I’ve been on a comic book kick recently and was really happy to be selected to read this on Netgalley, however, this just left me a little cold. I love the art style - it felt almost noir in its penmanship and really brought the characters to life. The story though, that’s what fell a little flat for me. Gripping for the first two thirds and then kinda’ just stopped - where did the horror go! Anyways, despite my middling review I would still recommend this.

Houses of the Unholy had me very interested the entire time. A group of six children making up horrible demonic stories about the adults around them abusing them had longstanding consequences. Years later these children are being murdered one by one and an FBI agent and one of the original six go on an investigation to figure out what's going on. I'm typically a Brubaker Phillips fan and will continue to read their work but the ending of this one had me raging. I will still be telling my audience about it and look forward to different viewpoints.

I mostly enjoyed this, but possibly because I live in the UK not the US, wasn’t alive in the 1980s, and have never understood religion let alone religious fanaticism, I don’t think I was the intended audience.

It was interesting and dark with a lot of plot twists, but it felt like the overarching plot fell flat, especially given the open ending- I need answers please!?

Read through Netgalley.

Low key this was better than I thought it was going to be. I'm not the biggest fan of the font on the cover. But the book was good and I enjoyed it.

I adored the artwork of this book, but I was not overly attached to the storyline. I couldn't stand the main characters, the spiciness seemed thrown in just for the sake of it and came out of nowhere, and just overall it didn't do it for me.

Satanic panic gripped America in the 1980s, like a modern-day Salem witch hunt, and suddenly the Devil was everywhere - especially in Natalie Burns’ town where she and a few other kids, later dubbed the “Satanic Six”, accused teachers of heinous acts, claiming Satan was involved, leading to horrible consequences for all concerned.

Decades later and someone is murdering the members of the Satanic Six and Natalie’s gotta go on the run. Teaming up with a disgraced FBI agent, they have to try and save the remaining others and figure out who’s killing them all. It couldn’t be Satan… could it?

Like their last book, Where the Body Was, Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’ latest collab, Houses of the Unholy, is another standalone book. It’s a twisty little number riffing on real life hysteria (Satanic panic was - arguably still is - a thing) and isn’t a bad comic but it’s not up there with their best either.

The story jumps between the present and the past throughout but the present storyline is much more compelling than the flashbacks, which become tedious and slow the narrative down. They provide some necessary backstory on the characters but often repeats itself - yeah yeah, we get it, Satan, blah blah - and feels like these are included to pad the book out to an acceptable length.

The present-day storyline though is unpredictable and often interesting. Natalie’s a professional kidnapper, tracking down kids who’ve joined cults and bringing them back to their concerned parents - that whole opening scene is pretty damn good. Brubaker includes more intriguing figures like Agent West and Natalie’s conspiracy nut brother Brendan and this narrative moves at a decent clip.

That said, the story never totally made sense to me - Agent West’s presence, the point of the murders - so I wasn’t surprised with the twist as I was waiting for something like that to happen given the half-(Bru)baked plot. The final act is a bit weak too. It’s a fault of this kind of story - anything Devil-worshipper-related tends to end in few limited ways, which skews towards the melodramatic and silly rather than coming off as exciting or scary - so I’m a little disappointed to see Brubaker fall back on convention like this rather than attempt something different to the well-worn formula. A certain character’s turncoat motivations too were especially unconvincing when stated out loud.

I found Houses of the Unholy to be by turns entertaining and boring. The narrative as a whole is pretty good until the final act where it all falls apart in an anticlimactic mess. The present day scenes are a lot of fun though there are too many flashbacks so that the narrative never gets to build substantial momentum. Sean Phillips’ art is what it always is: dependable and competent, if unexciting and occasionally bland.

Definitely not their best book, nor among their worst, Houses of the Unholy is a middling addition to the ever-growing Brubaker/Phillips library.

This is a 3.5 star review rounded up to 4 stars.

Houses of the Unholy is the story of Natalie Burns, a woman who was part of a satanic panic situation when she was a kid and who is now a private investigator who sometimes rescues kids from cults.

The story follows Natalie as she is involved in an investigation of the murders of people who were involved in the satanic panic scare she was part of in her childhood. As this investigation rolls on, the reader also learns about what happened when Natalie was a child.

This is a book by two creators who have worked together for decades. Brubaker and Phillips work very well together, and that is what makes this book work. The story and character work are good and the art is wonderful. The only flaw I found in the book was the ending.

There were a few too many twists at the end and I felt that, while I couldn't see how else it could end satisfactorily, I still wasn't satisfied. But, all in all, I found it an enjoyable reading experience.

I liked the general plot of the book but I wish there were more explanation/lore about why this all got started in the first place and why Blake wanted to open the gates of Hell at the end. What’s the motivation? Overall interesting read.

I really enjoyed reading this book. It was my first time reading anything from these authors and I will definitely be looking into more of their books.

I would love a sequel to this book.

Houses of the Unholy is a creepy horror graphic novel. It's a real page turner. The plot is really interesting and the artwork is great. I enjoyed reading it and recommend it to all horror fans.

Oh how I raced through this one. Such a page turner with a thrilling, suspense story. I enjoyed the dual narrative with the protagonist’s past flashbacks juxtaposed with her current storyline. There were some intriguing reveals and plot twists. I wished it was longer, I could easily read a novel of this. My only gripe was that some elements are very catered to the male gaze and there is some female nudity which I found gratuitous.

