This story makes you uncomfortable. Marketing this as horror doesn’t seem quite right for it. Nothing about it is particularly scary, but the entire book has an undercurrent of discomfort that you can’t quite put your finger on. The couple is drawn to this house, and it’s magic, but they both seem to regret setting the rule about not asking those two questions. Everything for them becomes about the place, and when they try to take a break- the house comes to them.

This was a relatively quick read. I read it all in one sitting. The entire time I was waiting for something horrible to happen to the couple. This was somewhat because of the marketing for horror and the intense tension the writing creates. You expect something dangerous to occur, and yet, it doesn’t.

This is a short book, but I felt the ending was dissatisfying, which takes a star away from this review.

Thank you NetGalley for the copy. In A House at the Bottom of a Lake two teenagers decide to spend their first date canoeing across a chain of lakes and discover what appears to be a house at the bottom of the last lake. Curiosity soon turns to obsession and potentially madness.

This was a nice, short read. Overall, I thought it was okay just marketed wrong. Besides the fact that I personally think diving to the bottom of a lake by myself is terrifying, the book is very tame. I wouldn’t even classify it as horror. It’s more along the lines of YA/Magical Realism. I think if you are aware of that going in, you’ll enjoy this a lot more.
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This was a eerie atmospheric tale about a couple who find a house underneath the surface of a hidden lake on their very first date.

They explore the depths of the lake and all the rooms in the house over the course of a summer while exploring their budding relationship. Enthralled by every unbelievable thing this house has to offer the two become slightly obsessed, spending so much time at this lake, discovering more and more new secrets about the house. But, when things start to get weird, an unsettled feeling begins to creep over them, even going so far as to follow them home. But, what are they if they don’t have the house? Who are they without this thing that has taken up every moment of their thoughts for all these weeks?

This was really strange and very creepy. While it wasn’t particularly scary, there were very foreboding elements to it.

A House at the Bottom of a Lake (eGalley, January 2021) by @JoshMalerman is so good and proper spooky... oh, to be seventeen again. The build up to the end and the pain and confusion Amelia and James feel is heartbreaking. If only they hadn't broken their own rule. Highly recommend!

This was a quick & easy read for my work day. I enjoyed it for the most part- had a really great premise.
Two teens on a first date find a house at the bottom of the lake.
While both magical and frightening the house lured the teens in to explore.
I wish the author would have continued where he left off. I felt it was a bit rushed and ended abruptly. Maybe there will be an extension of what happened later.

Thank you NetGalley!

A good, quick read just in time for Halloween. I don't completely understand what happened, but I liked it? I have never been one to be spooked by a dress or beaver pepper shaker, but Josh Malerman accomplished that. It was suspenseful with a dash of teenage romance. Honestly, James and Amelia were a little too, "and it was love," for my taste, but their relationship was a nice touch. Is the lake a portal to another dimension or parallel plane? I don't know. Was this all an allegory on not breaking into a stranger's home? Maybe. Like Amelia said, no hows or whys.

James and Amelia are teenagers who’s first date takes them out to a hidden lake where they discover something impossible, something they can call their own.

This novella is a whole mood. One big atmospheric mood.

I’m trying to understand the metaphor still. James and Amelia are important but even more so is the house itself. It makes you feel very tense and scared about what the answers are. The danger of the unknown. The feeling of falling in love. The nervousness and the anxiety.

Reading each chapter feels like they did when they were underwater and couldn't get enough air.
It feels like we are diving into each chapter with bated breath afraid of what is happening, exploring the house with them, and then making it up to the surface with relief. It drew out such tension. It's not very long but it definitely left chills and I highly recommend reading it even if you don't understand it at first. It’s a beauty to read and the dialogue is great, the description is great. The tension is basically it’s own character but it is welcoming and I can’t wait for others to be able to read it so we can discuss it.

This is not a genre I usually read and I've never experienced Josh Malerman’s writing before but now I will probably go out and get Bird Box. He kept me so invested in these characters and their relationship. I felt like I was experiencing everything that they did. It is beautiful. It's a coming of age story with magical realism. A story about love and a haunted house underwater. What's not to love?

5 out of 5 stars

Special thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group-Ballantine for sharing this ARC with me in exchange for my honest review.

Well, it has been a while since I have read something I didn’t understand at all... so it has that going for it!

This is not a horror book - it is a love story with a bit of a creep factor. The imagery is fantastic - like watching a movie.

Two teens find a house at the bottom of a lake on their first date and the house becomes their life for the summer.

