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** I received an ARC for an honest review **
Description
Murphy has seen ghosts all her life. Usually, they’re harmless. Strange shadows in the corner of a room. Pale figures that vanish when she looks twice. Whispers from the dead that have become little more than background noise.
But the First House is different.
Inherited from her grandmother after a messy divorce, a devastating loss, and the collapse of the life she thought she wanted, the isolated house on Tasmania’s coast seems like the perfect place for Murphy to start over. Better yet, with its notorious history and reputation for being haunted, it could become the ultimate tourist attraction for her new social media presence. Murphy isn’t afraid of ghosts.
She should be.
As she restores the decaying house, Murphy discovers its spirits aren’t merely lingering. They’re waiting. Teeth click beneath her bed. Rooms conceal impossible spaces. And something ancient moves through the darkness—a presence that has been tied to the house for far longer than anyone remembers.
The First House has been keeping its secrets for generations.
Now Murphy has come home.
And something inside has been waiting for her
Summary
I recently read new release horror novel The First House by Australian horror author JJ Carpenter.
Review
The First House is an Australian gothic horror combining supernatural, psychological horror honouring traditional ghost stories while adding a refreshing new perspective. Carpenter explores the lingering presence of history, the weight of family pasts and the possibility that some places hold on to memories. A setting of isolation, brutal weather and a decaying house with sinister supernatural elements. This is a ghost story like no other about confronting the past and discovering that some places are a gathering for rot and grief.
Carpenter delivers an unsettling and atmospheric haunted-house drawing strength from the connection of place, memory and the past. The protagonist is engaging with psychic abilities that make the house a threat.
The protagonist Murphy desires to rebuild her life by returning to a family home where her familiarity with the ghosts reveals genuinely terrifying encounters.
The setting is one of the greatest strengths. The house is oppressive and unpredictable, with its claustrophobic and hidden spaces, unexplained sounds, and disturbing manifestations of a building that possesses a history and will of its own. Carpenter uses the familiar comforts of a home as the foundation for something deeply unsettling that undermines the belief that a house offers safety.
Carpenter explores the relationship between personal history and inherited secrets and the house becomes a powerful expression of this idea: its physical decay reflecting the buried histories and unresolved events that continue to shape the present.
Carpenter’s approach to horror is particularly effective with an atmosphere of uncertainty where even familiar surroundings become threatening and slowly the supernatural power of the house with the refusal to let the past go also engulfing the protagnonist.
Conclusion
The First House is an atmospheric and unsettling gothic horror novel that combines a haunted-house mystery with questions of family history, grief, and inheritted trauma. Carpenter creates a memorable setting where the past refuses to stay buried and the familiar becomes threatening.
A highly recommended read for those who enjoy haunted-house fiction, Australian gothic horror, supernatural mysteries in a compelling and chilling read.
** This is my personal opinion and does not reflect any judging decisions **
