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Hare House
In the first brisk days of autumn, a woman arrives in Scotland having left her job at an all-girls school in London in mysterious circumstances. Moving into a cottage on the remote estate of Hare House, she begins to explore her new home – a patchwork of hills, moorland and forest. But among the tiny roads, dykes and scattered houses, something more sinister lurks: local tales of witchcraft, clay figures and young men sent mad.
Striking up a friendship with her landlord, Grant, and his younger sister, Cass, she begins to suspect that all might not be quite as it seems at Hare House. And as autumn turns to winter, and a heavy snowfall traps the inhabitants of the estate within its walls, tensions rise to fever pitch.
Striking up a friendship with her landlord, Grant, and his younger sister, Cass, she begins to suspect that all might not be quite as it seems at Hare House. And as autumn turns to winter, and a heavy snowfall traps the inhabitants of the estate within its walls, tensions rise to fever pitch.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published January 6, 2022
115 people are currently reading
5,550 people want to read
About the author
Sally Hinchcliffe
3 books41 followersSally Hinchcliffe was born in London but grew up all over the world in the wake of her father's diplomatic career. She spent many years working at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew developing research systems for taxonomists until a two-year sabbatical in Eswatini gave her the impetus to take her writing seriously. After completing an MA in Creative Writing at Birkbeck, her first novel, Out of a Clear Sky, was published in 2008. She moved to south-west Scotland to work as a writer and freelance editor full time.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 524 reviews
January 6, 2022
God, I just loved this book. I know it’s impossible, but I wish everything I read could make me feel like this: alive with excitement about what fiction can do, half-certain it was written specifically for me, and immediately desperate to read it all over again.
I don’t mind saying that I completely underestimated it at first. The premise and title, teamed with a direct comparison to Andrew Michael Hurley in the blurb, made me fear it would be derivative; what with the isolated country house and the hare motif, I thought it might be too similar to Starve Acre. How wrong I was about that! I understand points of comparison are useful – I’m forever using them in my reviews – but Hare House, in its essence, is an original. Any cliches in the plot are made entirely new by masterful plotting, a uniformly fascinating cast of characters, sparing deployment of tension and eeriness, and, most of all, VOICE. Plus the fact that I didn’t go in expecting it to be wonderful made it all the more pleasing that it is, in fact, wonderful.
A woman, about whom details are scant (she is never given a name; her age is only ever approximate; her appearance is never described) leaves London to ‘start a new life’ in rural Scotland. Her reasons for doing so are unclear at first, but what is plain is that she has no ties. A stay on a country estate turns into a long-term let, and she grows closer to the residents of both the main house and its adjoined cottages. The owners of Hare House, the Hendersons, have been unlucky – perhaps even, as is later suggested, cursed. After the death of their parents and brother, only two now remain: Grant, the relatively young (‘not yet thirty’) master of the house, and Cass, his capricious teenage sister. In the cottage next door lives the wily, menacing Janet, with whom the narrator strikes up a strained pantomime of friendship.
The first mention of witchcraft occurs when Cass casually suggests Janet is a witch. The narrator thinks little of the remark, but it will prove to be far more significant than she realises. As winter closes in, what starts as superstition feels increasingly like sensible caution. Local legends; biblical warnings; stuffed hares; clay figurines... I’d perhaps stop short of calling Hare House a horror novel; it has a gothic air, but gothic doesn’t feel like the right label either, if only because Hinchcliffe’s light touch seems antithetical to the melodrama I associate with that term. The uncanny, in this book, is a series of suggestions. As the plot hurtles towards its climax and the atmosphere thickens, the reader, just like the narrator, is forced to contend with increasing evidence that for the denizens of Hare House, witches are not the stuff of fairytales; they are an active threat.
That’s without even getting to the delicious intrigue Hinchcliffe cooks up around the tragic Hendersons, or how the book uses landscape. There are particular scenes and descriptions I can’t stop thinking about: the countryside surrounding the house, particularly when snow falls and an eerie quiet is tangible; the narrator’s feelings of freedom and release as she learns to cycle; the bare, shadowy gloom of Hare House, too big and too old for its inhabitants. I kept waiting for the narrative to falter, kept wondering if there’d be some development that would change the way I felt about it – but it is note-perfect all the way to the bravura ending, which made me almost squeal with glee.
And the language! The writing! Crisp as fresh snow, sharp as broken glass, not a sentence wasted, not a word out of place.
In the end, it actually did remind me a bit of Andrew Michael Hurley – not Starve Acre, and definitely not The Loney (to which the publisher compares it), but rather his best and most underrated book, Devil’s Day, for the slow build of unease against a beautifully realised pastoral backdrop. The narrator’s relationship with Hare House reminded me of some other favourite novels with an imposing house at their core: at first The House at Midnight, and later, as things grow more sinister, The Little Stranger. And it also fits neatly into the category (admittedly a category I made up) of voice-driven ‘dark character study’ stories, encompassing the likes of Notes on a Scandal and The Woman Upstairs.
I can’t wait to read this again. It’s going to become that special thing, a personal classic, I can just tell. Adored it, everything about it.
I received an advance review copy of Hare House from the publisher through NetGalley.
TinyLetter | Linktree
I don’t mind saying that I completely underestimated it at first. The premise and title, teamed with a direct comparison to Andrew Michael Hurley in the blurb, made me fear it would be derivative; what with the isolated country house and the hare motif, I thought it might be too similar to Starve Acre. How wrong I was about that! I understand points of comparison are useful – I’m forever using them in my reviews – but Hare House, in its essence, is an original. Any cliches in the plot are made entirely new by masterful plotting, a uniformly fascinating cast of characters, sparing deployment of tension and eeriness, and, most of all, VOICE. Plus the fact that I didn’t go in expecting it to be wonderful made it all the more pleasing that it is, in fact, wonderful.
