This author is really great. I really loved this book. This tale was highly engrossing and highly recommendable!!

Three sisters in a creepy mansion with a creepy childhood. A lot of fun and very twisted with some real serious trauma in the background to keep it spicy. Holly Seddon can do no wrong and this is her best one yet!

She's done it again! What an incredible read, and for all of the guesses you make about the twist, I'd bet my house that you won't guess this one!
I held my breath, had to remember to loosen my jaw and even force myself to sleep and work!
So happy to have been on the Holly Seddon journey, only sad that I have to wait for the next one!

Absolutely loved this book. Great suspense throughout and the two generations are both represented well. Highly recommended.

Thank you Orion for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. IYKYK, my reviews are always honest.

Writing: 4.5/5 | Plot: 2.5/5 | Ending: 2.5/5

SYNOPSIS

Three sisters get into a minor car accident and end up taking a shelter at a house with tons of history for their family. As they wait for help, realization dawns that they might not be alone.... DUN DUN DUN!!!

MY OPINION

Hi! It's me! I still read! Anyways! I absolutely loved The Hit List (banger alert was issued) but The Woman on the Bridge was a SUPER STANKER, so I was kinda nervous where this new one would fall. Thankfully, she resorted to her "true" writing ability a la The Hit List but the plot and ending kept this book from being bangerlicious. Tbh if she hadn't been writing her cheeks off, this would've been maybe a 2 star.

I'm tired of books being classified as thrillers for marketing purposes. Publishers, do better. This is as thrilling as my dog licking his ass in slow motion. I would consider this more of a family drama with lite thriller aspects that felt forced into the storyline. The ending was particularly uninspired and felt anti-climactic (first time I didn't write anti-climatic... take that!!!). I mean the whole book is based on happenstance, because what are the chances that you get stranded at the old creepy manor where your mom worked after 30 yrs of being away? Pretty slim to none. But the ending really took things to the next level and was like "bloop! gangs all here!" And some of the math did not quite mathulate. She should've just removed all the "thriller pillars" and stuck with a family drama.

What makes this book great is the writing and the characters. Seddon gives each sister a distinct voice and they each have their lil "redemption" or "personal growth" arc as well, which is nice. We don't often see this in thrillers, but then again this isn't a thriller so why did I say that? Why not delete it? Idk let's keep going. I hope that Seddon can tap into whatever crack she sprinkled in The Hit List because that shit BANGED. But also... I think this book would make a better movie. It almost felt as if it was written to be picked up as a movie, if that makes sense? Probably not.

Anyways, this had potential but the thriller aspects felt very forced and ultimately ruined a solid family drama.

PROS AND CONS

Pros: GREAT writing, well-developed and distinct characters

Cons: ending was a double pack of ass, thriller aspects felt very forced for marketing reasons, everything was based on happenstance

Tense, Credible..
Three sisters, one night, one secluded mansion house. Lost in a storm, three sisters find themselves in Moirthwaite Manor - a secluded and remote place where their mother once worked and which now lays completely abandoned- but which among them will draw the short straw and be the one to seek help? With a mounting and slow drip sense of menace from the off, the reader is drawn into the lives of the deftly drawn characters as secrets are uncovered and connections are drawn. Tense and credible, haunting and mysterious.

“Can there be anything more frightening than realising that a bad dream was a memory, and then finding yourself back in it?”


Three sisters find themselves stuck out in a storm after their car breaks down. They seek shelter in a nearby, abandoned manor, where their mother used to work when they were kids. Stuck in the dark with electricity and no service, they draw straws to see which sister should go out into the night to find help.

Once separated, the sisters each begin to remember sinister secrets hidden in the house, with their vague memories of their childhood visiting the manor slowly seeping into their current reality.

The narrative of this story is told from different perspectives, the main ones being from each of the sisters in the present and their mother when she worked at the manor 30 years ago. Although the entirety of the book takes places during just one night, the strength of the characters makes for riveting internal dialogue which is both entertaining and illuminating.

This novel is a slow burn to begin with, but Seddon’s writing is so absorbing and poetic it is intriguing enough to keep readers engaged. As well as the main revelation of the manor’s dark secrets, an underlying storyline depicts how the sisters battle with barely knowing each other and the lives they each choose to lead.

For me, there’s no better setting for a thriller than a creepy old house and this book really delivers when it comes to suspense and sending chills down your spine.

This is a perfect read for a cosy evening.

This story is so exciting and dramatic that you actually feel bad for enjoying the trauma quite so much. Darkness and menace lurking in the storm that drives the three bickering sisters off the road and to shelter in an old crumbling mansion where there mother used to toil and they used to play with the child of the owner. One sister more so than the rest, feels that these are her memories, the others just remote witnesses to history, they clash, they explore conflicting memories in the crumbling house were they used to play and their mother worked hard. Their pasts inflict on the present giving rise to conflicts and in the darkness of the storm in the shadows of the crumbling manor more is waiting for them than their personal grievances, will they survive what turns into a desperate and spooky sanctuary. Exiting, fun and very scary! .

