A move for a better future becomes a race against the past. Something dark lurks in Shadow Hill House and it is waiting. DOWNLOAD FOR FREE WITH KINDLE UNLIMITED
After her husband lost his job Jenny moves her family to the remote and beautiful Shadow Hill House. It is to be a new start. A safe place for daughter Abby to grow up and a new business teaching art for her. Only she cannot shake the feeling that something is wrong.
Why won’t the stains go from the carpets? Who is Abby taking to and why is she behaving so badly? Though her husband can’t see it Jenny feels there is something evil lurking in the house and she sets out to discover what it is.
As things begin to unravel Jenny fears for the safety of her family. Suddenly she wants to leave behind her dream, her home and everything they have, only leaving may not be possible.
In a desperate race against evil she must find the answer or lose all.
Find out if the family can escape Shadow Hill House for FREE on Kindle Unlimited.
Also available by Caroline Clark
Called From Beyond The Ghosts of RedRise House 4 book box set The Haunting of Brynlee House The Haunting of Seafield House The Haunting on the Hillside The haunting of Seafield House The Haunting of Old Filed Drive Daddy Won't Kill You The Spirit Behind you.
Shorter books with Carrie Something Evil This Way Comes With Wicked Intent Silent Screaming The Darkness in the Shadows
THE HAUNTING OF SHADOW HILL HOUSE is the first novel I've read by author Caroline Clark. In 1690 tragedy struck this large estate in the form of an abusive husband and father. However, the new family moving in from out of town are ignorant of the house's history. Planning on turning the place into an "artist's retreat", Jenny, Mason, and their young daughter, Abby, settle in--exhausting all of their savings to do so. With Mason no longer having a job, Jenny sees this as her chance to make her dream-job a reality.
Unfortunately, if it fails, they have nowhere else to go.
". . . it should have inspired her but still she felt nothing . . . "
While the exterior looks like a dream come true, the interior is another matter entirely. Suspicious stains appear on carpeting no matter how often they're cleaned. Then there's the issue of Abby immediately latching onto an imaginary friend named Victoria.
"Every time someone has moved in there since . . . well, there has been a tragedy . . . "
I felt that Jenny's character, and that of "Victoria", were the most fleshed out in this novel. Jenny immediately latches onto the "wrongness" in the home and her life becomes entwined with that of the past.
". . . she felt as if she was waiting . . . but waiting for what? . . . "
The atmosphere of the estate was best when stories of the past were brought up. I felt that the most intense emotions and believable characters were set in that time frame. Aside from Jenny, herself--who seemed the most involved with the forces around her and trying to "care for everyone"--the other characters just didn't impress me with the same depth of believability. They felt more like they were thrown in to play a minor role, and that the tale itself revolved primarily around two central figures.
Overall, I felt that the storyline itself was strong with an emotional pull, and some genuinely creepy moments. However, the lesser roles of other characters, numerous repetition of certain phrases, and a character that did play a pivotal role, but seemingly came out of nowhere, detracted from the novel maintaining a continuous connection. While this story fell "middle of the road" for me, I will certainly try another book by this author in the future.
This story was a good length and the plot was well thought out but something was missing. The story was somewhat lightweight and not dark enough for a really good tale of the supernatural. I couldn't work out if the priest was Anglican or Roman Catholic and whoever heard of a 17th century ghost child speaking and acting as if she was a 21st century brat.
A haunting of a beautiful and very old house resulting from what else? Evil. Wait. No. Ahem. Eeeeeeveeeelllllll! There. Much better.
That is all I will say, you just have to read it. My empathy for the ghost kept going this way and that. The writer could easily write another after this book and make it a series. But if not, then that is good too. The ending was not annoyingly left so, I was happy.
I absolutely loved this book. I've really enjoyed Carolines other books too. If you love creepy old houses, ghost stories and a good haunting, you will love this. It has a good story line and is so interesting you are pulled in immediately. I liked the reference in it if the couple in one of her other books. Fantastic. Bring on the next one
I do NOT recommend the audible version. The delivery was wooden at best. More like a bad electronic message than a person. That said, it was a pretty typical haunting story complete with evil spirit befriending child of the house and trying to kill everyone because she died a horrible death.
This story could have been so much better, but the characters have no Substance to them and every other line was what was wrong with her and more and more annoying repetitive sentences... And really as many chills as the character seem to get i the reader received none there was nothing scary about this book or if the were it was not written that way!
I feel like these author's are just having family and friends write them good reviews that if course misleads us the readers
Really enjoyed this one. It's not overtly "horror". It starts offa bit mellow and builds. If you have kids, you'll never look at imaginary friends the same way again. Definitely looking forward to reading the next one.
Another eerie haunted house from Caroline Clark. Do old places carry the memories of events from the past? Can tethered spirits have an effect on the living? What would an ordinary family do when presented with these problems? Read Caroline Clark, and visit the haunted places!
