Week 40 Review: The House at Watch Hill

From Goodreads:

#1 New York Times bestselling author Karen Marie Moning is back with a gripping, imaginative, and seductive new series in which a young woman moves to Divinity, Louisiana, to inherit a large fortune and a Gothic mansion full of mysteries and ominous secrets...

Zo Grey is reeling from the sudden death of her mother when she receives a surprising call from an attorney in Divinity, Louisiana, with the news she has been left an inheritance by a distant relative, the terms of which he will only discuss in person. Destitute and alone, with nothing left to lose, Zo heads to Divinity and discovers she is the sole beneficiary of a huge fortune and a monstrosity of a house that sits ominously at the peak of Watch Hill—but she must live in it, alone, for three years before the house, or the money, is hers.

Met with this irresistible opportunity to finally build a future for herself, Zo puts aside her misgivings about the foreboding Gothic mansion and the strange circumstances, and moves in, where she is quickly met by a red-eyed Stygian owl and an impossibly sexy Scottish groundskeeper.

Her new home is full of countless secrets and mystifying riddles, with doors that go nowhere, others that are impossible to open, and a turret into which there is no visible means of ingress. And the townspeople are odd…

What Zo doesn't yet know is that her own roots lie in this very house and that in order to discover her true identity and awaken her dormant powers, she will have to face off against sinister forces she doesn't quite comprehend—or risk being consumed by them.

My Review:
This was a really fantastic read! I really enjoy Karen Marie Moning's books, and I was really excited to pick this one up, that seems to be set in a new world, with new characters. I had such a great time getting to know everything!

One thing about Karen Marie Moning, is that a lot of her stories (I can't remember how many, exactly) have a narrator from the future that makes little asides, about what's happening in relation to what she knows is coming. Which is a pretty great way to create tension, to know of future conflicts. 

Zo's life has been very dreary for as long as she can remember. It was just her and her mom against the world, and when her mom got sick they quickly got deep in medical debt. That her priority was her mom, jobs were harder and harder to get, because they knew that she'd leave in the middle of a shift if she had to. Now that she's died in a fire-that may or may not have been intentional, and Zo was supposed to be there, too-things have changed. Not to mention that she's now to inherit this vast estate, which comes with a few conditions.

Loved getting to know Zo, and this world, as she explored, and found out some pretty troubling secrets. I was so entranced, and I had to keep reading! All the build up was so fantastic, and with the way things ended, I need to know what's going to happen next! 

This was a terrific read and I can't wait for the sequel! 

Author: Karen Marie Moning 
Series: The Watch Hill Trilogy #1
Read: October 4th, 2024 
Source: Ebook.bike
Reason Why: Love her writing and it sounded really great, and it's a Prequel & Sequel Challenge 2024 Book and a WoW Book! 
Publisher: Willow Morrow 
Published: October 1st 2024

5/5 Hearts

5/5 Books

5/5 Stars