A chilling ghost story with a twist: the New York Times bestselling author of The Winter People returns to the woods of Vermont to tell the story of a husband and wife who don’t simply move into a haunted house–they build one . . .In a quest for a simpler life, Helen and Nate have abandoned the comforts of suburbia to take up residence on forty-four acres of rural land where they will begin the … residence on forty-four acres of rural land where they will begin the ultimate, aspirational do-it-yourself project: building the house of their dreams. When they discover that this beautiful property has a dark and violent past, Helen, a former history teacher, becomes consumed by the local legend of Hattie Breckenridge, a woman who lived and died there a century ago. With her passion for artifacts, Helen finds special materials to incorporate into the house–a beam from an old schoolroom, bricks from a mill, a mantel from a farmhouse–objects that draw her deeper into the story of Hattie and her descendants, three generations of Breckenridge women, each of whom died suspiciously. As the building project progresses, the house will become a place of menace and unfinished business: a new home, now haunted, that beckons its owners and their neighbors toward unimaginable danger.
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It was nearing Halloween, so it seemed like a ghost story was in order. Jennifer McMahon is a new author to me. The Invited wasn’t scary in the traditional way most readers might expect. It was more of a mystery, and every good mystery should keep you guessing until the very end. The Invited delivered! I was shocked by the ending. An entertaining read for any season.
Jennifer McMahon is one of my auto-buy authors, and I get excited whenever I see a new release from her. The Invited is a ghost story with threads of witchcraft and spiritualism that serves up a generous dollop of greed, tragedy, and twisted genealogy. This book creeps along—a bit slow at the beginning—as characters are introduced and an old legend gradually unfolds.
Like a ticking time bomb, the book builds to an explosive conclusion, sucking the reader deeper and deeper with each successive chapter into the grim history of a small New England town. This isn’t a hide-under-the-covers type of book, but one that delivers shivers and goose bumps, while examining the darker side of human nature.
In the early 1900s, Hattie Breckenridge was hung as a witch, her body discarded in the bog where she made her home. Enter Helen and Nate, a married couple who purchase the land where Hattie lived. In a desire to escape the bustle of suburbia, they begin constructing a home, hoping for a quiet life.
It isn’t long before odd occurrences start. Things go missing, the sound of screaming rises from the bog at night, Nate sees a mysterious white doe. As he becomes fixated on the doe, Helen delves into Hattie’s family tree, learning Hattie wasn’t the only one who met a terrible fate. With the help of an odd young girl named Olive, and a new friend, Helen is soon immersed in digging deeper into Hattie’s past, trying to discover what became of her descendants. Helen grows certain Hattie is trying to communicate with her, warning her of an ugly tragedy to come.
If you like atmospheric reads, small town settings, and things that-go-bump in the night, you’re certain to love this spooky novel. It’s all here—broken families, spirit circles, small town gossip, haunted objects—there’s even whispers of buried treasure. Brilliantly packaged and delivered as only McMahon can do, she once again proves her skill as a gifted storyteller. Now, how long until her next book?
Jennifer McMahon’s latest premise is utterly chilling: Imagine you don’t stumble upon a haunted house, you build one. The Invited deserves a special spot in the canon of great ghost stories, and will remind McMahon’s readers why she is such a worthy literary descendant of Shirley Jackson.
The Invited by Jennifer McMahon is a suspenseful ghost story which you will not want to put down until the ending! It does not matter if you believe in ghosts or not, this story of a couple who move to Vermont to start a new life on an old piece of land which is rich with a terrible family history is engrossing. I won’t post spoilers, but Helen and Nate never expect what they will experience once they start building their dream home in the woods. The generational tumble of events which start on Harriet’s place in the early 1900s is strange and sad. It shows the prejudices of a town who cannot tolerate an artistic person with a special gift. A very good tale!
Another good one by this author, my second read from her! This is a good haunting story, different in that the house that is haunted has yet to be built! The husband and wife plan their dream house, buy the land and begin to build it themselves! The land has a horrible history with years of sightings of a woman who was wrongly accused and murdered on the property years ago!
The wife starts buying up local antiques that she reacts to, feelings she gets that she is meant to put these in her home! With these she has invited in the spirits of a family that the locals believed have haunted the area for generations.
I loved this book! It follows the usual format of alternating story lines but most of this one is set in the present. There is past events that set up the present day story and we get that right at the beginning. I liked the characters, the setting and the stories. Jennifer McMahon is always so good to read or listen to! If you like her other books, you will like this one as well. I listened to the audio book, provided by my library. The narrators are Amanda Carlin and Justine Eyre. Both were a delight to listen to.
