by her, and she's convinced herself she's okay with that because she has to be if she's going to keep surviving. She's that girl that's wrapped up beneath five layers of protective casing with barbed wire and sharp-tongued observation, but deep down she's a squishy little cinnamon roll who just wants to belong. But like . . . she definitely does NOT want to belong to a boarding house filled with otherworldly creatures that kill. When she agrees to take a position at Coldthistle House, Louisa believes it's a short term sacrifice that will give her some freedom. Of course she's wrong, she has to be or we wouldn't have much of a story. Her housemates are . . . odd ; an older woman who seems to have peculiar talents, a little girl with vicious abilities, shadows that move in the corner of your vision and most importantly Mr. Morningside.  Louisa is told she belongs among the house, the shadows, that she is meant to be a cog in the machine that lures evil people to the boarding house and serves them up with a well deserved death. At first her only thoughts are to run, escape the dark threads that keep unraveling at her feet. But Lee, the nephew of a boarder, does not seem to belong. Louisa is sure he is innocent of any stain on his soul, and the desire to protect him puts her at odds with her gut instinct to run and think only of herself.

Fitted between the chapters are stunning inky blue images, illustrations mingled with photo collages that bring the setting to life and make sure to stoke the chill building underneath your skin as you sink into the story. Louisa is my favorite kind of main character; a chip on her shoulder, soft longings buried in her soul, witty and flawed and a little bit selfish when we first meet her. The growth she experiences is slow and well-timed, fitting into the pace of the story itself which grows bigger and darker as we grow, lacing around her like spiderwebs. Her companions are all compelling, you want to know them too, their backstories, their secret hopes, especially the mysterious Morningside who offers some of the best snarky dialogue ever.

The spook in this book is just . . . it's a gourmet meal for the minds of people who like goosebumps that come in multiple courses. There are beautiful paragraphs that spook you visually with creepy crawlies that pop out of the page and horrify you as much as Louisa. There's that psychological fear that comes anytime the whole WHAT IS EVIL, HOW IS IT DEFINIED AND HOW IS IT PACKAGED? question gets explored because what is more chilling than putting shadowmonsters side by side with the evil that can breed within the human mind? This is the part where I forget to write professionally and just dissolve into emotions, okay. Like there's the story itself, there's the visual imagery in the illustrations and photo collages, and then there's stories within the story about dark and mysterious creatures. All of the elements weave together and they get filtered through Louisa's narrative and I feel like her backstory and her temperament adds such an intrigued perspective to it all. Does she believe what she's seeing or not, does she believe she has a roll to play in it or not, is her curiosity stronger than her disgust or fear? This questions are interesting and along with her they make you want to ask questions of all the other characters as well until you are so invested in the world you're half tempted to start taking notes so that you don't forget anything important.

Are you brave enough to pack your bags and hazard a stay at Coldthistle House? If you are grab your copy of HOUSE OF FURIES by Madeleine Roux A.S.A.P. The Residents will make sure you aren't disturbed during your read. *insert nefarious evil cackle*

C O N T E N T R A T I N G S

Content Ratings: highlight between ( ) for details

Romance: G ( No physical manifestations of romance )

Language: G ( No cursing )

Violence: PG ( Physical assualt of the main character by an older male. Multiple deaths and moderate attention to gore. )

Other: --

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C O V E R   D E S I G N:

I am in LOVE with the color scheme. The dark, inky blue makes you lean in close to pick up on the details of the house and the images. The scribbled title has a sense of urgency and foreboding. And it matches the illustrations inside the book.

~*~

O F F I C I A L   I N F O:

Title:  HOUSE OF FURIES
Author: Madeleine Roux

Release Date: May 30th, 2017

Publisher: Harper Teens
Received: Purchased, this spring,
received for review this fall

 

SUMMARY:

An all-new gothic horror series from the New York Times bestselling author of Asylum. 

After escaping a harsh school where punishment was the lesson of the day, seventeen-year-old Louisa Ditton is thrilled to find employment as a maid at a boarding house. But soon after her arrival at Coldthistle House, Louisa begins to realize that the house’s mysterious owner, Mr. Morningside, is providing much more than lodging for his guests. Far from a place of rest, the house is a place of judgment, and Mr. Morningside and his unusual staff are meant to execute their own justice on those who are past being saved.

Louisa begins to fear for a young man named Lee who is not like the other guests. He is charismatic and kind, and Louisa knows that it may be up to her to save him from an untimely judgment. But in this house of distortions and lies, how can Louisa be sure whom to trust?

Featuring stunning interior illustrations from artist Iris Compiet, plus photo-collages that bring Coldthistle House to chilling life, House of Furies invites readers to a world where the line between monsters and men is ghostly thin.