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House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland



Book Review


Title: House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland


Genre: Young Adult, Dark, Fantasy, Mystery


Rating: 4.5 Stars


I have read Our Chemical Hearts by this author and really enjoyed it but House of Hollow definitely sounded like it was more to my taste. All I knew about this book before getting into it other than it has a beautiful cover was that we are following the Hollow sister, Grey, Iris and Vivi. The sisters went missing for a month as children but have no memory of that time but since then strange and unusual things have been happening around them and I can’t wait to get into it. We are briefly introduced to the sisters and some of the strange events that happen around them. It is clear to see of the trio, Iris is the odd one out as she isn't like Grey or Vivi in terms of personality. Both Grey and Vivi left school and home early, while Grey pursued a career in fashion, Vivi joined a band and both are very successful, while Iris stayed at school and tried hey best to be normal but it doesn't seem possible. From what I can gather both Vivi and Grey are returning to London for work and strange things have already started happening again, when Iris encounters a man who seems to be wearing a bull skull on both her morning run and he appears outside her school. It seems that the trio disappeared as children but when they returned they had no memory of where they had been, and in addition to that their eyes changed from blue to black, and their dark hair turned white among other things that set people on edge when they were around the girls but Iris tries not to think about these things.


 

As we approach the ¼ mark in the novel, Vivi arrives from Budapest to drag Iris out of school but she has already left class because she saw the mysterious man outside her school and panicked. Together, Viv and Iris spend the day exploring London and doing the things they haven’t been able to do in a while. The entire time they are messaging Grey as they know she can’t stand being left out and they want her to arrive quickly but she doesn’t. By the time the pair head off for Vivi’s gig there has still be no word from Grey and Iris is starting to get worried. This worry grows when she sees Vivi have a panic attack on stage and when she corners her about it turns out that she saw the strange man too in the crowd. Iris confesses that he has been following her all day and wants to call the police but Vivi tells her not to while they head to Grey’s apartment to see if they can find. When they find the apartment empty and apparently unlived in, they head instead to Grey’s favourite nightclub hoping that her boyfriend Tyler might be there. Once again Iris’ logic in on point as Tyler is there and Vivi uses their “magic” to persuade the bouncer to let them in. Through Tyler they learn that Grey often disappeared for days and weeks at a time and tells no one when she is going or returning or even where she is going. Tyler thought that she was seeing someone else and they broke up, however, he does let slip that Grey never lost her obsession with the occult and that he’d left after seeing a man leave her apartment which might be the same man that is now stalking Vivi and Iris. The abilities the girls have seem to be similar but the ways they use them are entirely different, Grey uses her “magic” to almost hypnotise the people around her but it doesn’t work on certain people like Tyler, Vivi uses hers to seduce people into doing what she wants and the only time Iris used her power, it terrified her and she has never really used it since but we can tell there is a lot more still hiding the surface about the sisters, every single one of them.


As we cross the ¼ mark in the novel, days pass and there is still no sign of Grey which is worrying Iris. Upon returning home Vivi informs her that she has contacted everyone who would know where Grey is and no one has seen her in days. She also makes the comment that she can’t feel Grey anymore, this is linked to another of their abilities which is to always find each other but neither has done it in a long time. Iris tries and she can’t feel Grey either so they search her old room where they find a note and some clue from Grey including an address. Vivi and Iris set off to find the address and inside they find a dead body with rune marked on his chest in blood but this seems to be the place where Grey spent most of her time. However, before they can dig further to man in the bull skull appears so the girls hide. The man tries to burn the body and any evidence of Grey before leaving but Iris’ quick thinking allows them to rescue a lot of the journals and photos that Grey left behind. The strange man suddenly returns and Iris believe he is scared of them but she doesn’t have time to think of why as the man shoots Vivi and they have to escape through the window. They hide in a café while they treat Vivi’s wound and go through the information they salvaged from Grey’s flat. Some of the journal entries belong to their father and document his descent into madness, he believes that his children were swapped and that the three girls that returned weren’t his daughter and that his real daughters were dead. Both Vivi and Iris’ memories are returning now but they are small and disjointed so they can’t really make sense of them but Vivi remembers the Halfway. She thought it was a place Grey made up where everything is halfway between life and death and they realise Grey has visited the Halfway numerous times before. Grey also seems to remember the time when they were missing as she mentions it in an interview but never said anything about it. This, however, is a little overshadowed when Iris finds a flower inside Vivi’s wound just like the ones sprouting from the dead body in Grey’s flat but she doesn’t mention it. From this we can assume that Grey is in the Halfway and needs rescuing which is why she has left clues for her sisters. Iris doesn’t want to acknowledge that anything bad happened to them but she always wants to find her sister. Like Vivi, Iris is also remembering and she assumes that the Halfway can only be accessed through broken doors as that is what Grey’s clues point to.