Why are odd things happening at Helen and Nate’s new property? When they discover the violent history of the land, Helen wants to find out more. Good for readers who like a bit of supernatural stuff (nothing too scary) combined with mystery.
A dream home becomes one of nightmares for a husband and wife attempting to start a new life in the woods of Vermont. Board by board, stone by stone, tragic events of the past creep toward the light in this delicious slow burn of a haunted tale.
Anyone that knows me well at all knows I absolutely A-D-O-R-E Jennifer McMahon. She writes some of the creepiest and most chilling books I have ever read. Unfortunately, while I still really enjoyed The Invited, it was not my absolute favorite from her.
What it’s about: Helen and Nate have decided to leave their teaching jobs and move from the suburbs of Connecticut to forty-four acres in Hartsboro, Vermont. Using money she received after her dad died, Helen and Nate decide to build a house on the land and stay there in a trailer while it is being built. But this is not your standard, large piece of land and people in the area say it is haunted. Helen likes things with history though, and Nate doesn’t believe in ghosts. Soon Helen finds herself engrossed with the history of the property and the dark things that happened on the land. But when strange things start to happen at the building site during the night, Helen and Nate must decide if staying there is smart, or if it has the potential to be deadly…
The Invited jumps between past occurrences on the land, and POV-wise mostly between Helen and a young girl named Olive in present day. I loved the different timelines and storylines in the book, and they definitely kept me very interested in what was going on. I wasn’t a huge fan of all Olive’s sections, but most of them were necessary to the story.
And like with most of this author’s books, The Invited has a very real ghost aspect to it. So if you don’t like books that delve into the supernatural world, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend this to you. I happen to love that about McMahon’s novels, and that ended up being what disappointed me the most in this one. While the ghost aspect was there, I think she could have gone SO much further with it and made this book even better than it was. Especially considering the fact that this cover is so dang creepy and perfect for the story.
Also, did I mention how atmospheric this book is?? The setting was positively eerie, and it made everything seem even creepier.
Final Thought: The Invited is quick, interesting, and classic McMahon so if you haven’t picked up a book by her yet, or are already a huge fan, I definitely recommend picking this up. I loved that the sections of the book were broken into the building of the house, plus the pacing, along with the other things I mentioned. The only things that fell short for me were the ghost aspect, finding myself annoyed at times with Olive’s sections, and the fact I figured out a major part of the plot before it happened. This was still a very solid read though and one that I will be recommending!
MY RATING: / 5
Thank you to the publisher for providing me with an advance review copy of this book!
Jennifer McMahon’s gothic novel, The Invited, is a suspenseful and atmospheric ghost story that lures the reader in like the haunted bog that provides its setting. The book opens in 1924 Vermont with Hattie Breckenridge on the day of her death just as she had predicted it – hunted down and hung by the townspeople accusing her of witchcraft. The novel then flashes forward to the current day with Helen and Nate, a young couple who have left their teaching jobs to embark on a back-to-the-land endeavor. They try to dismiss the local rumors about Hattie’s ghost haunting their property, but they quickly begin to experience strange sights and sounds as they build their new home. Both disbelieve the other’s account, becoming obsessed and secretive as they follow their separate paths in order to provide proof. Meanwhile, their young neighbor, Olive, is seeking some answers of her own on the land. Olive is coping with her mother’s sudden disappearance and suspects it is possibly tied to a hidden treasure that Hattie may have left behind. Each chapter of The Invited is titled after a phase of construction, and building/demolition metaphors are threaded throughout the novel. As Helen and Nate work to erect a house that recalls the past, the surrounding town and its actual historical remnants seem to have been reduced to rubble. Salvaging both information and artifacts about Hattie and her descendants, Helen visits the sites that relate to their tragic lives. Just as secrets and mistrust have destroyed the foundations of these actual structures, they also are threatening to erode Helen and Nate’s relationship. The Invited is nicely paced and plotted, with some genuine surprises and interesting diversions. Fans of supernatural tales or meandering mysteries will find Jennifer McMahon’s newest release a chilling and satisfying addition to her body of work.
This is a great twist on a classic haunted house story. Loved it!
I’m already a huge fan of Jennifer McMahon, and I was so excited that this book didn’t disappoint. The characters are interesting and make smart decisions. The plot moves swiftly with turns on every page. Definitely a great read if you’re into horror that’s not too intense. I can’t wait to read another of her books!
