3.75 ⭐️ rounded up.

I really liked this book! I’m a sucker for happy endings. :)

The plot was really engaging—I was never bored and it kept me interested the whole time. I loved that the characters actually felt real (and not a phony kind of “real”), like I might know them in real life. I loved that the house was one of those characters, like Casita in Encanto or House of Wind in Silver Flames. I loved how the book wrapped up—that the authors are revealed to be the very characters you’ve grown to love, writing the story to fulfill a promise.

The haunted house / ghost story vibes were half way there for me. It could have been spookier, but it was still intriguing, if a little predictable. I never found myself wanting to stop reading, but I also never had an “OMG I *can’t* stop” moment.

The overall structure of the book struck me as odd—almost cool, but not quite. The dual POV was fun, but I did find myself questioning the back and forth from first person to third person. And then wrapping the book up with an epilogue and bibliography inside the story, actual acknowledgements and author’s note from Harrow, and then back to a “seven years later” scene from an entirely new perspective. Creative, but it may have felt just a little too disjointed for me.

Overall though, it’s a great read that I would recommend to any friend!