Special thanks to Tenebrous Press for the ARC copy they provided.
I went into Posthaste Manor expecting a typical haunted house story.
I should have known better than to expect anything from Tenebrous Press, who constantly and consistently provides the weird, the unusual, and the unexpected. Posthaste Manor was NOTHING like what I expected.
Not necessarily a bad thing, even if the structure of the book ended up not being one I enjoyed. I’m one for a book that keeps a consistent beat, even if it doesn’t move from beginning to end in one, fluid flow. Posthaste Manor is an incredibly woven tapestry of styles that don’t match, and narrators that are anything but consistent.
Throughout the first half of the book the story alternated between two characters encountering Posthaste Manor, and learning just what a mistake they’ve made in purchasing the house. At the halfway point, all of that shifts into a bouncing shift in perspective every chapter. To me it was jarring, but I believe that was my own personal preference in books style being bruised. I will not deny the authors of Posthaste Manor did striking work in tying all these miss-matched pieces together.
It takes two people of talent, and an amazing publication team, to create a work like this and pull it off.
And, right after stating the style was not for me, I will admit, Jolie Toomajan and Carson Winter pulled this book off spectacularly.
The mad creative, the average family, the young woman fleeing abuse, and yes, even the family cat gets a say in this book’s narrative, and that is something amazing.
Not to mention, I read this book mostly in the dark. At night. When everyone else was asleep.
That was a mistake.
Posthaste Manor gave me the shivers, and made me not want to look in any mirrors for three consecutive nights.
Can you ask more of a haunted house story? I don’t think so.
So, be aware this book will jerk you along like a marionette with faulty strings, but you’ll enjoy it the whole way.
Or, you’ll drop your book and run screaming from that bump in the night.
Whatever comes first.