A woman, about whom details are scant (she is never given a name; her age is only ever approximate; her appearance is never described) leaves London to ‘start a new life’ in rural Scotland. Her reasons for doing so are unclear at first, but what is plain is that she has no ties. A stay on a country estate turns into a long-term let, and she grows closer to the residents of both the main house and its adjoined cottages. The owners of Hare House, the Hendersons, have been unlucky – perhaps even, as is later suggested, cursed. After the death of their parents and brother, only two now remain: Grant, the relatively young (‘not yet thirty’) master of the house, and Cass, his capricious teenage sister. In the cottage next door lives the wily, menacing Janet, with whom the narrator strikes up a strained pantomime of friendship.
The first mention of witchcraft occurs when Cass casually suggests Janet is a witch. The narrator thinks little of the remark, but it will prove to be far more significant than she realises. As winter closes in, what starts as superstition feels increasingly like sensible caution. Local legends; biblical warnings; stuffed hares; clay figurines... I’d perhaps stop short of calling Hare House a horror novel; it has a gothic air, but gothic doesn’t feel like the right label either, if only because Hinchcliffe’s light touch seems antithetical to the melodrama I associate with that term. The uncanny, in this book, is a series of suggestions. As the plot hurtles towards its climax and the atmosphere thickens, the reader, just like the narrator, is forced to contend with increasing evidence that for the denizens of Hare House, witches are not the stuff of fairytales; they are an active threat.
That’s without even getting to the delicious intrigue Hinchcliffe cooks up around the tragic Hendersons, or how the book uses landscape. There are particular scenes and descriptions I can’t stop thinking about: the countryside surrounding the house, particularly when snow falls and an eerie quiet is tangible; the narrator’s feelings of freedom and release as she learns to cycle; the bare, shadowy gloom of Hare House, too big and too old for its inhabitants. I kept waiting for the narrative to falter, kept wondering if there’d be some development that would change the way I felt about it – but it is note-perfect all the way to the bravura ending, which made me almost squeal with glee.
And the language! The writing! Crisp as fresh snow, sharp as broken glass, not a sentence wasted, not a word out of place.
In the end, it actually did remind me a bit of Andrew Michael Hurley – not Starve Acre, and definitely not The Loney (to which the publisher compares it), but rather his best and most underrated book, Devil’s Day, for the slow build of unease against a beautifully realised pastoral backdrop. The narrator’s relationship with Hare House reminded me of some other favourite novels with an imposing house at their core: at first The House at Midnight, and later, as things grow more sinister, The Little Stranger. And it also fits neatly into the category (admittedly a category I made up) of voice-driven ‘dark character study’ stories, encompassing the likes of Notes on a Scandal and The Woman Upstairs.
I can’t wait to read this again. It’s going to become that special thing, a personal classic, I can just tell. Adored it, everything about it.
I received an advance review copy of Hare House from the publisher through NetGalley.
TinyLetter | Linktree
January 12, 2022
This is one of those books I find difficult to rate, I raced through it but at the same time I don’t think I really enjoyed it. The experience reminded me a little of reading things like Gone Girl I just got caught up in wanting to know what was going on, even though I wasn’t expecting a satisfying denouement. Although it’s well-crafted in terms of prose style, atmospheric, and Sally Hinchcliffe’s highly effective at establishing a sense of place, the issues I had were with the story/plot and the portrayal of certain characters. The novel’s set in a remote area of rural Scotland where a rather enigmatic woman has retreated, after an unspecified incident ended her teaching career. She relates her experiences solely from her own perspective and gives every appearance of being an unreliable narrator. It’s difficult to go into too many details without spoilers but this falls somewhere between psychological and supernatural mystery – with a nod towards folk horror. The narrator becomes embroiled in a series of unsettling events related to the local community: hints of witchcraft, mysterious animal deaths, and disturbing effigies abound. However, it’s unclear what’s real and what’s imagined.
My difficulties with this were partly linked to the fact that the tension between the psychological and the supernatural wasn’t resolved in a way I found particularly convincing, and partly to the representation of older and/or single women which seemed quite stereotypical. Although, to be fair, none of the characters came off that well overall: the dog was quite endearing but unfortunately failed to make it to the end. The central female character was especially problematic, self-deluding and manipulative which seemed to be attributed to her being lonely, single and on the verge of middle age: she reminded me of a younger version of Barbara in Zoe Heller’s Notes of a Scandal a novel I found intensely annoying but a lot of other people seemed to enjoy. So, I think it’s likely I just wasn’t a good fit for Hare House and I imagine that readers who enjoy these kinds of stories - rather than get trapped in them against their better judgement - will find it well worth their time. It’s not at all a bad piece of writing, and it’s often quite a gripping and eerie one. It’s just a little too open-ended, a little too conventional and a little too culturally conservative for my taste.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher Mantle, an imprint of Pan Macmillan for an arc
My difficulties with this were partly linked to the fact that the tension between the psychological and the supernatural wasn’t resolved in a way I found particularly convincing, and partly to the representation of older and/or single women which seemed quite stereotypical. Although, to be fair, none of the characters came off that well overall: the dog was quite endearing but unfortunately failed to make it to the end. The central female character was especially problematic, self-deluding and manipulative which seemed to be attributed to her being lonely, single and on the verge of middle age: she reminded me of a younger version of Barbara in Zoe Heller’s Notes of a Scandal a novel I found intensely annoying but a lot of other people seemed to enjoy. So, I think it’s likely I just wasn’t a good fit for Hare House and I imagine that readers who enjoy these kinds of stories - rather than get trapped in them against their better judgement - will find it well worth their time. It’s not at all a bad piece of writing, and it’s often quite a gripping and eerie one. It’s just a little too open-ended, a little too conventional and a little too culturally conservative for my taste.
Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher Mantle, an imprint of Pan Macmillan for an arc
January 21, 2022
Unfortunately, I really did not like this book. Despite the beautiful prose, it was a slog to get through. The book is slow and I found myself bored several times throughout. A lot of mysterious and witchy things happen, but they never end up getting explained. I’m ok with a few things not being explained but the whole book and how it ended was just super vague. The reveal, if you can call it that, is simply implausible. I don’t like what the reveal suggested because it invalidates a lot of what the reader suspected was happening. And even with my theory of what happened I still have no idea what the hell actually happened. Just a lot of strange instances with no clear cut explanation or reasoning behind it.
In terms of the characters, I found the main character very hard to like and she thoroughly annoyed me. Actually, all of the characters were annoying. I surprisingly liked Janet the most, the character that everyone disliked. Also, I didn’t understand the importance of Rory, he added nothing in my opinion. Maybe I’m just dumb and not understanding what should have been clear. Who knows. Overall, Hare House is just a confusing and muddled book that barely provided any answers or explanation.
In terms of the characters, I found the main character very hard to like and she thoroughly annoyed me. Actually, all of the characters were annoying. I surprisingly liked Janet the most, the character that everyone disliked. Also, I didn’t understand the importance of Rory, he added nothing in my opinion. Maybe I’m just dumb and not understanding what should have been clear. Who knows. Overall, Hare House is just a confusing and muddled book that barely provided any answers or explanation.
October 17, 2023
TW: body horror; death of animals; self harm
Overall, very unsatisfying story with no wrapping up of loose ends or real answers about what was going on (even in a bittersweet, open ended way).
Overall, very unsatisfying story with no wrapping up of loose ends or real answers about what was going on (even in a bittersweet, open ended way).
January 15, 2023
2.5 stars
“We walked through a landscape bleached with frost, the earth standing hard and frozen. Ice crept everywhere. Even the streams had begun to freeze, ice fingering out from their edges, tombing them over. Yet the cold left me feeling alive, as if we were indeed the only things out there that were still living, the only things moving in the whole landscape.’’
I like hares, just as I like owls. There is a wildness and otherness about them. Consequently there is lots of folklore about them and links with witchcraft and shapeshifting. This gathers together quite a few gothic and witchcraft tropes. It is set in Scotland, in Dumfries and Galloway. There are also a few dour Scots tropes and plenty of weather: rain, wind, snow and the like. Hinchcliffe does capture the landscape quite well. The themes are typical of this genre; mental illness, symbols of witchcraft, hares (inevitably), clay dolls, sprigs of Rowan, ancestral curses and the like. Someone also seems to be wandering about the place writing Exodus 22:18 (Thou shalt not permit a witch to live).
“If I hadn’t laughed before, I might have then, except that we had reached the churchyard gates and were standing staring at them. The wind here was wild and gusting, the tops of the trees tossing violently, and for the first time it struck me that walking through forests in a gale wasn’t that sensible an idea. But it wasn’t that which had brought me to a halt, brought both of us to a halt. On the gateposts ahead of us, fresh paint stood stark red against the rain-blackened stone. It was crudely done, the letters crammed in towards the end, the paint running, but it was still clear. Exod 22:18.’’
There is also an unreliable narrator, a single woman, approaching middle age, who has left teaching following an “incident”, some “mass hysteria” in the classroom. The reader learns more about this as the novel develops. She now does online work, writing essays and papers for people.
This is very easy to read and can certainly be described as atmospheric. The ending is certainly odd and leads the reader to ask questions about the narrator. Nothing wrong with that but the implications here play on certain negative tropes about women, especially single childless women. I didn’t find the whole convincing (what am I saying!!). And obviously there weren’t nearly enough hares.
“We walked through a landscape bleached with frost, the earth standing hard and frozen. Ice crept everywhere. Even the streams had begun to freeze, ice fingering out from their edges, tombing them over. Yet the cold left me feeling alive, as if we were indeed the only things out there that were still living, the only things moving in the whole landscape.’’
I like hares, just as I like owls. There is a wildness and otherness about them. Consequently there is lots of folklore about them and links with witchcraft and shapeshifting. This gathers together quite a few gothic and witchcraft tropes. It is set in Scotland, in Dumfries and Galloway. There are also a few dour Scots tropes and plenty of weather: rain, wind, snow and the like. Hinchcliffe does capture the landscape quite well. The themes are typical of this genre; mental illness, symbols of witchcraft, hares (inevitably), clay dolls, sprigs of Rowan, ancestral curses and the like. Someone also seems to be wandering about the place writing Exodus 22:18 (Thou shalt not permit a witch to live).
“If I hadn’t laughed before, I might have then, except that we had reached the churchyard gates and were standing staring at them. The wind here was wild and gusting, the tops of the trees tossing violently, and for the first time it struck me that walking through forests in a gale wasn’t that sensible an idea. But it wasn’t that which had brought me to a halt, brought both of us to a halt. On the gateposts ahead of us, fresh paint stood stark red against the rain-blackened stone. It was crudely done, the letters crammed in towards the end, the paint running, but it was still clear. Exod 22:18.’’
There is also an unreliable narrator, a single woman, approaching middle age, who has left teaching following an “incident”, some “mass hysteria” in the classroom. The reader learns more about this as the novel develops. She now does online work, writing essays and papers for people.
This is very easy to read and can certainly be described as atmospheric. The ending is certainly odd and leads the reader to ask questions about the narrator. Nothing wrong with that but the implications here play on certain negative tropes about women, especially single childless women. I didn’t find the whole convincing (what am I saying!!). And obviously there weren’t nearly enough hares.
December 23, 2022
(First read November 2021; reread December 2022.) This is a book that is perfect to me. Not a book I am trying to claim is objectively perfect, but a book that is perfect to me, that feels precisely calibrated for me. Everything about the story, how it’s told, how it’s written, the strength of the voice, the momentum of the plot... the slow unfolding, the macabre details, the setting, the beautiful writing about landscape, the expression of both freedom and isolation, the ways in which the ending is delicious and unsettling at once. There are moments in this book that comfort and console me, and others that leave me chilled to the bone – not in a ‘spooky’ way, but existentially. Honestly, probably top 10 of all time for me. I am so glad I have it to reread forever.
(Original – much more detailed – review here. Read that one for actual details of the book rather than just how much I love it!)
(Original – much more detailed – review here. Read that one for actual details of the book rather than just how much I love it!)
October 9, 2022
This did have a slight chill factor to the story but I wasn’t overall drawn in. I wanted to feel anxious and on edge, it did neither.
The writing itself the author did a great job, but, it left me confused and wondering what I’d just read. I was hoping for my eagerness of questions to be explained. It wasn’t there, I tripped back over the earlier chapters I’d just read to see if I had missed anything or been distracted from my thoughts.
Nope.
It’s said to be a thriller.
To me it was ok. But forgettable.
Just not for me I’m afraid. I know plenty who loved it though so don’t let me put you off.
The writing itself the author did a great job, but, it left me confused and wondering what I’d just read. I was hoping for my eagerness of questions to be explained. It wasn’t there, I tripped back over the earlier chapters I’d just read to see if I had missed anything or been distracted from my thoughts.
Nope.
It’s said to be a thriller.
To me it was ok. But forgettable.
Just not for me I’m afraid. I know plenty who loved it though so don’t let me put you off.
March 18, 2022
i have no idea what the hell i just read. huge anti climax to absolutely no explanation of ANYTHING that happened. the hares?? witches?? stuffed animals?? ann and janet?? i’m confused as shit. was a good read with the slight horror/gothic tones but.. what???
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 24, 2022
This is an odd book. I can't say I enjoyed it, but i couldn't put it down - I needed to know the ending. And although it has everything I usual love - Scotland, witchcraft, a gothic house, hares... this left me quite cold.
So the positives first- it's decently written and the prose helps the story flow. Hinchcliffe isn't too flowery and keeps it moving.
There are also some good ideas in here, but sadly I feel like they didn't amount to much. The narrator is not particularly likeable, and none of the other characters is either. They are just a bit flat and a bit sad and a bit uninteresting.
I wish the witchcraft/gothic-ness had been played up more, because I also feel like Hinchcliffe was desperately trying to write it as a 'could be spooky or could be delusion' type story, and it just left so many unanswered questions, i felt quite unsatisfied by the end.
Also there was some quite odd topics of eating disorder and mental health disorders in general which, the way they were written, felt very... out of place? I don't know.
In the end I don't think I would really recommend this to anyone, but it's a quick read for anyone who has picked it up.
So the positives first- it's decently written and the prose helps the story flow. Hinchcliffe isn't too flowery and keeps it moving.
There are also some good ideas in here, but sadly I feel like they didn't amount to much. The narrator is not particularly likeable, and none of the other characters is either. They are just a bit flat and a bit sad and a bit uninteresting.
I wish the witchcraft/gothic-ness had been played up more, because I also feel like Hinchcliffe was desperately trying to write it as a 'could be spooky or could be delusion' type story, and it just left so many unanswered questions, i felt quite unsatisfied by the end.
Also there was some quite odd topics of eating disorder and mental health disorders in general which, the way they were written, felt very... out of place? I don't know.
In the end I don't think I would really recommend this to anyone, but it's a quick read for anyone who has picked it up.
October 17, 2022
(3.5) The unnamed narrator is a disgraced teacher who leaves London for a rental cottage on the Hare House estate in Galloway. Her landlord, Grant Henderson, and his rebellious teenage sister Cass are still reeling from the untimely death of their shell-shocked brother Rory. The narrator gets caught up in their lives, even though her shrewish neighbour Janet warns her not to.
There was a lot that I loved about the atmosphere of this one: the southwest Scotland setting; the slow turn of the seasons as the narrator cycles around the narrow lanes and finds it getting dark earlier, and cold; the inclusion of shape-shifting and enchantment myths; the creepy taxidermy up at the manor house; and the peculiar fainting girls/mass hysteria episode that precipitated the narrator's exile and complicates her relationship with Cass. The further on you get, the more unreliable you realize this narrator is, yet you keep rooting for her. There are a few too many set pieces involving dead animals, and, overall, perhaps more supernatural influences than are fully explored, but I liked Hinchcliffe's writing enough to look out for what else she writes.
Readalikes:
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Wakenhyrst by Michelle Paver
There was a lot that I loved about the atmosphere of this one: the southwest Scotland setting; the slow turn of the seasons as the narrator cycles around the narrow lanes and finds it getting dark earlier, and cold; the inclusion of shape-shifting and enchantment myths; the creepy taxidermy up at the manor house; and the peculiar fainting girls/mass hysteria episode that precipitated the narrator's exile and complicates her relationship with Cass. The further on you get, the more unreliable you realize this narrator is, yet you keep rooting for her. There are a few too many set pieces involving dead animals, and, overall, perhaps more supernatural influences than are fully explored, but I liked Hinchcliffe's writing enough to look out for what else she writes.
Readalikes:
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Wakenhyrst by Michelle Paver
February 3, 2022
Witchy, mystical and intriguing, this book was a quick read that had a lot more to it than I was expecting.
The protagonist remains nameless and is first seen as a victim of a witch hunt that drove her from her job and home to escape to Hare House in Scotland, a small cottage on a larger estate. I'm left with questions that have kept me thinking about the story and what has happened, and if a book can keep my attention after I've finished it that's always a good sign for me.
The protagonist remains nameless and is first seen as a victim of a witch hunt that drove her from her job and home to escape to Hare House in Scotland, a small cottage on a larger estate. I'm left with questions that have kept me thinking about the story and what has happened, and if a book can keep my attention after I've finished it that's always a good sign for me.
October 16, 2022
3.5 but as it was atmospheric and well written I've rounded it up.
A little too much meandering and not enough plot for me and I think I'd have liked a bit more folk lore threaded through it too.
Aside from that a perfect Autumnal read.
A little too much meandering and not enough plot for me and I think I'd have liked a bit more folk lore threaded through it too.
Aside from that a perfect Autumnal read.
October 19, 2022
REVIEW: ⭐️⭐️.5/5
Two and a half stars because at least it kept me reading till the end, but I can’t say I really enjoyed this book. It was billed as a modern gothic novel about an unnamed British woman who rents a cottage in Scotland after a mysterious incident causes her to lose her longtime teaching job. She meets the family who owns the grounds and shortly after her arrival, strange things start happening at the cottage and the main estate house. As the story goes on, you learn more about what made the woman lose her job as well as the mysterious past of the people who own the property. Sounds promising, right?
Well, it wasn’t.
I didn’t sympathize with any of the main characters and the side characters were hard to tell apart. Too many plot points were never explained, and the book seemed to feed into stereotypes without challenging them in any way. I don’t need my books to promote good morals and I usually enjoy an unreliable narrator, but I at least was hoping she would be challenged on her extremely problematic views in some way by anyone at all in the text and she really wasn’t.
I was willing to endure a certain amount of ambiguity in the hopes of seeing how everything came together at the end, but it just didn’t? When you finally find out why the narrator lost her job, the event itself and the investigation after were so improbable that I just don’t believe it would ever happen that way, even in fiction. There’s no explanation for the mysterious happenings and the book is so heavy-handed with the overall “takeaway” at the end.
In the end, I wanted a creepy October read but it wasn’t even that creepy! Not worth your time. But the book itself is very pretty so at least there’s that.
Two and a half stars because at least it kept me reading till the end, but I can’t say I really enjoyed this book. It was billed as a modern gothic novel about an unnamed British woman who rents a cottage in Scotland after a mysterious incident causes her to lose her longtime teaching job. She meets the family who owns the grounds and shortly after her arrival, strange things start happening at the cottage and the main estate house. As the story goes on, you learn more about what made the woman lose her job as well as the mysterious past of the people who own the property. Sounds promising, right?
Well, it wasn’t.
I didn’t sympathize with any of the main characters and the side characters were hard to tell apart. Too many plot points were never explained, and the book seemed to feed into stereotypes without challenging them in any way. I don’t need my books to promote good morals and I usually enjoy an unreliable narrator, but I at least was hoping she would be challenged on her extremely problematic views in some way by anyone at all in the text and she really wasn’t.
I was willing to endure a certain amount of ambiguity in the hopes of seeing how everything came together at the end, but it just didn’t? When you finally find out why the narrator lost her job, the event itself and the investigation after were so improbable that I just don’t believe it would ever happen that way, even in fiction. There’s no explanation for the mysterious happenings and the book is so heavy-handed with the overall “takeaway” at the end.
In the end, I wanted a creepy October read but it wasn’t even that creepy! Not worth your time. But the book itself is very pretty so at least there’s that.
November 14, 2021
Thanks to Mantle for the advanced reader copy of this title in return for an honest review.
Hare House has been on my radar for a while and I was excited to be given an early copy of it to review. Unfortunately, it did not live up to my expectations.
I really hate giving less than positive reviews, but I have to be honest.
I expect a book - even one billed as a psychological thriller - to have some kind of build up in the first chapter or so, but I got 1/4 of the way through and felt nothing had actually happened. There’s the odd tease and the odd flashback, but none of it really built up to anything and just seemed a tad repetitive.
The main character was untrustworthy and didn’t seem like the right narrator for this story. Her, and the rest of the characters were, for me, a little too predictable, too much like cookie-cutter characters. I didn’t find the story as tense or as thrilling or as spooky as I thought it would be, and I felt it was almost a bit too timid and conservative for me.
I’ve seen a lot of other reviews, ranging anywhere from 3 to 5 stars, and there has been a lot of praise for it. But sadly, this just didn’t hit the mark for me.
Hare House has been on my radar for a while and I was excited to be given an early copy of it to review. Unfortunately, it did not live up to my expectations.
I really hate giving less than positive reviews, but I have to be honest.
I expect a book - even one billed as a psychological thriller - to have some kind of build up in the first chapter or so, but I got 1/4 of the way through and felt nothing had actually happened. There’s the odd tease and the odd flashback, but none of it really built up to anything and just seemed a tad repetitive.
The main character was untrustworthy and didn’t seem like the right narrator for this story. Her, and the rest of the characters were, for me, a little too predictable, too much like cookie-cutter characters. I didn’t find the story as tense or as thrilling or as spooky as I thought it would be, and I felt it was almost a bit too timid and conservative for me.
I’ve seen a lot of other reviews, ranging anywhere from 3 to 5 stars, and there has been a lot of praise for it. But sadly, this just didn’t hit the mark for me.
October 14, 2022
Well written, engaging, atmospheric and effective use of the unreliable narrator. I thought this would be a perfect seasonal read - lonely country house in Scotland, mysterious happenings, a family with a tragic past and a woman with a secret...
Downgraded to 2 stars for stereotyping a single childless woman as desperate and manipulative, and random/irrelevant episode just for the purpose of shaming emotional eaters.
Downgraded to 2 stars for stereotyping a single childless woman as desperate and manipulative, and random/irrelevant episode just for the purpose of shaming emotional eaters.
October 15, 2022
There’s an interesting mix of horror and beach read chick thriller going on here but for the most part it’s pretty boring. A former London school teacher, forced to resign under mysterious circumstances, rents a house in the Scottish highlands where she meets an obstinate old woman and isolated, parentless siblings. She immediately insinuates herself into the household of the troubled teen girl and her handsome older brother. It seems for a while she’s to be a positive influence but dangerous secrets and an impending snow storm will soon complicate things. As I said, pretty slow for the first half but picks up a bit near the end. I couldn’t help thinking if a man were to rent a house, people wouldn’t be so quick to have them doing chores and taking care of a seventeen year-old without learning more about them. It ends up working for the story as the themes and ideas are interesting. But I can’t help but feel the author intended the protagonist to be more sympathetic than she is, as I was like, “why are you inviting this woman into your home? Can’t you see she’s nutters?”. Probably should have been a much shorter book.
December 18, 2021
I was sent an ARC of this creepy, modern gothic novel by Book Break in exchange for an honest review.
We follow a woman who moves into a cottage on the estate of a formally grand Scottish manor and begins to get to know the inhabitants of the main house. But as the snow sets in and all communication with the outside world is cut off, things begin to get sinister…
This is a really tough one for me to review.
I really enjoyed the writing style, the beautiful descriptions of the Scottish setting and the tension that was created as odd, creepy things began to happen.
It’s got a lot of interesting themes, including grief and madness, and several jump scares that I thought were well done.
But the main character - an ex teacher - has what felt like problematic views on teenage girls and there were several eating disorder and mental health references that made me really uncomfortable.
I also didn’t connect with the main character, which meant that the stakes weren’t that high, and I didn’t love the ending.
Overall, this was a mixed one for me!
We follow a woman who moves into a cottage on the estate of a formally grand Scottish manor and begins to get to know the inhabitants of the main house. But as the snow sets in and all communication with the outside world is cut off, things begin to get sinister…
This is a really tough one for me to review.
I really enjoyed the writing style, the beautiful descriptions of the Scottish setting and the tension that was created as odd, creepy things began to happen.
It’s got a lot of interesting themes, including grief and madness, and several jump scares that I thought were well done.
But the main character - an ex teacher - has what felt like problematic views on teenage girls and there were several eating disorder and mental health references that made me really uncomfortable.
I also didn’t connect with the main character, which meant that the stakes weren’t that high, and I didn’t love the ending.
Overall, this was a mixed one for me!
January 14, 2022
I’m not quite sure what to think about this book. It started off well, quite promising in fact, it held my attention but then it seemed to build up into nothing. I kept on waiting for the big twist or the big reveal but nothing happened and I was very confused by the ending. It didn’t really tell me anything.
5/10
5/10
November 7, 2021
‘There was nothing there, I thought. Nothing but the shadows of the trees,my own imagination. It was only when it moved that I could make it out, the silent hare, turning and loping away into the dark.’
When a young woman arrives in a remote and far removed part of Scotland, looking to escape her troubled and shadowed past she may find that this place of peace and nature may not be as tranquil as she had hoped.
Moving into of one the old, slightly run down yet quaint cottages on the estate of Hare House, exploration beckons towards it’s beautiful and wild surroundings but as the nights get colder and darker, it’s not just shadows that are looming as it becomes apparent there is a very good reason this place seems so abandoned and isolated.
Hare House is hiding something sinister and damned and as winter slowly starts to tighten its hold it brings with it more than just snow which soon blankets everything it touches in a muffled silence and the dark, twisted history of madness, grief and loss begins to emerge all around to once again haunt those who still dwell on these grounds.
The locals keep to themselves, the village not easily accessible when the snow hits, an old estate house with what appears to be taxidermy gone mad on display for all to see, and a neighbour who perhaps has more secrets than Hare House.
Gothic, unsettling and oozing with atmosphere, Hare House is ready to welcome you, should you choose…
When a young woman arrives in a remote and far removed part of Scotland, looking to escape her troubled and shadowed past she may find that this place of peace and nature may not be as tranquil as she had hoped.
Moving into of one the old, slightly run down yet quaint cottages on the estate of Hare House, exploration beckons towards it’s beautiful and wild surroundings but as the nights get colder and darker, it’s not just shadows that are looming as it becomes apparent there is a very good reason this place seems so abandoned and isolated.
Hare House is hiding something sinister and damned and as winter slowly starts to tighten its hold it brings with it more than just snow which soon blankets everything it touches in a muffled silence and the dark, twisted history of madness, grief and loss begins to emerge all around to once again haunt those who still dwell on these grounds.
The locals keep to themselves, the village not easily accessible when the snow hits, an old estate house with what appears to be taxidermy gone mad on display for all to see, and a neighbour who perhaps has more secrets than Hare House.
Gothic, unsettling and oozing with atmosphere, Hare House is ready to welcome you, should you choose…
February 4, 2022
Not really sure what to make of this one and it seems a few other people have voiced the same opinion. I did listen to this as an audiobook and I think the narrator did a great job which helped to make this more engaging than it might have been otherwise.
It feels like a whole lot of nothing really happens and it puts me in mind of a similarly executed book, Pine. Gothic Scottish countryside, witchcraft, elements of mystery and building tension but there is a lack of a satisifying pay off. Like maybe the author held back and now the book suffers for it.
The prose was lovely and there were a few times that I'd pause to think over the choice of words and digest them. Very poetic and descriptive which, again, really came to life through the narrator.
Some themes were a bit oddly placed, such as mental health issues that are toed around and cast in a negative light and then suddenly an eating disorder which comes out of nowhere and seems a bit insincere. Add to that, the main character's view on other females (in particular teenage girls) and I found myself growing wary of her, distrustful. She wasn't an entirely likeable person but seemed so self-righteous in her own opinions that, even if I had wanted to like her, there was no hope of it.
A bit of a middle ground read. Aye, it's quick to get through but it's lacking as well sadly. If anything, listen to the audiobook if you can.
It feels like a whole lot of nothing really happens and it puts me in mind of a similarly executed book, Pine. Gothic Scottish countryside, witchcraft, elements of mystery and building tension but there is a lack of a satisifying pay off. Like maybe the author held back and now the book suffers for it.
The prose was lovely and there were a few times that I'd pause to think over the choice of words and digest them. Very poetic and descriptive which, again, really came to life through the narrator.
Some themes were a bit oddly placed, such as mental health issues that are toed around and cast in a negative light and then suddenly an eating disorder which comes out of nowhere and seems a bit insincere. Add to that, the main character's view on other females (in particular teenage girls) and I found myself growing wary of her, distrustful. She wasn't an entirely likeable person but seemed so self-righteous in her own opinions that, even if I had wanted to like her, there was no hope of it.
A bit of a middle ground read. Aye, it's quick to get through but it's lacking as well sadly. If anything, listen to the audiobook if you can.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 14, 2023
Well I don’t know why I let this sit on my shelf for so long. This reviews has been a long time coming.
I’ve seen such mixed reviews for this one, that I was concerned I wouldn’t love it as much as I wanted to. The mystery, the setting, the atmosphere… I thought something along the way might be a let down, and I’d fall into the same group of people that hadn’t loved it - I was absolutely wrong, and I thoroughly enjoyed my time with it; so much more than I thought I would.
Now I must say, I think buddy reading this helped. As I see it, there are two ways to read this story; one is the simple, straightforward, taking everything at face value way, the other is questioning absolutely everything. Unpicking it Stitch by Stitch. Never trusting anything and wanting answers…
This is what gave us so very many theories to discuss. Either everything is precisely what it seems or nothing is what it pretends to be. I love the ambiguity. Though it won’t be for everyone. This is a quiet creeping novel that can be many things at once. And it gave us so very much to talk about.
A belated thankyou to the publisher for the gifted copy. I’m only sorry it took me this long to get to it.
I’ve seen such mixed reviews for this one, that I was concerned I wouldn’t love it as much as I wanted to. The mystery, the setting, the atmosphere… I thought something along the way might be a let down, and I’d fall into the same group of people that hadn’t loved it - I was absolutely wrong, and I thoroughly enjoyed my time with it; so much more than I thought I would.
Now I must say, I think buddy reading this helped. As I see it, there are two ways to read this story; one is the simple, straightforward, taking everything at face value way, the other is questioning absolutely everything. Unpicking it Stitch by Stitch. Never trusting anything and wanting answers…
This is what gave us so very many theories to discuss. Either everything is precisely what it seems or nothing is what it pretends to be. I love the ambiguity. Though it won’t be for everyone. This is a quiet creeping novel that can be many things at once. And it gave us so very much to talk about.
A belated thankyou to the publisher for the gifted copy. I’m only sorry it took me this long to get to it.
November 1, 2022
What the actual hell did I just read? This was super slow and I expected everything to be explained at the end but there were 0 answers and 0 explanations to the ‘eerie’ things that happened throughout the book. Super disappointing as I was so excited to read this…..
February 20, 2022
I find myself hesitating as I begin to write this review, and that is because I am swaying back and forth with this one. It certainly wasn't what I was expecting, but I think that is because the book is difficult to categorise: like some of the characters and events within its pages, it is a bit like smoke as you try to grasp hold of it.
We have an unnamed narrator; a woman whose teaching career came to an end after a seemingly innocuous incident involving her A-Level students. To retreat/escape/start again, she decides to take refuge within a remote Scottish town. She rents a cottage from Grant, but also manages to ingratiate herself into the family's inner circle, becoming something akin to a friend or confidante to both Grant and his much younger, teenage sister, Cass. The family have suffered tragedies, but as our narrator spends more time there, she discovers that there are rumours and whisperings between the locals, suggestions of witches.
There was a lot to love about this novel. The setting and the landscape became just as much as a character as the people. Hinchcliffe certainly knows how to create a sense of atmosphere and place. The hints of local legend and folklore is also well handled: Cass casually introduces the idea of there being witches, almost as though she were merely discussing the weather. Hare House is also brought to life brilliantly, down to the creepy taxidermy which 'decorates' its walls. But then this is a very slow burn of a novel. You could be forgiven for wondering, at times, if you should carry on with this book. I have to admit, I did. And there will be some who are not satisfied at the end, when you are not given all of the answers. Strangely, this is why I find myself swaying back and forth about it. I actually liked that it didn't tell you anything definitive, but instead implies or hints at what may be going on. And so I find myself swaying between 3 and 4 stars. Whichever way I go, it has certainly left me an impression on me, as I find myself thinking about it, seemingly reluctant to let it completely go.
We have an unnamed narrator; a woman whose teaching career came to an end after a seemingly innocuous incident involving her A-Level students. To retreat/escape/start again, she decides to take refuge within a remote Scottish town. She rents a cottage from Grant, but also manages to ingratiate herself into the family's inner circle, becoming something akin to a friend or confidante to both Grant and his much younger, teenage sister, Cass. The family have suffered tragedies, but as our narrator spends more time there, she discovers that there are rumours and whisperings between the locals, suggestions of witches.
There was a lot to love about this novel. The setting and the landscape became just as much as a character as the people. Hinchcliffe certainly knows how to create a sense of atmosphere and place. The hints of local legend and folklore is also well handled: Cass casually introduces the idea of there being witches, almost as though she were merely discussing the weather. Hare House is also brought to life brilliantly, down to the creepy taxidermy which 'decorates' its walls. But then this is a very slow burn of a novel. You could be forgiven for wondering, at times, if you should carry on with this book. I have to admit, I did. And there will be some who are not satisfied at the end, when you are not given all of the answers. Strangely, this is why I find myself swaying back and forth about it. I actually liked that it didn't tell you anything definitive, but instead implies or hints at what may be going on. And so I find myself swaying between 3 and 4 stars. Whichever way I go, it has certainly left me an impression on me, as I find myself thinking about it, seemingly reluctant to let it completely go.
January 26, 2022
Very disappointed. Didn't like any of the main characters, the ending was very vague....no idea what was happening. Very overhyped in my opinion.
May 4, 2022
Very slow paced, confusing and in the end I wasn’t sure what really happened
I listened to this and the narration was excellent
I listened to this and the narration was excellent
December 10, 2022
i have no idea what i just read. so many hares in this story and for what? also who tf is Ann? why why why so many why
what was the plot? was there even a plot?
what was the plot? was there even a plot?
October 22, 2023
Um. It's beautifully written, but I've no real idea what actually happened. Is 'vague Gothic' a genre? I think that's what this is.
June 28, 2023
3.5*
No specific spoilers; but discusses some points that you might want to read about in the book first.
I'm not really sure what my thoughts are on this one. I'll probably come back and read it again in the future, and thus, gain clarity on my opinions.
The story is good. It's well paced and just spooky enough. I would have liked to gather more of a connection to our narrator, who we never learned the name of.
I do think there are a number of unanswered questions that we're left with and it makes me question whether those plot points were really necessary to the story. The "Aftermath" felt almost rushed because of it. I wanted more explanation about Ann and Janet; and /especially/ their relationship to the hares, if there was any at all. The hares were a significant part of the story, but the significance never really clicked. But still, I don't think the story lacked in the absence of these things.
Although, I'm not seeing the same gap in information that a few other reviewers have stated. I think it was made fairly clear what happened at the narrator's school and why she moved to Scotland. There's clearly something mysterious going on with the narrator, and having more focus on that might have answered some of those questions I was left with.
Overall, still one of the better books I've read recently! No Leporid trauma here, like I've recently experienced with certain other books 😅
No specific spoilers; but discusses some points that you might want to read about in the book first.
I'm not really sure what my thoughts are on this one. I'll probably come back and read it again in the future, and thus, gain clarity on my opinions.
The story is good. It's well paced and just spooky enough. I would have liked to gather more of a connection to our narrator, who we never learned the name of.
I do think there are a number of unanswered questions that we're left with and it makes me question whether those plot points were really necessary to the story. The "Aftermath" felt almost rushed because of it. I wanted more explanation about Ann and Janet; and /especially/ their relationship to the hares, if there was any at all. The hares were a significant part of the story, but the significance never really clicked. But still, I don't think the story lacked in the absence of these things.
Although, I'm not seeing the same gap in information that a few other reviewers have stated. I think it was made fairly clear what happened at the narrator's school and why she moved to Scotland. There's clearly something mysterious going on with the narrator, and having more focus on that might have answered some of those questions I was left with.
Overall, still one of the better books I've read recently! No Leporid trauma here, like I've recently experienced with certain other books 😅
February 23, 2024
Sally Hinchcliffe’s Hare House kept me guessing right to the very end. And even then, I was like, ‘Wait… What?!’
A woman arrives in south-west Scotland looking to start a new life. When she finds a cottage on the remote Hare House estate, she has hopes that this is the place to help her leave the past behind.
But the place is seeped in folklore, witches, and ghosts, and the woman has the creeping feeling that something is lurking just beyond her vision.
As the chill of autumn deepens, followed by the darkness of winter, the tension ratchets up. A snowstorm hits, keeping the inhabitants trapped and then things really start to get interesting.
I had no idea where this story was going and I most certainly did not expect where it ended up. I’m still not entirely sure what to make of it!
This would be a great book to read in the spooky season, but I found the snowstorm in the last third made for very enjoyable winter reading too.
“I turned to retrace my steps, half blinded by the snow now blowing in my face, driven by the wind.”
“So mesmerized was I by the dance of snow in the air, that when the scream came it was hard to work out where it was coming from, or what it was.”
A woman arrives in south-west Scotland looking to start a new life. When she finds a cottage on the remote Hare House estate, she has hopes that this is the place to help her leave the past behind.
But the place is seeped in folklore, witches, and ghosts, and the woman has the creeping feeling that something is lurking just beyond her vision.
As the chill of autumn deepens, followed by the darkness of winter, the tension ratchets up. A snowstorm hits, keeping the inhabitants trapped and then things really start to get interesting.
I had no idea where this story was going and I most certainly did not expect where it ended up. I’m still not entirely sure what to make of it!
This would be a great book to read in the spooky season, but I found the snowstorm in the last third made for very enjoyable winter reading too.
December 1, 2021
An atmospheric horror novel inspired by the witch hunts, haunted houses and folkore or Dumfries and Galloway, in Scotland.
This creepy Gothic thriller is narrated by a woman nearing middle age, who has left her teaching job in London to retreat in one of the small cottages near the isolated Hare House, a mansion occupied solely by Grant and her younger sister Cass, who has nervous problems, the last descendants after their parents and sibling Rory died. A stately, gothic house with a room full of stuffed hares dressed in Victorian dolls positioned as performing different tasks, all killed and stuffed by one of the family members long ago. Why are the animals around them dying? How did Rory die? What torments Cass? Who are the mysterious, tormented ancestors of the two siblings? Who is the spiteful Janet, living in the neighbouring cottage? And what brought our protagonist here?
There would be much to sink your teeth in: the atmosphere of the house and of the surrounding woods enveloped in the fog is sinister and creepy, and the bestiary adds an uncanny touch. I loved the complexity of the protagonist, a truly unreliable narrator who is going to leave us guessing till the very end as to her intentions and who really stands out in terms of characterisation compared to other characters who are flatter or a bit more stereotyped. Though gripping, the plot at times relies too much on ambiguity, stalls at times and leaves too many open, unexplained threads and facts. It also relies on a mix of elements and plot turns that to my taste are a bit conventional (clay figurines, the trope of the family madness, of the middle aged spinster turned sour, the lights going out). Nevertheless they do work and could satisfy lovers of traditional horror.
A dark academia subplot is revealed parallel to the events, but it is not very convincing although it is useful to clarify our protagonist’s motives. As the blurb says, perfect for fans of Francine Toon’s Pine.
This creepy Gothic thriller is narrated by a woman nearing middle age, who has left her teaching job in London to retreat in one of the small cottages near the isolated Hare House, a mansion occupied solely by Grant and her younger sister Cass, who has nervous problems, the last descendants after their parents and sibling Rory died. A stately, gothic house with a room full of stuffed hares dressed in Victorian dolls positioned as performing different tasks, all killed and stuffed by one of the family members long ago. Why are the animals around them dying? How did Rory die? What torments Cass? Who are the mysterious, tormented ancestors of the two siblings? Who is the spiteful Janet, living in the neighbouring cottage? And what brought our protagonist here?
There would be much to sink your teeth in: the atmosphere of the house and of the surrounding woods enveloped in the fog is sinister and creepy, and the bestiary adds an uncanny touch. I loved the complexity of the protagonist, a truly unreliable narrator who is going to leave us guessing till the very end as to her intentions and who really stands out in terms of characterisation compared to other characters who are flatter or a bit more stereotyped. Though gripping, the plot at times relies too much on ambiguity, stalls at times and leaves too many open, unexplained threads and facts. It also relies on a mix of elements and plot turns that to my taste are a bit conventional (clay figurines, the trope of the family madness, of the middle aged spinster turned sour, the lights going out). Nevertheless they do work and could satisfy lovers of traditional horror.
A dark academia subplot is revealed parallel to the events, but it is not very convincing although it is useful to clarify our protagonist’s motives. As the blurb says, perfect for fans of Francine Toon’s Pine.
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