The house kept its secrets – until someone disturbed it
Alone and isolated on a windswept moor, the centuries’ old building had seen its fair share of owners and more than its quota of dark legends when Lynn Schofield and her husband visited their friends there. From the moment they cross the threshold, it’s clear there is something very wrong here. Behind the walls is a house unlike any other and the horrors it has witnessed are embedded in its very fabric, ready and waiting for the next victim.
Decades later, another couple own the now ruinous house. For Diana, her initial reluctance to move in soon takes a leap forward when she sees something that shouldn’t be there. But as major renovations proceed – and the library starts to reveal its secrets – her mounting fears prove to be only the beginning of her nightmare.
Soon, she will discover the legends of Matilda’s Retreat are not consigned to the annals of history, as her life changes forever.
Dark bleatings, my spooky tribe. I recently had the pleasure of reading this brand new novel from Catherine Cavendish, and it is full of all the things I love in a good horror story.
We start with Lynn in 1997, who goes through a horrific event at a friend’s house, and suffers for a prolonged period of time, in a multitude of ways, because of that. She is then horrified further when her husband informs her of a decision he made while she was incapacitated, and this decision sets forth the plot.
Then we jump to Diana in 2025, and if you thought Lynn’s life was tippled with terror, just wait until you find out what’s in store for this next unsuspecting woman. And this is all because of one extremely demented house with a dark history, and a dark present, for that matter. It was historically inhabited by a man who sounds like pure evil incarnate, and a nun called Matilda. And when I say “inhabited”, I mean that they’re, in a fashion, still lurking and wreaking havoc.
I was surprised to find this quite scary because I’m not often frightened when I read, but this ticks a lot of the boxes that tend to make my hair stand on end. Diana, just like Lynn before her, has her arm twisted (quite severely) by her husband into a decision that she wouldn’t independently make, and then what follows isn’t just the supernatural disaster that unfolds, but the marital and emotional consequences. Diana is a woman who loses more and more agency in her own home because the man who is supposed to love her regards her less and less. I got shades of The Yellow Wallpaper and Rosemary’s Baby (minus the baby) from this story, a perfect, winning combination that I never knew I needed in life, but definitely did.
I don’t often love stories of this ilk because, honestly, I find them a bit tame a lot of the time. This, however, went much darker than expected, and played very cinematically in my head. Excellent weaving of both external and internal conflicts and A and B plots. Heavy, oppressive atmosphere, complex characters, great setting. I also really loved the writing.
I think general horror fans, as well as ghosty/haunting/possession/evil entity fans will love this. If you’d like to check out the book or the author, I’ve popped some links below for you:
Bleeeat!
Happy Goat Horror 
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