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Inhospitable
A fresh start for a marriage tested in more ways than one. An old house that has lurked, empty and bare, for decades after being deemed inhospitable. A husband who only has his eye set on one prize. A wife who's not sure she still wants what was once their shared dream.
A new place, an old wound, a fractured dream, a sinister presence, a living enemy...
A strange B-movie romp through the expectations of being a woman.
A new place, an old wound, a fractured dream, a sinister presence, a living enemy...
A strange B-movie romp through the expectations of being a woman.
164 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 26, 2025
About the author
Ali Seay
24 books89 followersALI SEAY lives in Baltimore with her family and the ghost of a geriatric wiener dog who once ruled the house. She’s the author of Go Down Hard, The Death Doula, and To Offer Her Pleasure, among others. Her work can be found in numerous horror and crime anthologies. When not writing, she hunts vintage goods, riffles through used bookstores, and is always down for a road trip. Visit her at aliseay.com
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
August 11, 2025
Okay this was a fun one. All the feminine rage and body horror vibes with this one🙌
Inhospitable follows a couple who have purchased a new house. This house comes with a buried secret though. The neighbor knows what this house really is and even tries to warn them. However, it’s too little too late.
Inhospitable follows a couple who have purchased a new house. This house comes with a buried secret though. The neighbor knows what this house really is and even tries to warn them. However, it’s too little too late.
January 4, 2026
Enjoyed this gentle fantasy horror from AS - gawd, those damn vines!
Nice message in the finish too, which kinda brought matters around full circle.
Always up for reading any unique horror experience from this highly talented author - good fun always guaranteed.
Rating: 3.7 bright stars, running devilishly green, thick and wild, wild...WILD!
Nice message in the finish too, which kinda brought matters around full circle.
Always up for reading any unique horror experience from this highly talented author - good fun always guaranteed.
Rating: 3.7 bright stars, running devilishly green, thick and wild, wild...WILD!
May 9, 2025
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - 5 Star Rating
Third Person POV (Bristol & Jace)
Splatter Level: 🩸🩸
Age Rating: 16+
🖤 𝓻𝓮𝓿𝓲𝓮𝔀 🖤
A beautifully written domestic horror with elements of botanical horror. Each time I read a book from Seay, it is always so full of heartache and emotions from our mains that has you flipping through the pages, hoping for a happily ever after but expecting the worse. INHOSPITABLE is no different and as an avid reader of the author, it has secured a place on my shelf alongside I THINK WERE ALONE NOW and GO DOWN HARD.
🖤 𝓹𝓵𝓸𝓽 🖤
Bristol and Jace haven’t always had the most perfect marriage. With Jace’s infidelities, they decide to purchase a new house for each other. But something lurks within the trees, something evil that drove the original owners away, calling out for Bristol. And when she finally gives in to the calls, the botanical horrors that await claim her and help seek revenge on the ones that have caused her harm emotionally or physically. This book is like Carrie meets The Ruins with its visual horror depictions and crazed climax, you’ll be gripped into its plot until the finale word. The fast-paced, short chapters grip you with elements of surprise that will have you finishing it in one reading.
🖤 𝓬𝓱𝓪𝓻𝓪𝓬𝓽𝓮𝓻𝓼 🖤
Bristol is a strong, loving wife. You can tell she’s trying all she can to make sure there marriage works. Jace on the other hand is one of those quiet, insecure types who falls prey to another woman who ultimately gets her demise. Together, they try but the chemistry isn’t there. You can feel their marriage slipping but they’re still trying to mold it. And don’t even get me started on the cuteness that is Dippity. Even through words, I can tell that he is such a good boy.
🖤 𝓽𝓻𝓲𝓰𝓰𝓮𝓻𝓼 🖤
🖤 infidelity
🖤 botanical horrors
🖤 early pregnancy loss
🖤 body horror
🖤 violence and gore
🖤 𝓬𝓸𝓷𝓬𝓵𝓾𝓼𝓲𝓸𝓷 🖤
I was in wow! I always am when Seay switches sub-genres in the horror department. But each one has been nothing short of a banger with likable characters and a badass climax that will have you entertained til the end! A must-read for the end of Spring going into Summer.
