The House of Last Resort

A Novel

By: Christopher Golden

Narrated by: Marnye Young, Noah Michael Levine

The next high concept horror novel from NYT bestselling author Christopher Golden.

Across Italy there are many half-empty towns, nearly abandoned by those who migrate to the coast or to cities. The beautiful, crumbling hilltop town of Becchina is among them, but its mayor has taken drastic measures to rebuild―selling abandoned homes to anyone in the world for a single Euro, as long as the buyer promises to live there for at least five years. It’s a no-brainer for American couple Tommy and Kate Puglisi. Both work remotely, and Becchina is the home of Tommy’s grandparents, his closest living relatives. It feels like a romantic adventure, an opportunity the young couple would be crazy not to seize. But from the moment they move in, they both feel a shadow has fallen on them. Tommy’s grandmother is furious, even a little frightened, when she realizes which house they’ve bought. There are rooms in an annex at the back of the house that they didn’t know were there. The place makes strange noises at night, locked doors are suddenly open, and when they go to a family gathering, they’re certain people are whispering about them, and about their house, which one neighbor refers to as The House of Last Resort. Soon, they learn that the home was owned for generations by the Church, but the real secret, and the true dread, is unlocked when they finally learn what the priests were doing in this house for all those long years…and how many people died in the strange chapel inside. While down in the catacombs beneath Becchina…something stirs.

©2024 Christopher Golden (P)2023 Spotify Audiobooks

Great set up but failed to fully deliver

This book was 3 1/2 stars for me. The premise of the story was fantastic and there was great opportunity for a lot of supernatural action. However, I felt the action was mostly lacking until the end of this book. I also felt that the constant introspective denials and rationalizations were excessive and detracted from the pace of the story. That being said, I did enjoy the story. I just thought there was a missed opportunity to deliver more.

Just Alright

As the title states the book was fine I guess. The ending left me wanting a bit more information about what actually happened. But other than that, it's fine.

Slow to start but good and creepy

Great narrators! I’m so glad I flipped to audio. The story is a bit slow to start but nice and creepy and gross after Part 1.

great story

loved this novel, interesting and new concept, the ending was brilliant. I would definitely read another from this author.

The description of the scenery.

Their Italian accents were hard to get through on the voice narration!

The story itself wasn’t as thrilling as I’ve previously expected from the author Christopher Golden. I was wishing for another book like his precious one, Road of Bones

Phenomenal

Christopher Golden didn’t disappoint. Another creepy tale set in an interesting location. Golden alway finds a way to use the setting to amp up the creepy factor. This one puts us with a newly “imported” married American couple in Sicily Italy who fear their new dream home may be haunted. Chock full ghosts, priests, catacombs, natural disasters, possessions, religious lore, creepy old people and RATS! If you are creeped out by rats maybe stay away from this one. But wait, on second thought that’s the whole reason we read horror right? I think you’ll like this one.

I was a little thrown off by the back and forth narration in the beginning but it didn’t take me long to get used to it and after awhile I found I quite liked it.

All in all it’s another well done horror story by this author. I’m going to give it a 4.8 only because I rated his novel Road of Bones at a 5 and that one is gonna be hard to top for me.

Meh story, but good voice actors

This story had so much wasted potential, especially when you figure out why it's the house of last resort. The characters are boring, dialogue okay helped by a good voice cast, plot is predictable, and the only reason why I gave this story 3 stars is due to the ending. I would say if you like a vanilla horror story with a good voice cast, I would say this story fits that to a T.

Lacks substance

The two person narration was less than good. The story was thin. Packed with what’s expected in a PC story.

So Not Scary

Oof. Thank goodness I'm finally done with this book. I mean, it's a short book, so that's something, but it felt long because it's just SO BORING. The premise and the setting were really appealing, and I was expecting an atmospheric experience, but I was sorely disappointed. With the exception of the outrageous accents employed by the readers, there was very little sense of place, and this story really could have easily taken place in any city in the world with old houses and old churches. Is this a haunted house story? Not really...very little of the story takes place in the house, and the author spends more time describing the protagonists' various states of undress while they wander the house rather than establishing a tangible concept of the house itself. Is it a possession story? I mean, I guess? Characters TALK a lot about possession--my God...so much talking--but again, not really a big part of the story until the final chapters. So what DO you get in this book? Way too many conversations between insufferable characters who seem to be incapable of any insights apart from being as patronizing as possible to everyone around them. That, and rats...lots and lots of rats. If you are really terrified of rats, then this book might be a little scary to you. Otherwise, it's just kind of a frightless slog. I really need to get better about DNF-ing books, but again, it was a short one, so at least the torment didn't last long.

Couldn't get past the terrible narration

It's just not spliced well. Whenever the wife or the husband talks in their SO's chapter, it's so jarring and took me right out of the story. I returned this.