Is the house a metaphor for summer love? I think yes, but honestly, it’s just so strange I don’t know what to think! The book kept me interested and wanting to know more, but it ended in a way that made me more than a little puzzled.

Big positive: It’s a short book, so you could read it in one sitting, easily.

A house at the bottom of the lake; is the title and the story. Its a unique eerie realism story and not horror. I’m saying this upfront because you’d either like it or you won’t!! There is no in-between.

Amelia and James go kayaking on their first date and discover a house. AT THE BOTTOM OF THE LAKE. The weirdness, the eerie feeling and the indescribable physics of the house makes them claim it as their own. So they visit the house every night to investigate the matter. The things they see and feel, their love and intimacy is quite brilliantly written by Malerman. Its something different from BirdBox and Malorie. Its fantastic. The ending was so ambiguous, I had to read it multiple times, but otherwise I loved this!!

Thank you Netgalley & Random House/Delrey for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

⭐️⭐️⭐️
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It’s weird. It’s creepy. It’s definitely spooky... so “A House at the Bottom of the Lake” is perfect for the spooky season!
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Not the scariest horror i have ever read, but it definitely had a creep factor. This story is surrealism at it’s finest, meaning it’s not for everyone. But, if you like strange endings, I would recommend this to you. Also it’s short enough to read in one sitting!
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Thank you @netgalley and This Is Horror for providing me with a E-ARC in exchange for an honest review.
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This was an interesting book to say the least. I thought it was a fascinating concept of finding a house at the bottom of a lake and basically making it their own. However, I just didn't feel connected to it. The chemistry wasn't really there for me between the two characters, and it wasn't very realistic to me how their feelings progressed. The first half of the book just felt like I was going through the motions to get to the end. I was planning to give it two stars, but based on the end, I decided to up it to three. I was still a bit confused at the end, but some books are intended to be left that way so that was probably just a personal issue on my end. It's a short book, and I do think some people will really love it, but it just wasn't quite right for me.

The Title/Cover Draw:
I got accepted to read this via Netgalley, but I wanted to read it because it looked really spooky. Plus I had heard a lot of people talking about it.
What I liked:
The story was told beautifully. You never knew exactly what was happening.
What I didn’t like:
The ending was very ambiguous.
What kept me reading:
It was short, but also I just wanted answers about why the house was how it was.
The Characters:
The main characters were innocent and full of wonder, who kind of lose the simple ideals they have.
The Ending:
See above.
Consider if you like / Reminds me of:
If you like short stories, spooky stories, or stories that leave you wondering.

See my video review here:
https://youtu.be/rWcnyGtuhEQ

Many thanks to #NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced review copy of this book. All opinions are my own.

I enjoyed this story. I didn't realize it was so short! I read it in two sittings. It was very fast-paced and flowed easily.

The blurb had me so excited to read this! A house on the bottom of a lake; what??? The premise for this book was really good. To me though, I felt it left something to be desired. Part of the reason for this is the length. This story really needed a greater length to do it justice. The other reason was the ending. It just ended so abruptly, that I was left scratching my head.

All in all it was still a good book. It held my interest from the first page to the last. I would recommend this for those who love paranormal/supernatural and weird!

I grew-up mid-class enough to have a swimming pool. Not to scoreboard anyone or sound pretentious, I know swimming pools are common enough, but I really loved that pool. I swam until my scalp turned green from the chlorine; I taught the neighbor kids how to swim. I counted down the days until it might, possibly be warm enough to jump in the pool for the first time. I was a great swimmer. I also had an irrational fear that if I was swimming alone…I was not really swimming alone, if you can catch that wave.

Growing up with a pool is awesome, much like I would imagine growing up somewhere that gets a lot of snow is. Snow is also awesome when you’re a kid. It’s when you grow up that you realize what a huge pain in the ass everything is. The pool needs constant maintenance and your heart damn near gives out every time you have to shovel the driveway.

One of the things I know as an adult who grew up with a swimming pool, is that I love pool water…clean, crisp, chlorinated pool water. And I freakin’ hate dirty, stinky, possibly urethra-swimming-up amoeba filled (we’ve all read the stories) pond, river, lake, ocean water.

So when Amelia and James decide to go canoeing on their first date and see the roof of a house mere feet below the surface of the lake both kids are immediately smitten, not only with each other but with the idea that in this house lay all their hopes and dreams.

