WOW This book was intense! Dual timeline done perfectly!! And that crazy twist! Yup, I didn't see that coming. Thats it I will give nothing away other than you need to read this!!!!

I always enjoy Jennifer McMahon although this is not one of my favorites. I wasn't as invested in this one and found that I was forcing myself to read it. The ending was clever and saved it - 3. stars. Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a free copy in exchange for my honest opinion.

This was not what I was expecting at all!!!!!! For the first few pages I was skeptical but then the next thing I knew I was 40% in & I was hooked on this book!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is in my opinion Jennifer McMahon's best work yet. So spooky and intriguing it sucks you in before you even realize it and when you do you're in too deep and loving it.

While I'd been excited to read Jennifer McMahon's latest book, I found it to be a bit of a disappointment. I've come to expect chills and thrills from her, a shocking twist and a satisfying story. This one, however, took a while to grab my attention. I had no problem putting down the book and stepping away for a day or two. While there were a few twists, the first one was predictable, especially if you're expecting there to be a twist somewhere in the story. For all of the talk and expectation of monsters, this novel lacked a gripping suspense where I really felt like I was on the edge of my seat. The creep-factor was definitely missing. The story itself is well written and intriguing, definitely thought provoking, so maybe my disappointment is just my own high expectations from the author. It was a good book, just not, in my opinion, McMahon's best.

Thank you Netgalley and publisher for a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

4.5/ In 1978, in a renowned treatment center in Vermont, Dr. Helen Hildreth works with the mentally ill. Her two grandkids - Vi & Eric know this prestigious doctor as just Gran. One day, Gran brings home a child, Iris, to stay with their little family. Iris is silent and beyond skittish. Violet is thrilled to have a new friend - and invites her to The Monsters Club that she and Eric have put together where they catalog all kinds of monsters and dream up ways to defeat them. Iris slowly comes out of her shell and the three of them do everything together.

Fast forward to 2019, Lizzy Shelly is the host of a popular podcast called Monsters Among Us. She is traveling to Vermont, because a young girl has been abducted and a monster sighting has the town in an uproar. Lizzy is determined to hunt this monster down - because she knows better than anyone that monsters are real - and one of them is her very own sister.

Okay, so this book was SO good - it was unlike anything I've ever read before! The writing style in this book was *chefs kiss*! I was intrigued by this storyline and was so invested in how this story would play out. I enjoyed Lizzy's character and how she unraveled her past before our eyes to seek out the future. I also loved how the "monsters" are demons that live within us - so that metaphor was executed beautifully. Highly recommend this book!!

Wow. Just wow. The Children on the Hillwas an amazing read. Right off the bat it brought all kinds of The Haunting of Hill House and The Drowning Kind vibes. But it definitely brought more than just a touch of horror. Not only that, but the book was full of surprising twists and turns.

Dr. Helen Hildreth is a world renowned psychiatrist, so dedicated to her work that her home where she raises her grandchildren shares the estate with her mental hospital. Kind of creepy, right? Growing up next to psychos? But the kids don't care. Vi and her little brother Eric are just like any other kids, playing games and having real and imagined adventures.

When their grandmother brings home their new "sister," Iris, she's different. But Vi is determined to make her fit in. She's wanted a sister for so long. And as things go, turns out there are a lot of secrets. And Iris has been through a lot. And she's not the only one...

I highly recommend The Children on the Hill. It's got a little bit of everything and it's an amazing book! Especially for any true crime podcast enthusiasts (I didn't even mention that part!). Special thanks to Netgalley and Gallery Books for an advanced e-galley in exchange for my honest review. This one is out now.

Thank you to NetGalley and Gallery Books and, of course, Jennifer McMahon for this ARC. I loved it!
#NetGalley #Gallerybooks #JenniferMcMahon
Oh Ms. McMahon, you never let me down. This book was nothing short of delicious!!
There are two timelines here. We have three monster loving kids in 1978 that are saturated in all things monster and horror. We also have Lizzy Shelley (!!!!!) in 2019 and we are treated to her podcast based on folklore, and urban legends. As we jump back and forth between 1978 and 2019, we learn what the connection is between the two timelines. Lizzy is one of the children on the hill that we first met in 1978. We think we’re reading one story and we slowly learn that we’re reading another.

As is the case with all of Ms. M’s books, I was extremely annoyed that actual life interfered with my need to devour this book. This book was a little bit of departure from her normal supernatural fare. If I had known that before starting this book, I would have been disappointed, but I enjoyed this very much and didn’t end up missing the norm! This plot parallelled Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein in several ways. Not only was it a favorite story of the main characters but it followed the theme. Who is the monster and who is the man?

Brilliant book by Jennifer McMahon! I enjoyed every minute of it, and it had a great creep factor going on. It will mess with your head. It had, to me, vibes from “Never Let Me Go” and “Frankenstein.” The tension built and built, sometimes it seemed a bit slow, or I was just excited to see what would happen next. One of the best books I’ve read this year. Thanks to Netgalley, McMahon and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

The Children on the Hill is a dual-timeline mysterious past supernatural thriller. Children go monster hunting and find plenty of creep. The ending is surprising but also abrupt.

