Both seventeen. Both afraid. But both saying yes.It sounded like the perfect first date: canoeing across a chain of lakes, sandwiches and beer in the cooler. But teenagers Amelia and James discover something below the water’s surface that changes their lives forever.It’s got two stories.It’s got a garden.And the front door is open.It’s a house at the bottom of a lake.For the teens, there is only … bottom of a lake.
For the teens, there is only one rule: no questions. And yet, how could a place so spectacular come with no price tag? While the duo plays house beneath the waves, one reality remains:
Just because a house is empty, doesn’t mean nobody’s home.
more
Wow, wow, wow.
What did I just read?
I snagged this novella the other day and I couldn’t resist bumping it up my TBR and cranking it out. I read this in one sitting and this book just blew me away. Stunning.
The gift of prose Malerman shares here is simply stellar. The tale is, at its core, a coming of age love story between two innocent 17 year olds. They borrow a canoe, enjoy the gorgeous lakes and discover a pathway to a third, hidden lake.
It’s beneath the surface and below their boat that the true star of this tale sits. A house. A majestic, massive, ‘shouldn’t’ be there house.
And like any curious teenagers, they explore it.
There are passages in this book that are so glorious to read that you’ll re-read them two, sometimes three times and they will transport you back to those warm summer days spent at the beach with your friends. The days were you didn’t have bills, a mortgage, doctor’s appointments or kids. Where all you worried about was being home by dark and did your crush like you too.
I don’t really ever reread books. This one, this one will be one I do.
The tale has some incredibly unnerving and downright terrifying moments, but at its heart is a story of two kids falling in love and the ties that bind.
Ok. Wow. Where to start? I think that is the key. Where to start? At what moment is the turning point of suspension of disbelief toward acceptance, an embrace of the other, the magical?
Mr. Malerman’s fairy tale, for that is what it proudly is, is an exploration of budding love, of first love, more importantly, and a discovery of self by the couple undergoing that transformation. It’s a key theme in fairy tales – the gradual, wonderful emergence from a cocoon, of something starting off, unsure but blossoming in its own right. The love story of the two seventeen-year-old characters in the novel, James, and Amelia, is breathtakingly rendered, and, though you will have to excuse the watery simile, it makes you want to drown in that wonderful possibility of the world Josh creates, and not come up for air.
Metaphors are king, of course, as with all Fairy tales, but I think it is well played here. Everything about the novel makes you want to accept the impossible, to believe the impossible, because that wonder is exactly the feeling of first love, all over again. A brilliant, wonderful, exciting, electric build-up of something you have never experienced before. The two main characters’ exploration of the house a mirror of their own relationship, the dance of sexual awakening shown clearly through diving into new pools, new rivers, and lakes of experience.
As with all fairy tales, the hint of fear, of failure, of the monster lurking beneath the façade and behind the curtain, is present. Magical discoveries contain the potential of fear, a bitter taste to paradise, a groundswell of uncertainty. The further the characters progress, the more we need them to develop, go further, become more invested, the more the pressure for something, anything, to go wrong invades our belief of the novel, we, and the characters themselves manifesting that fear, which, I believe, Malerman hints does not need to be so. An acceptance of the right of that fear to exist is all the monster behind the curtain needs. Its very existence being nothing, without form, until manifested through the protagonists’ own fears. I think it’s a metaphor, as hinted in Malerman’s own words, that people look for something wrong in paradise, that need to see the horror in beauty, blight in perfection. And of course, at some point, the magic must end, to begin again, this time on dry land and with eyes open.
So. That is my take on this marvelous, poetic, lovingly written testament to budding love, teenage experimentation, and finding oneself in the flesh of another human being. People have complained this is not horror. Pfff. What fairy tale does not contain horror?
This was spellbinding.
Congratulations on the Stoker, Josh. This leaves me in no doubt as to why.
5 out of 5 ’s
If you’re seventeen or, if you ever were seventeen, this book was written for you. I believe you can read A House at the Bottom of a Lake purely for the enjoyment of the story or as an allegory representing the sometimes-frightening passage of teenagers into adulthood. Either way, it’s well done.
In this novel, two teenagers take a canoe out onto a lake, then to a second lake, and finally, to a third, previously unknown lake. To get there, they take chances, scraping the sides of the pristine canoe, as they must lay down and push through a narrow tunnel to get to this third lake where they find the house, under the water. Their obsession with the house and each other grows with each visit until they go too far. What is too far? What happens when you go too far? Well, that’s the story.