Thansk to NetGalley for the ARC etc etc

This one was fun! I'm a big fan of Satanic Panic stories, I grew up as it started to let up a bit most places but people like my neighbors were still a lot like this. I'm not an avid reader of Brubaker and Phillips, at this point there are so many Criminal books that I'm kind of intimidated... but I appreciate that this was a standalone. I'd definitely recommend it to other fans of the Panic or maybe to Stranger Things fans who want something a bit more realistic.

This was an interesting read and one that picked up for me in the second half. I didn't find the first half great at setting up the back story of the main character, Natalie. The flashbacks helped but if it weren't for them it would have given very little context wise. I also found the sex scene very gratuitous as it added nothing to the plot. Don't get me wrong, gratuitous sex scenes are fine sometimes but, when it is a graphic novel that is under 200 pages they are unnecessary when not adding to the plot.

The second half was better and just as things were starting to pick up and get really interesting it ended. And rather abruptly in my opinion. Maybe there will be more and it will become a series which would explain the ending.

2.5 stars rounded up to 3.

There’s a lot I liked about this - in particular the bones of its Satanic-Panic-revisited-in-first-person story, which I think is a magnificent jumping-off point for a longer piece of fiction, should this ever get reworked or adapted - but ultimately I didn’t feel it had the time to breathe. Less opaque than some of Brubaker’s other recent work, I think that the straightforward approach works against it - the rhythm became predictable by the midpoint, and I found myself anticipating certain plot beats as they approached. That in and of itself isn’t fundamentally a knock against knowing genre fare like this, but for me, it ultimately stayed Good and never ascended to Triumphant. I like the bleak, intriguing ambiguity (both literal and emotional) of its ending, and while the stark, semi-realistic style Phillips uses here isn’t typically my thing, I found it perfectly suited to this tale.

Ultimately, I’m glad to have read it, and think that despite its occasional forays into cliché, Brubaker and Phillips are titans for a reason, and it’s because what passes for pedestrian in their body of work likely only does so because we’ve come to expect so much of them. It’s not a crime to merely be predictable but good. I’m satisfied.

At this point in their careers a reader usually knows what to expect from a Brubaker and Phillips. As a team they have carved out their own niche of 70’s/80’s influenced noir masterpieces and within that space they do not miss…ever. Still, having read all of their prior collaborations, Houses of the Unholy managed to surprise me quite a few times with its swervy plot and willingness to tread in ambiguity. It’s probably the closest thing to Fatale they’ve done since that breakthrough book, but they’ve learned a lot of new tricks in the intervening years making this one of their stronger efforts, which is really saying something.

A pretty alright horror graphic novel! I enjoyed the setting and the call backs to the Satanic panic of the 80s but I felt like the lack of true resolution at the end made it fall flat for me. The art style isn't bad but certainly not my favorite.

Houses of the Unholy has an interesting plot and cool art style! I really dig cult vibes/satanic panic stories.
The overall story felt a little rushed and could have used some additional detail.
Thanks to Image Comics & NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Houses of the Unholy is the first work by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips that I have read and I was blown away by the content material. The story follows Natalie Burns and her involvement in the Satanic Six, in which her and five other children made claims of being forced to engage in satanic rituals by a counselor in the 80s. Now, Natalie has grown up and has tried to put the past behind her, but is found by Agent West and is brought back into the fold by investigating the deaths of other children involved in the Satanic Six However, nothing is what it seems anymore and Natalie is left to wonder if the actions of her childhood have influenced the world in more ways than initially thought.

The artwork was compelling, and the story was a quick and fast paced read. I found myself reading through the pages as if I was living through the Satanic Panic myself. Overall, an interesting and thought provoking read.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing this comic in exchange for an honest review.

I loved the art style and the story immediately drew me in. Cults and conspiracies that might actually be true? It's a perfect set up.

This story was emotional and heavy, and draws great attention to the vulnerability of children to indoctrination. I'm really fascinated by the past story line here, and wish I would have gotten more.

I'm a little disappointed in the ambiguous ending. I'd like to keep following Natalie.

First and foremost, thank you to Image Comics and NetGalley for providing me with an eARC for an honest review!

This is an interesting book, in a number of ways. I love the duo of Brubaker and Phillips, and as a result was expecting a lot from this book. I was marginally disappointed by the end of it, however. I wanted more of this story, more of these characters, and more to chew on. On the plus side, I wanted more because there is so much about the book that I enjoyed and that I found interesting, but it feels the whole time like it is just scratching the surface of the concept.

Basing a story around the Satanic Panic was a good decision, because it is a time that I have seen revisited some, but never with much nuance or depth, and Brubaker and Phillips provide a fair amount of this throughout the book. It is a quick story that tugs on certain threads that indicate a deeper evil, but sometimes it feels as if that tugging is leading to an empty rope, with the philosophical pondering just out of reach of the pace of the story. Don't get me wrong, the pace works well, but it could use a few more moments of slowing down to allow itself to settle.

The art of this book is beautiful and provides a sense of the surreal throughout it, which lends itself well to the feeling of being lost in memory and lost in the past. It adds strong emotions to the already strong story, and heightens the feeling that something is never quite right throughout the duration of the story. I recommend this book if you are interested in a new stab (pun intended) at framing the Satanic Panic through the eyes of the graphic novel, and open to a quick read.