What if you learned that the land you had just purchased for your dream house was rumored to be haunted? What if strange things started happening, and items began missing, as soon as you started construction? Would you feel a bit uneasy? What if you were convinced you had encountered the spirit of the legendary owner? Would you pack up and leave? What if the lore of a buried treasure on your newly acquired property was actually true? Would that encourage you to be brave enough to face a restless spirit? Those are the unnerving scenarios new owners are faced with after purchasing the property once owned by Hattie, a woman accused of being a witch. This was an intriguing mystery filled with unique characters, folklore, murder, an unexplained disappearance, and the unending search for truth and a possible treasure — in the woods of Vermont.
A great story with tales of Witches and their ghosts! A very easy and fun read, especially for October.
It’s spooky but not scary. I feel it would be great as a movie too!
Definitely a thumbs up from me!
#theinvited #jennifermcmahon #bookstagram #bookreview #4star #lallahbookreview #readinginlallahland
I really enjoyed this unique tale. Makes me want to build my own haunted house in Vermont!
2.5 stars.
THE INVITED is the latest novel I read by Jennifer McMahon. I have previously read several of her other novels and am generally impressed with her imagination, characters, and twisted endings. The premise of this novel was one I found intriguing. Instead of your normal, “move into a house only to find out later that it’s haunted” theme, our main couple is moving from the city with plans to build a classic “saltbox” style house of their own.
In essence, BUILD a house to be haunted.
“. . . What people don’t understand, they destroy.”
Nate and Helen happen to buy a large property where a woman–once falsely accused of witchcraft–was dragged outside and hung from a tree in the surrounding bog. Her house was burnt to the ground, and her only child went into hiding far away.
This is where the story deviates from the “usual”.
“. . . What if objects didn’t just hold memories, but held traces of the people who’d touched them, threads that connected them still?”
We’re introduced to several different sets of characters–each with issues and secrets of their own. With all of these people brought in, I found it difficult to connect with any of them, really, as most of their personal agendas seemed designed to be obvious red herrings.
“. . . it’s a dangerous game you’re playing. Blurring the lines between the past and present, the dead and the living.”
The novel went back and forth from the present day, to various points in the past. These never bothered me, as they were clearly labeled chapters, and utilized to give a more in-depth description of some of the characters.
Most of Jennifer McMahon’s novels leave me guessing right up until the very end. Unfortunately, this time I thought I had figured out a couple of the main mysteries very early on, and was “hoping” for some twists to make me realize I’d been wrong.
However, the twists never came.
“. . . fury brought its own fire with it, tinting the world around you . . . ”
Overall, I still love McMahon’s writing style, but this book just fell flat for me. The few characters I did enjoy enough to keep reading about had some interesting parts to their backstories. Regrettably, since there were scarcely any characters that fell into that category for me, it made the more “subtle” clues feel all too obvious, in my opinion. While I was mildly curious about the situation, I never once felt that I was reading a “Horror” novel with this book, as it lacked any real scare factor. In the end, I feel that this is why I was ultimately disappointed–I had figured out the ending very early on in the story, and nothing about it seemed “horrific” to me. There is no question of McMahon’s ability to write, just frustration that I was able to guess at the answers so easily, and did not feel like I was reading her usual genre.
Helen and Nate have a nice, settled life as teachers at a private school in Connecticut. But they also have aspirations for a simpler life. So using their savings and an inheritance, they buy 40+ acres in the tiny village of Hartsboro, Vermont and decide to build their own dream house themselves. Helen, a history teacher, wants a house and land with history–and she gets her wish when she discovers the story of Hattie Breckenridge, a woman who apparently lived (and died) on their property over a hundred years ago. Marked by the villagers as a witch, Hattie was killed, leaving behind her young daughter, Jane. Helen becomes fascinated with Hattie’s past and begins trying to find out what happened to her–and her family members. But a series of more and more weird events start happening once they move in. Is it just the people of Hartsboro, who don’t like outsiders? Or is it Hattie? And are Helen and Nate in danger?
I just love Jennifer McMahon’s books and she’s someone whom I will read anything they write. This was such a good book that drew me from the very beginning. I started it while on vacation in Vermont, so I was really excited that it happened to take place in Vermont–a place I’d never been until this year. McMahon’s descriptive language makes it so easy to visualize her (often eerie) settings, as well as her characters.
Along with Helen and Nate, our slightly hippyish couple, we have Olive, a teenage girl from Hartsboro, and her dad and aunt, plus various Hartsboro townsfolk. Olive was a very compelling character; she’s been abandoned by her mother and is teased and bullied terribly by her schoolmates, since the town all believes her mom ran off with another man. Her bereft father isn’t much help, leaving her to raise herself or rely on her aunt. She has one friend, Mike, who is a good guy, but annoys our feisty heroine with his wimpy-ness. It’s hard not to fall for Olive, believe me. Even Helen will grow on you, too. And no matter what, they are so easy to picture.