Jenny, her husband, Mason, and their daughter Abby are moving to an historic old house. Mason is out of work, and looking to set up a home based accounting business. Jenny is an artist and art teacher. Her dream is to open an artist’s retreat. Shadow Hill House, with its remote setting and large interior is the perfect place for this family to start fresh and live their dreams.
Their contractors flaked out, and left without finishing a few of the renovations. Without offering a reason, they returned a portion of their retainer, and left the house. Mason is faced with a bit of painting, and other small jobs as soon as they arrive. The most annoying of which is stains on the carpets of the master bedroom and hallway. Even with repeated scrubbing they stubbornly remain.
Abby is quite taken with one of the bedrooms, and immediately declares it hers. Jenny has concerns about it being at the opposite end of the house from hers, and having all of the guest rooms between them. However Abby is adamant.
Abby settles in quite happily, and finds an old toy left behind. It is quite a scruffy teddy bear. Its name is Mr. Good Bear, and she refuses to be parted from it, even though Jenny can’t seem to get it clean. For the first time, Abby, discovers what her parents believe is an imaginary friend, Victoria, and insists her parents also treat Victoria as real, a part of the family.
Though her parents are concerned about the vast changes in Abby’s behavior, they don’t see much wrong with indulging her for a bit. Abby did after all leave all of her real friends behind. Perhaps she is just lonely. Could there be more to Victoria than meets the eye?
Jenny enjoys the nearby village. She even heads for coffee with a few other mothers of young children at Abby’s school. She likes this group, but is disturbed to hear that her house has seen many violent events in the past. The locals refuse to go there. Could these rumors have anything to do with the odd behavior of their contractor?
Join the family as they find out firsthand the terrors of living in a haunted house!
This was a book I should have liked more. I wanted to like it more. After Lovecraftian stuff, ghost stories are my favorite. My favorite sub genre of ghost story is the haunted house. This should have been an easy win for me. It wasn’t.
It was ably enough written. The characters were decently constructed. I liked the relation of the family members. They seemed quite real. The story was alright, but doesn’t really stand out among the many other haunted house tales out there.
Two things bugged me about this book and brought it down to a two star rating.
More than anything, the character of the mother was extremely distracting to me. Jenny’s empathetic reaction to the (maybe unintentionally?) malevolent spirit, would be understandable for many young women. But only is they don’t have children of their own. I don’t want to go into details because it would involve spoilers. I’ll leave it at this- she regularly makes choices that are quite obviously endangering her daughter because she feels badly for this particular (and yes, pathetic and sad) ghost. But, as broken as many moms would be about the choice, few mom’s would prioritize a ghost child over their own live child, who’s both biologically related and raised by her from the cradle. Sorry. It distracted me every time Jenny did it, and she did it more than once.
The ending was also unusually weak. At the end, it was almost set up for a very clever surprise ending. I thought it was coming. I could see it coming. I could taste it in the air. And then, no. No, it ended up being more pedestrian than I feared.
It has its charms in places, but you shouldn’t feel bad if you skip this one. Nothing life changing here.
I finished the book and somewhat enjoyed it. Was in the mood for a haunted house book and that's what I got. But... the characters were not developed as well as I would have liked and the story was soooo predictable. What bothered me most was the repetitive sentences. And sometimes even the entire paragraph felt like a repeat several times over. It was annoying but I still finished the book without too much drudgery. As this is the first book I've read by this author, I would give her another try. I wouldn't recommend thiiiis book though.
big house sold cheap and buyers don't bother to cross verify - check no neighbours - check spooky girl ghost - check ghost befriends a child of the family - check bathroom encounter with ghost - check (would have loved more with a mirror scene !) adults trying to rationalize ghost until too late - check failed exorcism - check
A run down version of The Conjuring at best, has lesser scary elements. Overall, not disappointing.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Good storyline, good editing. Realistic, sometimes I found myself skipping paragraphs because of the repetition of the same event or character feeling done over and over again. I think this book was written better than the previous books, so I look forward to this Author growing her storytelling skills.
Victoria is one temperamental little girl! I get she was a victim in life, but in death she was a tornado!! I felt bad for Victoria the ghost, she did nothing to deserve to be killed by her father in such a manner! That part was sad. The book is very intense and makes you go OMG! It's exceedingly hard when it comes to children and death!
Victoria was scared of her father who was a mean man . He killed Victoria and her mother. Now she haunts -Shadow Hill" once her home. New owners of house are haunted. Great story and book deserves a 5 star rating. I recommend book.. Great ..
This book was fabulous. It has non stop excitement while Jennie tried to solve and help Victoria the ghosts problem. The end might have a twist or the start of a clever sequel
Very readable book, I truly enjoyed it but I figured out what they needed to do before they did. Good anyway, I will definitely read this either again.
Enjoyed the premise and the story was solid. The writing just lacked quite a bit. Ended so many thoughts with a question. “Did I really see this?” “Was this real?” Not great.
Loved this book & the spooky storyline, think when there's a child involved you kind of put yourself in that situation, so sad that Victoria's father did this to her & how she still craved that family unit in the afterlife.