As we approach the halfway mark in the novel, things are beginning to happen but very slowly for my liking. One evening Tyler turns up at the house because the police are looking to arrest him for Grey’s disappearance and he believe she is framing him. However, when Iris asks about anyone Grey might have spoken to he remembers her former roommate Yulia disappeared for a time when they were living together. Along with Vivi they got to see Yulia who is terrified of them because of what Grey did to her. It turns out Grey captivated Yulia and one time when Grey disappeared she followed her and just like Vivi and Iris she doesn’t remember anything about that time but she was missing for a week. Yulia give them the address for the flat they had but she also tells them when she reappeared she has runes written in blood on her chest and that the blood was Grey’s. She also lets slip that her parents can’t sell or rent the flat because it seems cursed and she believes Grey was the one that cursed it. By the time they arrive there is none of Grey’s presence there but they do find carrion flowers in the wall like the ones that were in the body. I really liked the dynamic between Tyler and Iris during these scene but as there is no sign of Grey they return to her burnt out flat to see if they can find another clue. There they find the carrion flowers blooming all around the doors of the flat and Iris can feel Grey’s presence behind a door. Tyler thinks that the pair have gone mad especially when Iris begins talking through the door to nothing. Just as Iris is giving up, Grey appears but it seems that she is bound to the door and can’t go beyond it and warns Iris to run because he is coming presumably the man in the bull skull. It seems that the mystery is getting deeper as the tension rises and I can’t wait to see whether Vivi and Iris actually go into the Halfway again. I am currently undecided on whether or not this book will have a happy ending as the tone seems rather dark.


As we cross into the second half of the novel, it seems Grey did return to their world but this time she seems wild and feral, biting and fighting her sisters when they try to take her to the hospital. Eventually they succeed in doing that but word of Grey’s return is already spreading, despite this Vivi and Iris refuse to leave her side even when their mother does. Iris has to explain to Tyler why their mother hates Grey so much and she internally reflects on how she is seeing fragments of the madness that took their father entering into their mother’s behaviour. That isn’t the focus and Iris sees a doctor and nurse huddled outside Grey’s room and they give her a silent warning to do enter but she tries anyway only to find the policeman outside dead and the door to Grey’s room locked. Grey appears behind her telling her to remove her shoes which Iris does, Grey quickly explains that the policeman wasn’t what he appeared to be and that the bull man is coming for her. He does turn up moments later finding the policeman dead who seems to be a spy sent by the bull man and when he enters Grey’s room the sisters slip away making their way to Tyler and Vivi silently getting them to remove their shoes too before slipping around the corner just as the enraged bull man appears. He tracks and chases them through the hospital grabbing hold of Tyler at one point but Grey stabs him and the four of them manage to escape into the street where Grey hypnotises a driver of a passing car who drives until the car runs out of fuel. Now they are in the middle of nowhere, Grey has developed a high fever and slips in and out of consciousness so she isn’t able to explain what is happening as neither Vivi or Iris seem to understand and Tyler is an outsider into all this. We also get some more insight into Iris’ characters, like how the kiss with Justine went badly it turns out it happened again this time with a grown man. While Grey saved her before the man raped her, Iris pleaded with her to spare the man’s life and Grey turns on her for letting lesser people push her around even when she has the power to control them completely unaware that Iris doesn’t want the power and won’t use it even when her life is in dangerous so she can’t control it like her sisters can.


As we approach the ¾ mark in the novel, the trio plus Tyler end up in Edinburgh where their story began all those years ago. Grey has seemingly led them to the home of a little girl called Agnes, Iris assumes that Grey bought the house for the girl as all the mail is in their grandmother’s name which Grey uses when she wants to hide her identity. Agnes explains to Iris that the Halfway infects the people that enter it and it infects her, Grey, Vivi and Iris but in different ways. While she heals Grey recover, Iris tells her about the man and that he might have cut Grey which scares Agnes. She explains that with Grey’s blood the man can always track her similar to the way the sisters can always find each other and that no where is safe for them. While Grey is recovering Iris gets Agnes to explain about her time in the Halfway, it seems like them Agnes accidently entered the Halfway but was unable to find her way back and she was there for decades. However, upon one of Grey’s trips into the Halfway she found Agnes and was able to bring her back as Grey learnt that their blood was different for some reason allowing them to return and by painting a series of runes on Agnes’ chest in her blood, they were both able to return. Tyler also explains that he might have gone there when he temporarily died from drowning as his mother swears when he began coughing up water that she saw white flowers there as well. However, the bull man finds them really quickly and while Agnes tries to help Vivi and Grey she is attacked and killed by the bull man. The bull man ends up knocking out Tyler and injured Iris so he is free to take both Grey and Vivi into the Halfway. Both Tyler and Iris are distraught when they realises both girls are gone but Iris is filled with rage and goes to the house the entered the Halfway through before only to find it is now someone’s home. However, Claire, the woman living there tells Iris about Saint Anthony’s Chapel where kids have disappeared before as she uses her power intentionally for the first time. With Tyler tagging along they arrive at the Chapel a few minutes before dawn when the barrier between worlds will be at its weakest and just as the sun rises they cross over into the Halfway together.


As we cross into the final section of the novel, we get to see not only the Halfway but we find out the truth behind the disappearance of the Hollow sisters and why their don’t have any memories. For me the author setting apart Vivi and Iris from Grey was fitting especially after what Grey had done and the decision they made during the epilogue to return to the Halfway to see if they could find someone who was left behind. I also really enjoyed the fact that Cate was aware of what the girls really were for years but didn’t say anything because she had come to love them and that she knew they had no part in what Grey did and they even helped her put everything to rest in the end. House of Hollow was definitely a change of pace and genre from Sutherland’s previous novels and I really enjoyed it and hopes she writes more books like this in the future, although I do want to know what happened to a particular character but I guess that’s left up to me to decide what happened.


Buy it here:


Paperback/Hardcover: amazon.co.uk amazon.com

Kindle Edition: amazon.co.uk amazon.com

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