I love Holly Seddon’s writing and here she uses her beautifully crafted prose to deliver an atmospheric narrative. It’s a slow burner with the events taking place during one night after three sisters break down near their childhood home. But we also have flashbacks to their childhood as told by their mother. Not an awful lot happens to be honest but the tension gradually builds between the characters and their location as the past looms over them all.
This isn’t my favourite book by this author, the plot in the past was the more interesting part of the novel for me as I found the sisters a little 2 dimensional and clichéd but the setting and descriptive elements of the storyline kept me engaged until the end.

The description on NetGalley is accurate. The story is told from the present day pov of the 3 sisters plus that of their mother set in the 1990s when she was a servant in the big house with a very little from the daughter of the house, eventually. The problem is that the book drags so much that I almost gave up - the girls are very different but flat (eldest sensible, practical oh yes?, middle quiet, business-like, youngest, scatty, allegedly worldly) the old house just that - I kept thinking what's going to spring out of the wains-coating, answer, nothing, the secret, when eventually unfolded - predictable. .There's nothing creepy about dark, wet country roads with no phone signal, that's life. I'm still not sure whether the odd words that appear on a line were meant to be there - seemed random at first, then I tried to link them into a sentence (well, I had to do something to enthuse myself) nothing; so I assume that they were just annoying pre-publication glitches. Who knows? I'm sorry that this just did not do anything for me because the description was good, but never fulfilled for me. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy.

Loved it !!! Dark and dramatic with twists and turns. I practically inhaled this book . A really good read!

Honestly, I had to force myself to finish this one. It was so slow, I got to 70% of the book and nothing had happened. Literally nothing.

A predictable twist, an anti-climactic ending, and transparent character building. I won't be reading more, unfortunately.

This was my first Holly Seddon read and I was impressed with it, I enjoyed her style of writing. The chapters are short with different POVs, it’s mainly set during one evening but some chapters return to past events, but it’s still easy to follow.
This was set in a creepy abandoned mansion during a storm, with no electricity so it was a tense read where everyone has a secret and you know something bad happened there in the past but you’re not sure what. I thought it was slightly slow about halfway though but then lots started to happen and the ending was full of surprises.

I loved the premise of this one but it fell so far short for me unfortunately. Obviously it is a concept that's been so over done and this just didn't really rate as a horror, thriller or drama in my eyes. The first 70% of the book just absolutely drags. A whole section is just about a woman walking through the woods...... that's it. There's no tension built, no atmosphere, it's just a narration of her wandering about looking for signal and I kept waiting for something creepy to happen or for anything..... and yeah, there was nothing. The narration is split between the 3 sisters and then it also cuts to the past. I'd say the past is slightly more interesting than what the sisters get up, since that's essentially nothing. And then the last 20% all of a sudden there's other people there and dark secrets are revealed and all that jazz.

The editing is also absolutely terrible and there are random words missing from sentences and they're just randomly a few lines below, it's the most strange thing I've ever seen. Hopefully that all gets sorted before the books released but it was definitely distracting seeing a line with just one word n then playing "where does the word fit in" with the surrounding sentences. It wad all a bit of a train wreck to be honest.

I dont know, maybe I missed something and others will love this. It just felt like such a missed opportunity that there was no tension built or creepy noises or twists or footprints or shadows or something when they're in this bit old creepy abandoned house!

Spoiler.
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There is no villain in this story so why oh why would the "others" ne sneaking around and lurking in the 1st place?! Why all this drama instead of just walking up to the sisters and saying Hi?! It's just insane

With thanks to Netgalley for this Arc

I thought this book was well written, beautifully descriptive with good strong characters that the author brings to life brilliantly. However the first half of this book failed to get my attention fully and I found my mind wandering off. That said the last part of the book where it all comes together was really good but it just took so long to get there. 3.5 ⭐️

This story line felt a bit contrived. 3 very different sisters breakdown near a house their mother had worked in many years previously and they had played in as children. The house is now empty and they seek refuge in it. due to the weather. Big mistake as it is very creepy and there are others in the house. The story was very complicated.

I'm a longtime fan of Holly's and this was my absolute favorite - spooky house, family dynamics, a rollicking storm, a creepy child. Sold! Five stars from me.

The Short Straw is a tale of sisters anc secrets, compelling and pacy with a terrific group dynamic of characters.

Three stranded sisters who barely know each other in ways that count, an old dilapidated house from their past and a collision of memories keeps you involved throughout this twisty tale.

Excellent plotting and a tale of the unexpected The Short Straw is a brilliant, clever one sitting read