There’s No Place Like Home…Kim and Julian Taylor are in the market for their first home, and a visit to the secluded Beacon estate finds them enamored. It’s a peculiar home, rather large and in need of some renovations. The price is right however, and after a tour, they snap the house up without hesitation.The man who sells them the house has one last detail to share before they sign on the … to share before they sign on the dotted line. The previous owners of the home disappeared under mysterious circumstances nearly eight years ago and have recently been declared dead in absentia. Unperturbed by this fact, Kim and Julian set about making the home their own.
It quickly becomes clear that the two of them are not alone there, however.
This volume contains all four installments of the serialized novel Black Acres: In Absentia, The Borderland, The Amber Light and In Darkness. It also contains a brief preface by the author.more
Excellent horror story! I am not new to this author or narrator. Ibsen and Hempel make a great duo for horror! Ibsen’s writing is very creepy and Hempel is the perfect voice for his work! I’ve been wanting this set of books for a while, but glad I got them all in one. This is NOT your usual haunted house story! Loved it!!!
I have read/listened to several books by Ambrose Ibsen and always enjoy his haunted house stories. I have to say that this one wasn’t my favorite, but was still pretty good.
I think part of the problem with this book was the fact that it was a compilation of 4 separate novellas that were merged together. Since these works were released at different times, there was some (necessary) repetition of parts of the story. This made the story drag in my opinion and I sped up a lot of the book to get through these parts.
The premise of the book is this: A young couple wanting to get out of the big city and move to a remote location find what they think is a great deal on a house. But, after viewing the house and making the deal, they find out that the previous owners disappeared 7 years ago without a trace.
Undaunted, they move in and start renovations. But, soon, weird things start to happen and the wife, Kim, is on the verge of a nervous breakdown. as she sees and hears things that aren’t really there (or are they?). However, her husband, Julian, seems to be totally unaffected by the events.
Since I have read a lot of haunted house stories, this one didn’t really offer much that was new. I also found the author’s verbiage to be over the top a lot of times. Julian was an unlikable character until the very end and the couple does all of the things that you should never do in this type of situation even after they realize that things are going downhill fast.
The ending was a little unsatisfying and I would have liked to have more information on the cause of the haunting. All in all, not a bad book, but not the best by Mr. Ibsen. The narrator does his usual excellent job and is perfect for the book. I was given the chance to listen to the audiobook version of this book by the author/publisher/narrator and chose to review it.
I’d love to give this story more than 5 stars. It’s creepy factor is off the charts. A couple city dwellers buy a house in the middle of nowhere. There is nothing for miles except dead forest but the house was a good price and they were finally in a financial situation to afford a house. The husband figures with the money they save buying the house they can afford to put money into it. He’s happy as a clam but the wife hates it. She never feels comfortable in it and when she starts seeing and hearing things wants nothing more than to get far away.
The pace of the story is perfect, it ramps up as the plot develops. At certain points I thought she needed to bean her husband over the head, throw him in the car and drive but she’s dutiful. The character building is a big part of the charm of the story.On one hand the husband seems blind to everything but the stinking house and the wife is either going insane or something paranormal is truly happening to her.
It’s a clever story and one I’ll enjoy over again, and over again!
Okay, so I read a lot of weird books so it’s hard for anything to chill me. This book did the trick. It had a mixed feeling of an American Horror Story Episode mixed with Paranormal Activity. When I read the summary, I had a vague expectation of what to expect—every haunted house story seems to follow a similar arc—and while the setup of this book met that, the rest was a very pleasant surprise.
The general decline into insanity on the part of all the characters was so tastefully done that I began to question if the things they saw were really there. Each character was very physically and emotionally vivid—to the point where I hated on Julian for how cold he was to Kim. In the end, however, I was happy with how things turned out.
I don’t want to give anything away so I’ll just say if you’re looking for something to give you a chill, this is it. Oh, and if the story doesn’t chill you enough, the skillful narration will make sure the job gets done.
This book was given to me for free at my request and I provided this voluntary review.
Great book