From the beginning of the book, we are set off kilter and really we never recover. This is a horror book with thriller twists. Because what you think this book is about isn’t and what it isn’t is. And if you’re confused by my review, you just need to read it. This is the story of Dee who is looking for answers to what happened to her sister that went missing elven years ago. It’s also the story of Ted who is a often misunderstood recluse in a home with boarded up windows, his daughter Lauren who he is struggling to parent, and his smart cat Olivia. There are layers and layers to this book but clues throughout so we you get to the end; you realize what exactly had been happening all along. The book is creepy and deeply unsettling but I could not put it down. I will not quickly forget this book.

Thank you NetGalley and Tor Nightfire for the opportunity to read and review this advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

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I audibly gasped at the first plot twist in the Last House on Needless Street. Then, there were a series of other hard turns of plot. All were completely unforeseen—at least by me. The book is definitely the work of a master craftsperson.

The plot is so great, I can’t tell you much about it. In fact, don’t even read the publisher’s blurb. It’s much better to have little to no clue before jumping into this excellent thriller. Here are the barest bones of the plot. A young girl named Lulu went missing ten years ago. Other children are also missing. Could a serial killer be responsible?

I can’t recommend the Last House on Needless Street more highly. Unfortunately, I can’t tell you why I feel that way. Just read it, I guarantee you will be as wowed by it as I am. 5 stars and a favorite!

Thanks to Tor Nightfire and NetGalley for a copy in exchange for my honest review.

This was such a phenomenal story! Twisty, unexpected, and full of emotion, I did not expect the story to go in the direction it did, and then to be so well-constructed and sophisticated in execution. Very well done.

There are so many twisted layers to this book. I'm not even going to attempt to summarize the plot, but I will say that it starts as a horror novel that ends on a note of hope. You'll have to read it to find out how/why. And you should read it. It takes a while to get into the rhythm of the book, but once you do, you really want to know what's going to happen next.

"This is the story of a serial killer. A stolen child. Revenge. Death. And an ordinary house at the end of an ordinary street.

All these things are true. And yet they are all lies...

You think you know what's inside the last house on Needless Street. You think you've read this story before. That's where you're wrong.

In the dark forest at the end of Needless Street, lies something buried. But it's not what you think..."

Thanks to NetGalley for the free ARC in exchange for my honest review.

“I don’t put the knife back in the high cupboard. Instead I bury it in the back yard ‘under cover in dark’. Isn’t that a beautiful expression? It makes the night sound like a warm blanket, littered with stars.”

This horror adjacent psychological thriller is about the mysterious activities happening in a secluded house on Needless Street. Surrounded by forests and curious characters, protagonist Ted is socially awkward, a little peculiar, creepy at times and potentially a serial killer. Definitely gives you Norman Bates vibes. He lives with his spiritual cat Olivia, and Lauren, a young girl who cannot walk and has been forbidden from going outside. Concurrently, Ward reveals that in this town, almost a decade earlier, a young girl by the name of Lulu disappeared. In present time, her sister Dee is still on the hunt to find Lulu’s captivator and moves onto Needless street to discover the truth. And that is literally all I can say! The writing will give you chills, make you wonder, frustrated, and fulfilled on rotation, throughout the entire book. In fact, the weaving of emotions that Ward was able to evoke throughout the novel is part of why I absolutely loved this book. Although triggering at times, with detailed child and animal abuse, the context and characters are developed with such careful consideration that I would still strongly suggest it for those who may shy away. Go into this with an open mind. Do not read this like a horror novel. And trust that Ward understands how to construct a thoughtful and methodical journey for her readers.

This is probably one of the best horror novels that I've ever read ....although I don't know that it was very scary. There was a pervasive sort of creepiness to the story. The last house on Needless Street is boarded up and inhabited by three characters: Ted-who is drunk and obviously not quite right, Olivia-a religious cat, and Lauren-Ted's daughter who is not always there. The story is told from all of their points of view and also that of Dee. Dee is a disturbed woman who is plagued by the loss of her little sister years ago who moves into the neighborhood to stalk Ted because she thinks that he took her sister. All of these narrators could be unreliable-or not.
This story did not go the way that I thought it would and even when I had it figured out, it still took some unusual twists. I won't make a big deal of the twists as there are some that may figure them out and others who may like to be surprised.
I especially loved the Afterword where the author explained what led her to writing the book.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in return for my honest review.

I absolutely loved this book! I picked it up for two main reasons - that gorgeous cover and the fact it was endorsed by Stephen King. I have long time been a King fan so it was enough to make me pick this book up with such a short blurb. And I am so glad that I did pick this book. There is everything I love about books like this - a bad guy who you aren't sure is even bad, a girl just out for revenge and a lot of characters that leave you wondering who they really are, and one heck of an ending. I never saw that ending coming and I couldn't believe it when I read it. Each time I had to take a break from the book, I just couldn't wait to get back into it. This certainly was a perfect book for me!