There were moments in the beginning when my belief was almost stretched to the breaking point, then the uneasy feeling of dread and escalating tension pulled me back in, and the story never lost me–after that, in fact, I couldn’t put it down.
What an interesting mystical read. This book was definitely not what I expected (horror) Seemed more YA than anything else. All in all it was an intriguing read, magical realism describes it best.
A great concept that could have gone in many different ways..
Thank you to Netgalley, Random house and the Author Josh Maleman for the ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Well this was real weird and creepy little book! I don’t always read horror, but I liked Bird Box and was really intrigued when I heard about this one. Two teens on a first date to a lake come across a fully submerged, fully furnished house and can’t seem to stop themselves from exploring it. Pretty quickly their romantic feelings and this compulsion to explore get tangled up and things start to get creepy. I couldn’t put it down, I had to know the answers to the questions the main characters agreed not to ask, for fear of breaking the spell. Why? How? …Who?
This is not an easy book to review, but I’m gonna do my best. I loved this story, but it’s definitely not going to be for everyone (just like Malerman’s other books).
Two seventeen year olds are out canoeing and discover a house underwater. They go down to explore several times. The feelings I got when reading it were…. otherworldly, eery, spooky, claustrophobic,
It’s like a coming of age romance mixed with the type of horror that many people today don’t think are horror. There are several types of horror, and this reminds me more of the older days of horror. The Mary Shelley, Shirley Jackson, and Richard Matheson type of horror.
The writing style was what was needed for this type of story; very immersive, reflective, atmospheric. The ending was incredible to me, but if you like your stories to end nice and neat with everything explained, then it’ll irritate you. I like having a little something to be left for my imagination.
The only thing that I didn’t care for was the way the sex scenes were written. Totally cringe worthy.
Thank you Random House Publishing and NetGalley for this arc in exchange for my honest thoughts.
Well, this is the first book by Josh Malerman that I have read… yeah, I know, I haven’t read Bird Box. But I will read it. I will read everything written by Josh from now on. This book… I don’t know where to begin. It was magical, scary and funny. The ending was somewhat arbitrary, which for the most part, I always like, but in this instance, I was a bit underwhelmed? Still, a great book and Josh has found a new fan.
This was a quick but interesting read. I felt it was more of mystery, suspense or thriller than horror. I did enjoy it despite being left with so many questions by the end of the story.
My take on this story is one of young love. It’s like finding a house at the bottom of the lake. It’s scary, it’s exciting, it’s new and it’s yours and yours alone. You don’t question things, you just live it. It’s all you can think about, your every waking moment is spent in this new experience! And maybe you realize that this is not a love to last the rest of your lives, so your house disappears, you say goodbye. This is a poignant story filled with metaphors, symbolism and something that touches us all.
I really enjoyed it. I bought a copy for my granddaughter I liked it so much. Great imagination. Love this author
I’m still not sure how I feel about this one… It was creepy and cool for a while (the tone is totally captured by the amazing cover). And it was also weirdly vague and left me at a bit of a loss. Sure, suspension of disbelief is a major requirement – but that is the case in a lot of what I read, so that doesn’t bother me in and of itself. Yes, a vague non-ending is becoming de rigeur in this type of story – but ditto. Neither of those on their own throws me off of a story, but something about the way they played out in this one is why I’m hesitant to recommend it and unsure whether I enjoyed it or not…
Don’t get me wrong – I am not sorry I read it and never even considered stopping. Malerman has an easy writing style that doesn’t require a lot of effort, which means even if you’re not sure about how things are going, it’s very easy to stay with the story and keep flipping pages. The characters were left pretty (deliberately, I suspect) undeveloped. This a story about atmosphere and magic, and Malerman did an excellent job establishing both and continuing to ramp things up right until the book ended. But something about the whole read left me feeling like things were unfinished – and not just the way it ended/stopped.