Third Person POV (Bristol & Jace)
Splatter Level: 🩸🩸
Age Rating: 16+
🖤 𝓻𝓮𝓿𝓲𝓮𝔀 🖤
A beautifully written domestic horror with elements of botanical horror. Each time I read a book from Seay, it is always so full of heartache and emotions from our mains that has you flipping through the pages, hoping for a happily ever after but expecting the worse. INHOSPITABLE is no different and as an avid reader of the author, it has secured a place on my shelf alongside I THINK WERE ALONE NOW and GO DOWN HARD.
🖤 𝓹𝓵𝓸𝓽 🖤
Bristol and Jace haven’t always had the most perfect marriage. With Jace’s infidelities, they decide to purchase a new house for each other. But something lurks within the trees, something evil that drove the original owners away, calling out for Bristol. And when she finally gives in to the calls, the botanical horrors that await claim her and help seek revenge on the ones that have caused her harm emotionally or physically. This book is like Carrie meets The Ruins with its visual horror depictions and crazed climax, you’ll be gripped into its plot until the finale word. The fast-paced, short chapters grip you with elements of surprise that will have you finishing it in one reading.
🖤 𝓬𝓱𝓪𝓻𝓪𝓬𝓽𝓮𝓻𝓼 🖤
Bristol is a strong, loving wife. You can tell she’s trying all she can to make sure there marriage works. Jace on the other hand is one of those quiet, insecure types who falls prey to another woman who ultimately gets her demise. Together, they try but the chemistry isn’t there. You can feel their marriage slipping but they’re still trying to mold it. And don’t even get me started on the cuteness that is Dippity. Even through words, I can tell that he is such a good boy.
🖤 𝓽𝓻𝓲𝓰𝓰𝓮𝓻𝓼 🖤
🖤 infidelity
🖤 botanical horrors
🖤 early pregnancy loss
🖤 body horror
🖤 violence and gore
🖤 𝓬𝓸𝓷𝓬𝓵𝓾𝓼𝓲𝓸𝓷 🖤
I was in wow! I always am when Seay switches sub-genres in the horror department. But each one has been nothing short of a banger with likable characters and a badass climax that will have you entertained til the end! A must-read for the end of Spring going into Summer.
April 22, 2025
This review was originally published at FanFiAddict.
Few things satisfy the soul as neatly as a quick and nasty bit of natural horror, and Ali Seay’s Inhospitable certainly does satisfy. As for what what the titular inhospitableness refers to, oh let us count the ways, dear reader.
Bristol and her husband, Jace, have just moved out of the city and into a long-dormant fixer-upper farmhouse that’s been left abandoned by its previous owners for decades. Thanks to a distant relative looking to unload the house for cheap, Jace was able to buy the property for a steal, and right away even those who don’t count themselves as a well-read horror fan will be seeing the red flags here, well before a strange neighbor pops up with ominous warnings to scare them away.
The home’s previous owners didn’t just up and walk away from an underwater mortgage — oh no, no, no, no, they went missing with a capital-M. The land the house is built on isn’t just cursed, it’s alive, and the greenery that’s taken over the walls and roof of the barn is alive in ways that no vine should be. We’re talking real man-eaters here, thick, nearly-sentient, The Ruins-style carnivorous plants.
How these plants came to be is the stuff of local legend and rumors. Nobody really knows the backstory, and none of that really matters anyway. Whatever happened in the past is a moot point. Bristol and Jace are here in the present and have to deal with it, or die trying.
The only problem is, their marriage is fractured beyond repair. Jace wants babies, Bristol maybe doesn’t, and to top it all off, Jace is having an affair, which Bristol is wise to. All of which adds up to a whole lot of inhospitablity, inside and outside their new home.
Seay mines away at the interpersonal conflicts between Bristol and her spineless, selfish, idiot husband to keep the tension high, and then ratchets that up further with some wicked body horror. The vines aren’t content to just eat any old random passerby or local wildlife. They need a host, and a scorned, vengeful wife with a barren womb certainly does fit the bill awfully nicely… And Jace, well, the guy sure looks like plant food to me!