I enjoyed reading The Last House on Needless Street. This is not your typical horror story. And that is a good thing. It's a real page-turner that is hard to put down once you start reading it. It keeps you guessing right up until the end.

This was a trippy horror book to start off the spooky fall and Halloween season. There are rave reviews for this one, so I couldn’t wait to get into it. It was definitely a creepy book, but it also got weird in a way I didn’t necessarily enjoy. It’s very hard to explain the premise of this one without giving much away, but it follows a missing girl and a suspect. Not much is what at seems and at the end, I’m not sure I followed all the twists. I liked it fine enough, but did not love it as so many others seemed to. 3 stars ⭐️. Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the advanced copy for review.

Thank you, Catriona Ward, NetGalley, and Viper books for the opportunity to read this book. It releases on September 28th!

The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward is one of those books that is difficult to describe without giving away spoilers. So, just a heads up. Possible Spoilers Ahead. Trigger Warnings: Child Abuse. Ted lives on Needless Street. His daughter Lauren visits occasionally. But his love is for his cat, Olivia. It is pretty obvious that something isn’t right in the house right off the bat. He drinks but there are other issues as well. Lauren and Olivia the Cat also have their own points of view of what is happening on Needless Street. Then Dee moves in across the street. Only, she has other motives for moving there. Ted was a person of interest in the disappearance and now she is determined to find her sister or find the person responsible. One thing is for sure, nothing is as it seems.

Actually, that is just the given synopsis. To me, everything is as it seems. There aren’t actually twists to this story, just an occasional fact left for the reader every once in a while. Everything was obvious to me from the get-go. I wanted to read this book and be shocked, so I ignored other reviews and didn’t even read the synopsis. All I know is that Stephen King had an endorsement quote on the cover, it was a horror book, and may or may not contain a serial killer story. I did not want any other details. I heard a few people describe this book as a gothic thriller…so I was in! But now that I have finished reading the book, my question is…do people know what a gothic thriller is? Because in my opinion, this is not even close to a gothic thriller. In fact, it wasn’t even scary. I wanted a horror story. What I got was a distorted story that used mental illness as its major plot point. Yes, go ahead and read the afterward about how the author explains, but again, in my opinion, it still didn’t work.

I knew what was happening in this story. It did not feel unpredictable to me. It used Dissociative Identity Disorder as a plot point. The main character experiences severe childhood trauma and the story we get is the effect of that trauma. All the evidence is there in the beginning. I felt that this book could have gone in a different direction or at least have the ending executed in a different way. But I just could not get into this book. After reading some of the other reviews, I can tell I am in the minority here and that is ok. I can see how people enjoyed the writing. The writing is complex and not linear so it does keep you on your toes in that sense. Overall, not a win for me. I rate this book 2 out of 5 stars.

Such a convoluted path reading this book. Several times I was struggling to follow the story line, trying to figure out what was going on. Cats that can talk and reason? Really? Questioning if I should keep reading but I stuck with it and slowly, very slowly, began to find the way through the forest into the light. Many passages were difficult to read, due to the gruesome content. I was never able to identify with any of the characters which is important to me as a reader.
I stuck with it and am relieved that I did. By the end I had figured out most of what was happening and feeling so depressed about the characters. Reading the afterward gave me hope for those who actually struggle with the horrors of abusive childhoods. Catriona’s description of her discussions made me see the issue from a different perspective and I am thankful for that.
Many thanks to Catriona Ward, Viper, and NetGalley for affording me the opportunity to read an arc of this book, to be published on September 28th.

“I like this kind of place, where you’re in between one thing and another. Hallways, waiting rooms, lobbies and so on; rooms where nothing is actually supposed to happen. It relieves a lot of pressure and lets me think.”

3.5 stars.

<I>The Last House on Needless Street</I> is going to be a very polarizing novel, to say the least. Because there are several notable moments where it shifts and transforms dramatically, pulling the rug from under the readers' feet (more than once) with reveals that change everything about the novel. Some of these rug-pulling changes work... and the others will be the thing that make or break the novel for readers.

I am one of those who did not like the direction that the story took in the last 20% of the book or so. After reading the author's note, it became more clear why the author was going for this particular element. Personally, however, I think the author took an excellent psychological thriller with a horrifyingly creepy build-up and then immediately dampened its effect with a frustrating curve ball.

I can't help but think of a similar effect which happened in 'Survive the Night' by Riley Sager, where a great premise and cast of characters were let-down by an underwhelming climax and finale.

I did end up rating it 3.5 stars because it was so, so enjoyable up until that last 20% or so. Increasingly creepy and unnerving, yet Ward somehow weaves in dark humor that sets the tone for the unusual circumstances. The well-done strange characters (the man Dee meets with! ugh!) and events created a very unsettling foundation for the story. I don't know if I will ever feel the itch to reread the book because of how I felt about some of the turns it took, but I will definitely not be forgetting some of the imagery anytime soon.

[I received a copy of this work from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review]

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3824503902

I went into this novel with excessively high expectations: from the plot description to the title to the cover and all the hype, everything set me up to think this would be a favorite of the year. And...it was not. Ward's writing is excellent, and her easy way of creating a world and characters (even a very sweet, if overly pious, cat) made reading a quick and painless experience. However, I didn't love the 'twists' (such as they were), and I didn't love the unintentional commentary that setting those twists in a horror/thriller creates. I'm being vague to avoid spoilers, and I realize from the (spoilery) final author's note that Ward intended a different message (even a corrective to older, harmful stereotypes), but I think the book still managed to uphold some of those stereotypes (in teasing them out) more than it managed to dismantle them.

I do love horror but I overestimated what I'd be able to process when I first requested it. A horror movie or tv show is one thing, but the images of a book stick in my mind a lot longer, and the birds in chapter one about ended things for me. I did eventually return to finish this, and it is very good, but I recommend it for those with a stronger stomach. Although the story is very real, I appreciate that it was told through multiple narrators. We all experience and interpret things differently, right? It made the ending more satisfying to see the strings of web come together, making something whole and unnerving. Definitely good. I just wasn't ready for it.

I don't even know what I just read! This was the most bizarre, unusual story I've possibly ever read. Told from alternating perspectives from a multiple personality disordered kitten, a young boy and an older man, all of whom have some dark connections to murder and serial killers. I honestly couldn't figure out what the heck was going on in this story and felt lost most of the time. It is very atmospheric, with the creepy house playing a central role. This one was definitely a case where I was sucked in by a gorgeous cover that kind of left me wanting. Much thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my review copies. The kitten narrator was definitely the best part of the story for me!

This book is very difficult to review without spoiling it. It's a complex story with several narrators. Each character is unique. The story doesn't really fit a specific genre. There's a mystery, but not in the traditional sense.
Honestly it was hard to get through. It's pacing is slow. The characters are interesting at times and at others completely strange. The book is either a masterpiece or just all out weird. I can't decide.

This novel packs a punch! Nuanced, layered and terrifying; it is like the Russian nesting doll featured in the story which has more and more slowly being unpacked the further into the novel you get. The author grips you immediately and then deftly leads you through a multi room nightmare. Excellent!

When Dee was a teen her sister, Lulu, disappeared while on a family trip, never to be seen again. The police investigated a man, Ted Bannerman, but no arrest was ever made and the case went cold. Years later Dee is so convinced that Ted had something to do with the disappearance of Lulu that she goes so far as to move to a house on Needless Street, the very same street that Ted lives on, so she can conduct her own investigation in the hopes of either finding her sister or discovering what happened to her. Can Dee uncover the truth?

This may have been one of the strangest novels that I have ever read. At first I found it very confusing and hard to follow, especially when the facts surrounding certain events seemed to contradict each other, but by the end it all made perfect sense after the big twist in the novel was revealed. The events are presented to the reader through the eyes of multiple characters and normally that is something that I really enjoy, but in The Last House on Needless Street it almost added to my confusion as I read. While this made things a little more confusing than they already were, it is a definite necessity for this particular novel. To be perfectly honest I’m not really sure what to think about this novel, and I feel that it is one that would be almost more enjoyable when read a second time around. The Last House on Needless Street is a twisted novel that, even with my confusion, was enjoyable to read.

The Last House On Needless Street is a difficult book to review, the less you know about the plot going in, the better.
The official synopsis:
“In a boarded up house on a dead end street at the edge of the wild Washington woods lives a family of three. A teenage girl who isn’t allowed outside, not after last time. A man who drinks alone in front of his tv, trying to ignore the gaps in his memory. And a house cat who loves napping and reading the bible. An unspeakable secret binds them together, but when a new neighbour moves in next door, what is buried out among the birch trees may come back to haunt them all…”

The story is told from multiple points of view: Ted, Olivia (the cat and she is wonderful in her observations about humans), Dee—Ted’s new neighbour, and Lauren. None of them are reliable. They withhold information from the reader, from each other, and even from themselves, the malleability of memory—especially in regard to trauma—is a key theme. In her author’s note (don’t start the book there) Ward describes the book as “a story about survival, disguised as a book about horror.” This is a very accurate description.
Ward takes a used before horror device and portrays it in a way that’s much more sympathetic, less superficial, but without making it any less scary or twisty - because survival itself and the things survived are pretty horrific. This book is somewhere between horror, psychological thriller and literary fiction. It was a fabulous book for the season definitely a spooky read with the darker parts of the forest at the end of Needless Street getting their role in the story.

A keep you up at night book. Hard to put down till close to the end. Thriller about missing children, abuse and disassociate identity disorder.