The novel is told from a variety of points of view, but mainly Olive and Helen. We learn a lot about each of them. As I said, it drew me in from the beginning and kept me reading. As with most of McMahon’s books, it’s layered with that creepy, mysterious edge. In many ways, it’s a proper ghost story. But she always manages to write it so that instead of rolling your eyes, you feel a little creeped out, or find yourself looking over your shoulder at night. Hattie herself plays a really strong role in this book, and I liked how well the story set up the idea of how much people (and small towns) fear what they don’t know.
“What people don’t understand, they destroy.”
It’s funny, I could guess where a lot of this book was leading, yet it in no way diminished my enjoyment of it. I could see how that might annoy some, but it didn’t bother me in the least. I was completely immersed in the characters, the eerie ghost story, and trying to piece together all the plot pieces. Hattie’s story–and that of her descendants–is fascinating. There was just something about this book that I loved: that intangible piece that makes you a part of the story, keeps you flipping the pages, and makes you feel both sad and amazed when you finish the book. 4.5 stars.
I received a copy of this book from the publisher, Doubleday, and Edelweiss in return for an unbiased review (thank you!).
3.5 stars
I was intrigued by a thriller set in Vermont. I can count on one hand how many books I have read that took place there. Out of all of those books, zero were thrillers. Which was the main reason I decided to request the book. I am happy to say that the author did pull it off.
The main plot line of The Invited was an interesting one. I haven’t read a book where the haunted house was built. Every other thriller that involves ghosts, the house were already built. It was a refreshing change.
The plot line with Helen and her obsession with finding Hattie’s descendants was written beautifully. I agreed with Nate at one point in the book. I thought that it was morbid that Helen was bringing in items that were present during a violent death to put in their new house. But at the same time, I got why Helen was doing it.
I thought I figured out Olive’s story line reasonably early in the book. Yeah, word to the wise, don’t do that because it came back to bite me in the butt. I was thrown for a loop not once but twice. I will say that I thought Olive would have made a great detective. I am not going to say much more than that.
I liked that I got to see what Hattie, Jane, Ann, and Gloria went through before their deaths.Out of all of the story lines, I was surprised by Jane’s. I was surprised at what she revealed.
I thought that the characters in The Invited were well written and well rounded out. The author did a great job of giving them depth. Their stories pulled at my heart: Olive’s, the most. Even the characters I didn’t like were well written.
The Invited fit well with the thriller genre. There were times in the book where I didn’t know what was going to happen or who it was going to happen too.
I loved how the paranormal angle of the book was written. It wasn’t overpowering. There was just the right amount of ghosts in the book. Which is something I never thought I would say. Plus, Hattie never harmed anyone. She manifested only to Helen.
If I liked the book so much, why the 3.5-star rating. I didn’t like how Riley’s story line turned out. I don’t like it when a character does a sudden 180, which Riley did. It baffled me.
The ending bothered me. Why reveal what it revealed then? Why to the person it was shown to? I don’t get bothered by endings, but this one got to me. There were too many whys, what ifs and a wth on my end.
4 stars
Helen and Nate are a very close married couple. She teaches history and he teaches science at a prestigious private school. They decide to pack it in and build their own house. They find property in Vermont. Then strange things begin to happen.
With her love of history, Helen must research the land they bought and learns that it belonged to a woman named Hattie Breckenridge who was murdered by townsfolk for being a witch. Her daughter survived.
Helen begins to collect things from around the property that will give their new home authenticity and to connect with Hattie. She contacts a new friend in town and together they begin to look into the history of the land. They find pictures on the internet of Hattie and her subsequent descendants. They all died bad deaths. Helen begins to keep a journal.
The more Helen gets into the story, the more entranced she becomes. Soon, she is seeing Hattie. This she does not tell Nate for some reason. She befriends a young girl named Olive (Ollie). Olive figures large in this story.
This is a very well written and plotted novel. I like Nate and Helen and especially their relationship as they go through this experience together. I would term this a horror story, or even very terrorizing. It is more of a paranormal story. I thought the story line was refreshing and the book was very enjoyable to read. This is my first Jennifer McMahon novel, and I immediately went to Amazon to look for others of her books. Well done, Ms. McMahon!
I want to thank NetGalley and Doubleday Books/Doubleday for forwarding to me a copy of this great book for me to read, enjoy and review.
I loved this book! Didn’t see what was coming, so it was exciting.