Inhospitable packs in a broad array of themes and topics over its too-brief 160+ pages, from child death and failed pregnancies to toxic men and broken marriages, not to mention the violent supremacy of Mother Nature. Seay covers a lot of ground, but I found myself wanting more, particularly when the story veers toward Good For Her territory as Bristol embraces her rage and finds some natural outlets for her anger. Still, I couldn’t help but wish for an extra chapter or two of the old ultraviolence, just for cathartic good measure, and to deliver more fully on the promise of threats offered.
That said, Inhospitable works well enough as it is, for what it is. That I wanted more pages is a compliment to Seay more than a complaint of dissatisfaction. I’ve been reading Seay fairly regularly since her savagely violent serial killer meet-cute horror romp, Go Down Hard, at the start of the decade and have found her to be an easy go-to author for works that are consistently satisfying. Couple that with how much of a sucker I am for this breed of horror and Seay’s messaging here, it’s hard to be too upset at how quickly it all flies.
Seay takes a lot of familiar tropes that are practically de rigueur for this kind of horror and smartly inverts them, presenting them through the lens of a hurt woman, toxic relationships, and the feminine urge to do lots and lots of body horror.
Few things satisfy the soul as neatly as a quick and nasty bit of natural horror, and Ali Seay’s Inhospitable certainly does satisfy. As for what what the titular inhospitableness refers to, oh let us count the ways, dear reader.
Bristol and her husband, Jace, have just moved out of the city and into a long-dormant fixer-upper farmhouse that’s been left abandoned by its previous owners for decades. Thanks to a distant relative looking to unload the house for cheap, Jace was able to buy the property for a steal, and right away even those who don’t count themselves as a well-read horror fan will be seeing the red flags here, well before a strange neighbor pops up with ominous warnings to scare them away.
The home’s previous owners didn’t just up and walk away from an underwater mortgage — oh no, no, no, no, they went missing with a capital-M. The land the house is built on isn’t just cursed, it’s alive, and the greenery that’s taken over the walls and roof of the barn is alive in ways that no vine should be. We’re talking real man-eaters here, thick, nearly-sentient, The Ruins-style carnivorous plants.
How these plants came to be is the stuff of local legend and rumors. Nobody really knows the backstory, and none of that really matters anyway. Whatever happened in the past is a moot point. Bristol and Jace are here in the present and have to deal with it, or die trying.
The only problem is, their marriage is fractured beyond repair. Jace wants babies, Bristol maybe doesn’t, and to top it all off, Jace is having an affair, which Bristol is wise to. All of which adds up to a whole lot of inhospitablity, inside and outside their new home.
Seay mines away at the interpersonal conflicts between Bristol and her spineless, selfish, idiot husband to keep the tension high, and then ratchets that up further with some wicked body horror. The vines aren’t content to just eat any old random passerby or local wildlife. They need a host, and a scorned, vengeful wife with a barren womb certainly does fit the bill awfully nicely… And Jace, well, the guy sure looks like plant food to me!
Inhospitable packs in a broad array of themes and topics over its too-brief 160+ pages, from child death and failed pregnancies to toxic men and broken marriages, not to mention the violent supremacy of Mother Nature. Seay covers a lot of ground, but I found myself wanting more, particularly when the story veers toward Good For Her territory as Bristol embraces her rage and finds some natural outlets for her anger. Still, I couldn’t help but wish for an extra chapter or two of the old ultraviolence, just for cathartic good measure, and to deliver more fully on the promise of threats offered.
That said, Inhospitable works well enough as it is, for what it is. That I wanted more pages is a compliment to Seay more than a complaint of dissatisfaction. I’ve been reading Seay fairly regularly since her savagely violent serial killer meet-cute horror romp, Go Down Hard, at the start of the decade and have found her to be an easy go-to author for works that are consistently satisfying. Couple that with how much of a sucker I am for this breed of horror and Seay’s messaging here, it’s hard to be too upset at how quickly it all flies.
Seay takes a lot of familiar tropes that are practically de rigueur for this kind of horror and smartly inverts them, presenting them through the lens of a hurt woman, toxic relationships, and the feminine urge to do lots and lots of body horror.
