Review: How to Sell a Haunted House by Grady Hendrix

Title: How to Sell a Haunted House

Author: Grady Hendrix

Genre: Adult, horror

Publication date: January 17th 2023

Published by: Berkley

Source: Borrowed ebook from library

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Synopsis: When Louise finds out her parents have died, she dreads going home. She doesn’t want to leave her daughter with her ex and fly to Charleston. She doesn’t want to deal with her family home, stuffed to the rafters with the remnants of her father’s academic career and her mother’s lifelong obsession with puppets and dolls. She doesn’t want to learn how to live without the two people who knew and loved her best in the world.

Most of all, she doesn’t want to deal with her brother, Mark, who never left their hometown, gets fired from one job after another, and resents her success. Unfortunately, she’ll need his help to get the house ready for sale because it’ll take more than some new paint on the walls and clearing out a lifetime of memories to get this place on the market.

But some houses don’t want to be sold, and their home has other plans for both of them...

My rating: ★★★☆☆

I've read a couple of this author's books and really liked them, so I was really looking forward to reading this one especially because of the premise. A horror book about selling a haunted house? Yes please! Unfortunately, this was not what I was expecting and I didn't end up enjoying it as much as I thought I would.

Years ago I watched a movie called The Selling about a real estate agent trying to sell a haunted house and it was so freaking funny and just dumb—I absolutely loved it! 😆

I think I had it in my head that this would be like that movie, (because the author always throws in some humor in his books) but it absolutely was not. This wasn't as fun as I thought it would be, and it wasn't that scary either. Creepy? Sure. This had creepy dolls and puppets for days...

So it definitely had the creepy factor down. And there was also a thing with an eye and eye things gross...

which I can definitely appreciate, but it wasn't scary. (Although I should mention that I consume so much horror that it's pretty hard to scare me lol).

I think the thing that hindered my enjoyment of the book right off the bat was all the family drama. Going into this, I was expecting horror, but the first solid third of the book was nothing but drama and bickering between the siblings. I did not enjoy it. Their fighting was SO annoying!

But, I mean, this book was fine. It wasn't as scary or funny as I was hoping, but it was creepy and the story was decent (though I guessed the culprit of the haunting, the actual culprit, as soon as the character was mentioned at the beginning of the book). Like I said, I've read a couple of this author's books, and while I end up enjoying them, I always end up liking the premise more than the actual book. And How to Sell a Haunted House was no different. Except that, unfortunately, I liked it less.

Have you read this book? If so, what did you think about it? If not, what do you think? Does it sound like something you might want to read? Leave me a link to your review or comment below! 😊