I know that Ringo once famously proclaimed that he’d like to be under the sea, in an octopus’s garden, with you. But an octopus’s garden this is not. It’s a house under the water, it’s a fully furnished house under the water, it’s a fully furnished house where everything stays in place like somebody(thing) lives there…under the water. That’s a no from me, dawg! See: irrational fear, paragraph one and amoeba, paragraph three.

But give credit to Amelia and James, they explore the hell out of this house and they’re both intelligent enough to know that nothing about what they’re experiencing makes any rational sense. But the magical, surreal-ness of it all makes the house an obsession that’s impossible to escape.

Don’t read this expecting a scare; being a teenager is scary enough, asking somebody out on a date is scary enough, falling in love is scary enough. Those are the elements that Malerman turns his talents to in this novella. I really enjoyed this magical, coming-of-age, slightly haunting novella and recommend giving this quick read a try.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for allowing me early access to this title in exchange for my honest review.

I confess, I am a big Malerman fan by now. I felt his recent novel, INSPECTION, was unjustly overlooked for a thrilling and unique story. In this short novel, he changes gears on us bringing us an almost fable of love and coming of age, and loss of innocence all wrapped up in a surreal, fantastical adventure. I was sucked into the concept immediately as the two teens discovered the hidden third lake and what awaited them at the bottom of it. I felt like I was floating through the story, just like the two kids. I wanted to dive down to this mysterious house, too! I loved the ending and I'll be parsing the metaphors of the house and the lake for many days now. A quick read and one definitely worthy of your time.

Copy generously provided by Netgalley for review!

Well done atmospheric descriptions of the nature and environments depicted, though occasionally long winded. I also enjoyed the central conceit, of the titular house. The relationship between the main characters is good as well, specifically at the beginning when they’re getting to know each other; unfortunately I get this aspect suffered a little as the novella went on.

This novella is marketed as horror, but is definitely not. I would describe it as a fantasy, with mystery elements that never get explored (by design). Dialogue and thought processes seemed a bit repetitive to me, a lot of “we should go back to the house… no, wait, we can’t… but we need to…”, and as mentioned in other reviews, things that need to happen for the protagonists to progress in their quest just seem to happen with no issue.

Not great, not horrible either. Fairly middle of the road in my opinion!

I am rating A House at the Bottom of a Lake three stars because "I liked it." Of note, I use the Goodreads formula for star giving and / or rating.

First off, I appreciate so much the opportunity to read this book via Netgalley. I have tried to gain approval for many of Malerman's books, and this was my first success so I thank you ever so much!

Much like in Bird Box, Malerman's writing captivated me within the first few pages. Malerman has a unique talent to not only allow his (adult) readers to remember those awkward, all consuming and draining emotional teenage years, but to bring us right back to reliving them - emotions running at level 1000% and 1000% of the time. Hyperbole? Perhaps . . . but maybe not so much if you really think about those teenage years, first dates, and discovery.

I don't know if I myself would classify this book as horror as it felt more mythical and magical and YA, which are all delightful things to be! When I scroll through NetGalley, it's the horror section I peruse, thus how I stumbled on A House at the Bottom of a Lake. Much like with my reading of Bird Box, I was enveloped in the story within mere moments, but unlike with Bird Box, it wasn't with fear and tension and an elevated heart rate that I kept vigorously turning pages.

And what about that ending!? In reading a few reviews via Goodreads to evaluate whether or not I was the only surprised reader, it came to light that no, I am not. A consistent complaint I have read about this novel, via others' reviews, is that it doesn't feel like Malerman's other works; I don't necessarily agree that this makes A House at the Bottom of a Lake less worthy of a read. I personally feel that Malerman's talents lie within multiple genres, and it's not necessarily fair to compare this book with his others. I will continue to read and love Malerman's books, and A House at the Bottom of a Lake included in this love!

this was a beautifully done book, it was a great scifi and horror novel, the characters were great and it was superb.

James and Amelia, both seventeen years old. James finally gets up the courage to ask Amelia on a date. He decides to take her canoeing. There is a big beautiful lake, connected to a second smaller lake, that is even more beautiful. And not as many people are on the second smaller lake. It's a intimate place for a first date. They can eat the lunch he brought them in the canoe. As they eat their lunch they happen to see a tunnel. Covered with branches, obscured by the normal eye.
They row their way there and notice that the tunnel is actually big enough to push the canoe through. When the reach the other side of the tunnel a third smaller, swampy lake appears.
There lives will change here.
Interesting, intriguing!

Did not like. It was an odd story and just did not connect with any of the characters. I think others would enjoy.