I don’t know what that is or how else to explain it, but this one felt like it was a work in progress. Not in the sense of being raw or unedited – but in the sense that even the author wasn’t entirely sure what was happening or why… It was disorienting, which may well have been what he was going for, but which left me feeling odd throughout…
I had a hard time with Unbury Carol and have wanted to read Inspection but haven’t had the chance – this experience still leaves me curious to try more of his writing, despite my issues with Unbury Carol. Malerman intrigues me, largely because of his unusual plots (and this one was no exception there) but he also confuses me a bit – not necessarily in a bad way, but in a somewhat unsettling one (again, this may be the point). It makes for an unusual read that is definitely NOT going to be for everyone. For me, I suspect it’s got to be the right time to read a book like this – you need a headspace that is willing to meander into strangeness and I don’t always have that – but when it is, even if it’s not a perfect fit as is the case here, the story still entertains. And at the end of the day, that’s why I read fiction…
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my obligation-free review copy.
This was the freakiest book I have ever read. It was extremely verbose with no characterization. I was very disappointed.
I received an ebook ARC from NetGalley and this is my voluntary, honest review.
Loved the Atmosphere it created. Really felt horror not thriller at all. It wasn’t bad but it wasn’t tood good either. It was mostly horror read
It was ok. Not my favorite from this author. Interesting premise but never really scared me
I’m still not sure how I feel about this one… It was creepy and cool for a while (the tone is totally captured by the amazing cover). And it was also weirdly vague and left me at a bit of a loss. Sure, suspension of disbelief is a major requirement – but that is the case in a lot of what I read, so that doesn’t bother me in and of itself. Yes, a vague non-ending is becoming de rigeur in this type of story – but ditto. Neither of those on their own throws me off of a story, but something about the way they played out in this one is why I’m hesitant to recommend it and unsure whether I enjoyed it or not…
Don’t get me wrong – I am not sorry I read it and never even considered stopping. Malerman has an easy writing style that doesn’t require a lot of effort, which means even if you’re not sure about how things are going, it’s very easy to stay with the story and keep flipping pages. The characters were left pretty (deliberately, I suspect) undeveloped. This a story about atmosphere and magic, and Malerman did an excellent job establishing both and continuing to ramp things up right until the book ended. But something about the whole read left me feeling like things were unfinished – and not just the way it ended/stopped.
I don’t know what that is or how else to explain it, but this one felt like it was a work in progress. Not in the sense of being raw or unedited – but in the sense that even the author wasn’t entirely sure what was happening or why… It was disorienting, which may well have been what he was going for, but which left me feeling odd throughout…
I had a hard time with Unbury Carol and have wanted to read Inspection but haven’t had the chance – this experience still leaves me curious to try more of his writing, despite my issues with Unbury Carol. Malerman intrigues me, largely because of his unusual plots (and this one was no exception there) but he also confuses me a bit – not necessarily in a bad way, but in a somewhat unsettling one (again, this may be the point). It makes for an unusual read that is definitely NOT going to be for everyone. For me, I suspect it’s got to be the right time to read a book like this – you need a headspace that is willing to meander into strangeness and I don’t always have that – but when it is, even if it’s not a perfect fit as is the case here, the story still entertains. And at the end of the day, that’s why I read fiction…
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my obligation-free review copy.
I received an e-copy ARC of A House At The Bottom Of A Lake, authored by Josh Malerman, from NetGalley and the publisher, Del Rey, an imprint of Random House, in return for my honest review, which follows below. I thank both for this opportunity. From what I understand this will be a new printing of the novella, so there are people who have read this previously, but for me this was the first time.
I rated this novella 4 stars.
The idea that there are houses, churches, even whole towns, buried within bodies of water by human design or forces of nature always astounds me. The first time I remember being made aware of this phenomenon: the 1999 film In Dreams, starring RDJ and Annette Bening. I have seen this coupled with the horror and dark fiction mediums other times to great success as well: Dan Chaon’s Await Your Reply had the ruins of a sunken town in Nebraska and Melanie Golding’s Little Darlings featured a still sunken town as just two examples that were recent reads for me.
Characterizing this novella as horror may put too much expectation on it to deliver heavily on that end of the genre, setting the reader up for disappointment. I do think the author intended for this to be more than just a metaphorical tale of first love and how strange and unknown it can be; there are what I consider obviously supernatural/dark elements added, their purpose unfortunately not fully realized, at least for me. But even with what I felt were missed opportunities, and an ambiguous ending ( which can be polarizing ), reading this was a treat; I wanted to keep turning the page to find out the next wonder.
I know there are questions that will never be answered about the house at the bottom of a lake, but visiting the rooms and hallways perched invisibly on the shoulders of two adventurers, while falling in love over a magical summer, I think I can let it slide.