May 1, 2025
This is the first Ali Seay book I've read that I haven't liked much. I still think it was incredibly well-written and I would definitely recommend it to anyone that is looking specifically for domestic horror, which I think Seay handles really well here.
I'm a big sucker for the "fixing up a creepy house" trope, and I loved the plant element to the horror. It was a great twist on otherwise well-tread ground, and led to some brilliant imagery. It also gets into some great territory with how it addresses societal and interpersonal expectations associated with being a woman in a marriage.
The biggest disconnect for me was that I never felt like I understood the main character, Bristol. Seay's characters have, in the past, brought me into stories that otherwise might not have lined up with my preferences. Bristol was not enough to outweigh my personal dislike of stories that center a failing marriage--and ultimately that was my biggest complaint. The story just wasn't for me, even though I simply adore Seay's writing.
Seay is still an auto-buy author for me.
I'm a big sucker for the "fixing up a creepy house" trope, and I loved the plant element to the horror. It was a great twist on otherwise well-tread ground, and led to some brilliant imagery. It also gets into some great territory with how it addresses societal and interpersonal expectations associated with being a woman in a marriage.
The biggest disconnect for me was that I never felt like I understood the main character, Bristol. Seay's characters have, in the past, brought me into stories that otherwise might not have lined up with my preferences. Bristol was not enough to outweigh my personal dislike of stories that center a failing marriage--and ultimately that was my biggest complaint. The story just wasn't for me, even though I simply adore Seay's writing.
Seay is still an auto-buy author for me.
June 11, 2025
If you were to ask me what my favorite subgenres of horror are, eco-horror would be somewhere on the bottom. Mother Nature isn't something that generally gets under my skin. I was not far into Ali Seay's latest, Inhospitable, when I realized eco-horror is a major theme of the book. You might be saying, “Hey dummy, didn't you bother reading the synopsis?” No, I did not because this is a book by Ali Seay, and whatever she writes, I read it without bothering to check what it’s about. And with Inhospitable, she continues to bat a thousand when it comes to my enjoyment of her work.
You can read Steve's complete review at Horror DNA by clicking here.
You can read Steve's complete review at Horror DNA by clicking here.
June 11, 2025
If you were to ask me what my favorite subgenres of horror are, eco-horror would be somewhere on the bottom. Mother Nature isn't something that generally gets under my skin. I was not far into Ali Seay's latest, Inhospitable, when I realized eco-horror is a major theme of the book. You might be saying, “Hey dummy, didn't you bother reading the synopsis?” No, I did not because this is a book by Ali Seay, and whatever she writes, I read it without bothering to check what it’s about. And with Inhospitable, she continues to bat a thousand when it comes to my enjoyment of her work.
You can read my complete review at Horror DNA by clicking here.
You can read my complete review at Horror DNA by clicking here.
August 22, 2025
This book is just okay. I feel like I spent the first half being like “this is such a hamfisted metaphor it’s a bit annoying”- and it’s kind of a lot of tell, not show, about their “perfect husband and wife life”. I found the characters to be all sort of one dimensional and kind of unrealistic. The second half had good enough gory horror imagery that it made up for all the books downsides, in my opinion. The book is short enough and easy enough to get through that I would still recommend it to anyone who is into body horror with a message.
Honestly, the description on the back of “A strange B movie romp about the expectations of being a woman” is pretty spot on.
Honestly, the description on the back of “A strange B movie romp about the expectations of being a woman” is pretty spot on.
January 22, 2026
I'm not that acquainted with Ali Say's work. Although I really liked To Offer Her Pleasure.
Once again this story concerns a person who comes into contact with an entity that's bound to turn them into a killer. And maybe this is one of her trope? I liked the trip, as it reminded me of old school horror in a way but felt it has slightly less depths than To Offer Her Pleasure. Still a recommendation on my part, a cool book to read while on vacation
Once again this story concerns a person who comes into contact with an entity that's bound to turn them into a killer. And maybe this is one of her trope? I liked the trip, as it reminded me of old school horror in a way but felt it has slightly less depths than To Offer Her Pleasure. Still a recommendation on my part, a cool book to read while on vacation
April 9, 2026
A very interesting and strange book!
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews