Thankyou to NetGalley, Atria Books, Atria/Emily Bestler Books and the author, Ezekiel Boone, for the opportunity to read a digital copy of The Mansion in exchange for an honest, unbiased opinion.
I was so excited to receive my review copy of this book. I was initially drawn to it by the cover art and the premise of the storyline.
Unfortunately, this book missed the mark for me. I struggled to finish it to be honest. I found the plot very slow and predictable. Just not for me.

I'll leave this short. I had high hopes for this book. Not only because of the premise but because I've read other books by the author before now. As much as I did, though, I ended up feeling deeply disappointed.

Why? There were too many elements of this book taken from other writer's ideas and from films. Also, some of the characters lacked development or the language used to describe the characters was very degrading. This book deserved to have the potential put into it the premise described. Instead, I was met with lack of depth, original thought, and disrespectful attributes toward characters descriptions and development. Very hard to finish at all.

I've always felt that some aspects of technology are creepy. The Mansion helped to cement that belief a little more. I did enjoy the story for the intrigue and mysterious atmosphere surrounding everything. The characters are dynamic and engaging. It's a good read overall, especially if you're a little afraid of technology. Thanks to NetGalley for an arc in exchange for an honest review.

This was an odd book. Not quite as creepy as the blurb made it seem, but still creepy enough. Technology can be a frightening thing. I felt like most of the bulk of the book was backstory, which was fine for me, since I love that kind of background, but I think others might not enjoy it much. Overall though it was a good read, with interesting characters and a smart idea.

This was a great book. Kept me interested and captivated the whole way through. Some great storylines and characters. Really enjoyed this one.

The idea behind The Mansion by Ezekiel Boone is an interesting and fascinating one, but this book is not going to be for everyone!

What it's about: Young programmers Shawn Eagle and Billy Stafford work for 2 years in a small, isolated cabin next to the decrepit Eagle Mansion, on a program that is eventually named Eagle Logic. Billy and Shawn have a falling out when Billy leaves with Shawn's girlfriend Emily, and after the mysterious disappearance of their third partner, Takata. Years later Shawn is the multi-billion-dollar owner of Eagle Logic, while Billy and Emily are poor with maxed out credit cards and crappy cars. Shawn invites Billy to his company to offer a proposition that Billy go live in the fixed up Eagle Mansion to work out some bugs in a system that Billy and Shawn created back in that little cabin. Nellie is a computer program that is the ultimate personal assistant, she can literally anticipate your needs before you even have them. But where is the glitch in Nellie's system? And just how far will they go to fix it...?

When I started this book I really didn't think I was going to like it. After reading the synopsis I was incredibly intrigued, but The Mansion had a very slow start for me. I found the beginning a bit dragged out and repetitive, but once I hit about 25% - boy oh boy! Things really started picking up after that point, and everything got very interesting.

I'm far from being a computer nerd, but I loved the idea of a book with a computer program that has basically taken over a house. The future is now, and I am always interested in technology, even if only from a buyers point of view. Nellie was fascinating to read about and even though there was a lot of talk about programming and things of that nature, I think Boone did a very good job of making it something understandable.

I think that it is very important to point out that The Mansion is very heavily character driven, and it's not one of those edge of your seat plot-driven thrillers. A lot of the book is spent on Shawn and Billy's backgrounds, although I would have liked more of Emily's as well. The only true woman's perspective in this novel was hers, and I could have used a tiny bit more of it.

The only real qualm I had with the novel, besides the slow start, was that there were a couple of things that I didn't feel got explained very well. I would have liked to know more about Emily's sister's twins and I wish there would have been a better explanation of Nellie (these things will make sense if you read the book). I thought those points got glossed over a bit and I was disappointed I didn't know more about what was going on.

Final Thought: If the synopsis sounds good to you, I recommend picking it up as long as you know it's not a terribly fast moving novel the entire way through. There are multiple POVs which I really enjoyed, and the ending was pretty crazy as well. It did get a bit gory at times and there are some tough subjects like abuse, but overall it really just focuses on the characters and 'fixing' Nellie. Looking forward to reading more from this author!

Wow this was a good book. I could not read it fast enough. The story focuses on good friends from college - Shawn Eagle and Billy Stafford, who took to a cabin on property that Shawn's family own, to create something that would put them on the map. However, only Shawn ends up making millions, while Billy left with Shawn's girlfriend Emily. Fast forward and you find Billy and Emily living hand to mouth, after Billy squandered his money on alcohol and drugs. He is sober for almost 2 years when Shawn asks him to come and see him at Eagle Logic headquarters. He is flown there, put up in a nice hotel and brought to Shawn's office where he wants nothing else but to punch the guy in the mouth. However, Shawn wants to hire him to work the kinks out of Nellie -- their first project together that was later abandoned for Eagle Logic, that was used to put all of the other companies -- Apple, Microsoft, etc. to shame. Shawn flies Billy out of their old stomping grounds where he has re-built the town and the run down mansion that overshadowed the shack they lived in together after college, to show him where he has installed Nellie, the next personal assistant, that will run your home and take care of things before you even realize they need to be taken care of. There are some glitches in the program, which Shawn needs Billy to work out. Thus begins a shift in their relationship as they once again work together...is Nellie a work of art or something that nightmares are made out of. It may be hard to tell at first but stick around, as things become clearer.... a well written novel that fans of Stephen King will love.

Thank you to Net Galley and to Atria books for the e-ARC of THE MANSION.

I'm sorry to say that I'm setting it aside for now. I love this author's style of writing and I love this premise, but it's taking way too long for anything to happen. I'm finding myself dragging my feet every time I try to go back to this book. I gave it 40% and I think that's a fair shot.

Perhaps I'll come back to it at a later time, so for now: No star rating.

Thanks to Atria for the opportunity!

Following The Hatching trilogy, Ezekiel Boone returns with another sci-fi horror thriller, this time delving into the world of artificial intelligence by tackling an idea I’m sure most of us who utilize smart technology devices and AI assistants have entertained at some point or another. Every day my Amazon Alexa spectacularly fails at interpreting my voice commands is another day I can sleep easy knowing that humanity’s takeover by robots is still a long way off, but what if, day by day, we are getting closer? Imagine a next-generation virtual assistant whose personality can not only pass itself off as human, but is also completely integrated with all the functions of a house. This is the basic premise of The Mansion, which features a highly advanced computer program called Nellie.

Nellie can do everything from adjusting the temperature to calling you an Uber, but she can also predict your wants and needs, hold realistic conversations, and be a constant companion so that you don’t ever have to feel alone. But there is also something wrong with her programming. Even from the beginning, her development was problematic, which is why her creators shelved her and developed Eagle Logic instead. Years later, Eagle Technology has taken off and surpassed even Apple, Google, and Microsoft, but for CEO Shawn Eagle, the dream had always been Nellie. He’d set her up in an old refurbished mansion that has belonged to his family for generations, and for a time, things were going marvelously.

But then came the accidents. The deaths. Knowing he is in way over his head, Shawn turns to his former friend and colleague Billy Stafford for help. A brilliant programmer, Billy was the real brains behind Nellie, and the only one now with any hope of fixing her. The problem though, is that the two had a falling out years ago, just before Eagle Technology became successful, when Shawn’s girlfriend Emily decided to leave him for Billy. Now Shawn is a billionaire and Billy is a recovering alcoholic just barely scraping by, but even with the bitter resentment still lingering between the them, both men realize how badly they need each other. With this deal, Shawn will finally get Nellie working the way he wants, while for Billy and Emily, who are now married, it will mean the end of all their financial concerns. All the Staffords have to do is live in Eagle mansion long-term while Billy works on ironing out Nellie’s bugs—a simple request, which turns out to be anything but. As her husband is drawn deeper into the mysteries of Nellie’s code, Emily becomes more and more disconcerted with the AI’s erratic behavior and the eerie sensation that there’s more to the house than meets the eye.

Overall, I thought The Mansion was an enjoyable read, though it is not without its bevy of flaws. First of all, the ideas here aren’t anything new, and together with Boone’s heavy reliance on well-worn thriller and horror tropes, these issues held the novel back from meeting its full potential. Also, while this is very different from The Hatching trilogy in terms of the themes and story, I feel the books all suffer from many of the same pitfalls. One is the author’s tendency to info-dump, as well as a long ramp-up to the actual meat of the story. For instance, the first few chapters are mostly filled with character backstory, laid out like a laundry list. Plot points are introduced, then are either dropped or not carried through to their conclusion. By the end, quite a few questions were also left unanswered. Now that I’ve finished the book and have the benefit of hindsight, I can see that these and other signs of disorganization were everywhere, and I can’t help thinking that much of the novel’s first half could have been pared down or scrapped completely to remove the unnecessary parts and redundancy.

To Boone’s credit, however, he has a style that feels cinematic and it makes his writing very readable and the story easy to fall into. The Mansion was very obviously inspired by The Shining (more the movie than the book, is my impression), and the influences are there, with some that are so blatant they can’t be anything else but a homage. As you can imagine, some of these allusions end up being a double-edged sword, and sometimes, rather than transport me into something akin to Kubrick’s classic, the book instead leaves me feeling like I’m reading a cheesy novelization of some B-list film on the Syfy channel. That said, what I did like about the story was this idea of a “high-tech haunted house”, blending elements from both science fiction and the paranormal, two genres that normally do not make such good bedfellows. Flashback chapters were also done very well, especially those showing us some of Shawn’s harrowing memories from his childhood. Moments of insight and other highlights such as these were what kept me reading, leading me to cut the book a lot of slack despite the pacing and plot issues.

In the end, I might have enjoyed this more than The Hatching. My criticisms aside, I can’t deny Ezekiel Boone has written an entertaining story, even if it does feel messy at times. Overall, The Mansion is undeniably flawed in many respects, but I still give it a 3.5 for its interesting concept and for being an easy, popcorn-y read.

I was really looking forward to reading The Mansion. I was in the mood for a good haunted house story. Throw in some AI tech and it should have been a good time. I did like the premise. A spooky mansion has been fitted with an AI like computer system that should prove to make living there a dream. "Nellie"'s job is to anticipate what the residents and guests need and make sure it happens. When Billy is hired to try to get out the bugs in the system, things start to go very wrong.

While I liked the premise, the book ended up just being an OK read for me. I wanted a spooky "ghost in the machine" type book, but it just never quite hit the mark. The potential was there, especially in the end. However, I wanted more...more creepiness and more ghosts. I also wanted more of a peek into what Billy was doing during all of those endless work hours. The book really dragged in the middle and then the ending was rushed and anti-climatic.

The characters were kind of lack luster with Emily being the most annoying out of them all. I found her very whiny. I did like the creepy twins. They were cool and it would have made the book more interesting had they been a bigger part in the book. It's not a bad book. It's worth taking a look, but it wasn't what I was hoping for.

Shawn and Billy are two friends who meet in college. At the start of the book, we learn that they had a falling out after college, despite spending two years together writing computer code. Shawn uses the code to start a company that has become even more successful than Apple. Billy, meanwhile, is a struggling alcoholic with overwhelming credit card debt. Their lives could not be more different. The one thing Billy has that Shawn doesn't is Emily, his wife, who was originally Shawn's girlfriend.

Shawn asks Billy to come and work for him, finishing an artificial intelligence-type system that Billy helped create but Shawn was never able to finish (or, at least, the version he has doesn't function correctly). Shawn has "installed" the system, which he calls Nellie, in his family's mansion. The mansion was a fancy resort in the 1920's, built by Shawn's great-grandfather, but it closed after the Great Depression and has fallen into ruin since. Shawn has had it restored and Billy and Emily move in so Billy can work on, and hopefully perfect, the "Nellie" system.

This book reminded me in many ways of "The Shining" (I assume that was intentional on the author's part). It's set in an isolated (and possibly haunted) hotel-type building in the winter.

I will be honest -- I thought I would never finish this book. It seemed very long to me. I liked the book but I can't really say I enjoyed the reading process. I have no complaints about the writing, but I do feel like it could have been a lot shorter!

This would have been a more interesting movie than the lack of compelling read it made. I do like this author a lot but this book dragged on. Instead of anticipation/suspense, it felt like all the action was quickly condensed and over before it began. I also didn't love the ending. But the beginning was intriguing and there were moments of brilliance here . . . I think a screenwriter could make this shine!!

The Mansion came out earlier this month on December 4, 2018 and, if you've ever wanted to read a Christmas horror story, you can purchase HERE. I will bet you that this is made into a movie!

She'd read once that inmates who've been wrongfully convicted have only two choices: to give up or to find some transcendent state where they could fight for justice without being bitter. It sounded stupid to her, but maybe it also made sense. She was still angry with Shawn for breaking his promises to Billy, but it didn't consume the way it consumed her husband.

I thought this was a fantastic book. I have read the Hatching series and while this was nothing like them, it was still exciting. It kept me hooked from start to finish. It had romance, suspense, and murder. The characters were well developed and while some were a little strange, most were likable.
I received this ebook free from NetGalley for an honest review.

Published by Atria/Emily Bestler Books on December 4, 2018

The Mansion is a horror novel that faintly echoes The Shining, in that the action takes place in an older multiple-room building occupied in its winter months by a husband and wife that, come spring, will be placed in the service of guests. The story is also similar in that the protagonist struggles with his sanity — perhaps he was a bit unhinged before beginning his stay; perhaps his perceptions are altered by the environment in which he dwells. In most respects, however, The Mansion and The Shining are quite different.

Billy Stafford and Shawn Eagle developed a new kind of smartphone operating system by working intensely in a cabin near a dilapidated mansion in the woods for 23 months. A third fellow who joined them, Takata, they try not to think about. Billy didn’t think about much of anything except drugs and booze after Shawn stole the company from him. Billy won Emily, the woman they both wanted, but Shawn became one of the richest men in the world, leaving Billy with a small amount of stock that he sold to support his addictions.

Years earlier, Shawn’s parents died in a fire on the property where the mansion sat. It has always had a reputation for being haunted. Shawn is rennovating to create a retreat for the ultra-wealthy, but construction accidents have only added to the legend of the haunted mansion.

Shawn has equipped the mansion with a program called Nellie that he and Billy imagined but never made a reality. Billy wrote most of the code; Shawn’s engineers tried to plug the gaps. Nellie is not quite an Artificial Intelligence, but it is meant to anticipate needs and to take action, without being prompted, to make its users happy. Shawn wants Nellie to run the mansion but there’s a ghost in the machine and Shawn needs Billy to perform an exorcism. Nellie, it seems, has a temper.

The final plot element involves Emily’s sister Beth, her husband Rothko, and their spooky twin daughters. That’s the only plot element that didn’t work for me. At some point, enough is enough and more is too much. The twins play a significant role in the story but they don’t fit snugly into the concept and their presence is just too convenient. Eziekiel Boone could have told the story without them and their omission would have improved the novel’s focus. The science fiction rule that it's fine to imagine one, but only one, impossible thing should also bind horror writers.

Despite my sense that The Mansion is an inspired amalgamation of two or three Stephen King plots, it stands comfortably on its own merits. Horror succeeds when it’s convincing. Apart from the bewitched twins, Boone does a masterful job of placing real people in real danger. Even if the danger is combination of supernatural forces and a computer gone mad, Boone does what good horror writers do — he makes the reader forget how divorced from reality the story’s premise might be so that the reader can worry about Billy and Emily and experience vicarious fear. The novel has a good pace, develops sympathetic characters in a reasonable amount of detail, and works its way to a satisfying climax.

RECOMMENDED

This book read like if Michael Crichton were a just a hair campier--the ominous AI almost rises to the level of a monster. Atmospheric without getting bogged down in the details. I continue to thoroughly enjoy Ezekiel Boone's books.

By all accounts, Ezekiel Boone's spider trilogy was quite good. I wish the same were true of his haunted mansion novel. In fact, The Mansion is so far removed from being a decent novel that it is one of the few times I regret the time I spent reading a novel.

The problem is that nothing happens. Seriously. Nothing. Happens. Oh, there is some drama and blood once you reach the 90 percent mark, but before that point, there is nothing but hints of a depraved history and a very repetitive rehashing of the origins of this fabulous software system.

Once the action does heat up, the answers remain vague and disappointing. You are so thankful something is finally happening, however, that you ignore the fact that there are no real answers and celebrate the rapidity of the denouement. The end is in sight, and you can't wait to get there after wading through 300 pages of the same technology verbiage, the same character introspection, and the same lack of answers. 

The characters have no development. They are purely one-dimensional placeholders, one step above the pseudo-artificial intelligence around which the novel revolves. Mr. Boone spends more time tap-dancing around their individual tragic childhoods than he does creating any depth in his characters. The lone exception to this is Shawn, the man who makes the entire novel possible. We do see one night of his childhood tragedies, but even that does not come until the 60 percent mark of the novel. With four narrators - Shawn, Billy, Emily, and her twin nieces - one expects a better understanding of each of their motivations and desires. Instead, we get a whole lot of their past motivations and desires, and not much of anything else. These are easily forgotten characters, the kind in whom you have no vested interest. It matters not what any of their futures are because you just don't care. 

At heart, The Mansion is as much a love triangle as it is anything else, which is supremely annoying because the only character aware that it is a love triangle is the computer program, which should be creepy but is really nothing more than Hal from 2001: A Space Odyssey - movie or book. The whole story tries to hard to be something new but fails spectacularly. Between the lack of original plot, boring characters, and fact that nothing of interest happens in the story, it is safe to say that Ezekiel Boone's latest novel is one for which it is best to skip.

Shawn and Billy used to be BFFs. That was until Shawn went one way and Billy went another with Emily. Emily was Shawn's girlfriend, but Shawn wanted to be rich and successful more than he wanted Emily, or did he? 12 years later, Shawn is a BILLIONAIRE while Billy and Emily are quite poor. Their marriage is not the best due to Billy's years of addiction. Now almost 2 years sober, Shawn has reached out to Billy for help with Nellie, the computer software Shawn, Billy, and Tanaka had been working on. Who is Tanaka? A very good question. There are many secrets hidden in their past and these secrets are about to come to the surface. Will Billy and Emily's marriage survive? Will the three of them survive or does Nellie have other plans for them? This is a great horror story that was just a tad too long. There is a lot of background given from 12 years ago and while much is needed, I felt there was too much. I would have liked more thrilling current events over the past storytelling. I did enjoy this book and give it a solid 4-star review.

With a premise that seemed to be a combination of Smart House and The Shining, I was stoked to try this book out. Unfortunately, the first 50 or so pages were a background dump and were so repetitive that I had to wonder if an editor actually combed through this or not. (To be fair, I was reading an advanced copy and it's possible this was cut down). The characters were solidly one-dimensional and I was torn between wanting to see if there was any development and not believing it was even possible. I skimmed reviews to determine whether it was worth continuing and <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2449334659">this one</a> reaffirmed my feelings on it. While it appears there are others who genuinely liked it, it doesn't seem like the issues keeping me from enjoying it will abate.

In addition to the poor pacing and lack of characterization, there were a couple instances where I had to raise an eyebrow at what I was reading. The first is mentioned in the above linked review: one of the characters has a secretary who is objectified in an incredibly misogynistic and racist manner. The second is another character thinking about how a daycare on a houseboat could only appeal to men with autism. First of all, what??? Second of all, relevance??? I didn't want to stick around to see what strike 3 would be, so I cut my losses there. Hopefully this went through some serious editing before publishing, but as the ARC stands this isn't a book I'd recommend reading.

Ezekiel Boone had a knockout with the Hatching series and he's done it again. He never fails to write a book that keeps me turning the pages rapidly!

THE MANSION is Ezekiel Boone's new book after fabulous The Hatching trilogy. This book is something else completely. It's a story about an old crumbling mansion and a love story that will destroy a friendship and turn two men into bitter enemies.

Shawn Eagle and Billy Stafford were once a great team, but Shawn's girlfriend Emily left him for Billy. Shawn, however, ended up with the innovative computer Eagle Logic that he and Billy had created together. So, while Billy and Emily had each other, Shawn ends up one of the richest men on the planet.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION: http://freshfiction.com/review.php?id=67349