“Fear was a drug, and these stories were a delivery method.”

Jennifer McMahon does it again with this twisty, supernatural thriller that had me sleeping way past my bedtime! And just when I thought I’d figured it out…she threw me for another loop. Great read!

Another great story from Jennifer McMahon! I absolutely loved this story and was drawn in from the beginning. The twist was fantastic and the characters were interesting. I loved the dual story line and it truly enhanced the plot. The concept of monsters and humans being monsters was very well done. Reality is just as scary as the horror novels that we find ourselves getting lost in (like Frankenstein). I adore Jennifer McMahon's books and this one was no different!

This book is quite a ride. I did not see the ending coming. The author was very skillful at weaving the story so that the reader was kept guessing and begged for more. This is a terrific thriller.
I liked how the author used flashbacks and flash forwards to deepen the mysteries. As a reader, I found my interest piqued by this method.
Not to give away the ending, the story revolves around three teenagers raised in a mysterious institution. They begin to question their pasts and in so doing uncover more questions than answers. Things get stranger from there. Suffice it to say that you will not put this book down.

3.5 stars! Thank you Netgalley for the arc.I have read from Jennifer McMahon before (The Winter People & The Drowning Kind). I enjoy the multiple timelines and multiple POVs. I feel the twist in this one was a little predictable for me but still enjoyed the plot.

The story is told in three alternating parts. The first part is set in the late 1970s in Vermont where Eric and Violet (Vi) Hildreth live with their grandmother, Dr. Helen Hildreth, chief psychiatrist and director of Hillhouse Inn, a psychiatric facility. Dr. Hildreth is progressive in her treatment approach and Hillside Inn seems like a nicer place, relatively speaking, than most psychiatric facilities. Eric and Vi are fascinated with monsters, having formed their own monster club and written a book on monsters. When grandma brings a strange young girl, Iris, to the house to stay with them, she is indoctrinated into the club as well. Iris has no recollection of her past. Vi is certain that information on Iris can be found in grandma’s records and in parts of the facility that are off-limits. What she will discover will upend their lives, as grandma has some rather dark disturbing secrets.

The second part of the story is excerpts from a book that reveals the “truth” about Hillhouse Inn and Dr. Hildreth, or as much of the truth as the journalist could discover.

The third part is set in the present. Lizzy Shelley has reinvented herself since her childhood at Hillhouse Inn, but her fascination with monsters has continued. She has built a successful career as a monster hunter, with a podcast, book, lectures, and an appearance on a reality tv show. While she travels around the country investigating local monster legends, she pays the most attention to a series of disappearances of teenage girls, always on the night of a full moon, always after they have reported seeing/meeting the local monster, and all with troubled backgrounds, so their disappearance is assumed to be the result of them running away. Lizzy believes that a monster is involved in their disappearances, and that the monster is her sister.

It is not hard to guess what Dr. Hildreth has likely been doing in the off-limits parts of Hillside Inn, and the truth, when revealed, is appropriately disturbing. However, there are some rather surprising twists involving the monster -- including her backstory and the role she plays in the disappearances that Lizzy investigates. The author does a good job of setting up the plot that draws Lizzy back to Vermont, the Hillside Inn, and a reunion with her "sister." The author also does a good job portraying the conflict that Vi experiences when she realizes the truth about her grandmother, Dr. Hildreth.

I received a copy of the e-book via NetGalley in exchange for a review.

McMahon is a favorite of mine so I was thrilled to be awarded a copy of her newest. It did not disappoint. I love a story filled with quirky characters and spooky places and this fit the bill.

Something At Work In My Soul, Which I Do Not Understand

Many books have twists, in the plot or in their whole POV. The Children on the Hill is one that has twists that keep coming until the last page.

The book is well-written. The story was inspired by Mary Shelley's Frankenstein in important ways, but was in no way derivative. The author deftly unwound the bandages to slowly reveal the creature within.

As the Hillside Inn's dark atmosphere congealed around them, I felt as helpless to escape unscathed as the children were. The adult characters are creepy, but mesmerizing. Dr. Frankenstein thought he was changing the world for the better, too.

Thank you to Jennifer McMahon, Gallery Books, and NetGalley for the free advanced reader's copy. It was a privilege to read. With my review, I bestow a free gift of an enthusiastic recommendation to all lovers of superior horror fiction.

Hmmmm, let me start with what I liked about the book. The plot was interesting and the writing was great, I had no issue following the characters even with dual timelines. Loved the short chapters which always makes books easier to read in my opinion. However the pacing was a little slow and it seemed there were things added to extend the length of the book.The biggest issue I had was the ending which really fell flat and didn't answer questions that needed to be answered. I may be expecting too much as I am a big fan of psychological thrillers with plot twists that blow you away. So I wouldn't discourage anyone from reading, I think many people will enjoy it.

What a wild ride! I loved the supernatural element. I truly didn't know what was going to happen next. McMahon did an amazing job of entwining past and present. I don't want to give away any spoilers, but this one had twist after twist. While it was slow in the beginning, I highly recommend. Thank you to NetGalley, Jennifer McMahon, and Scout Press of Simon and Schuster, Inc. for the ARC. This was my first McMahon book and certainly won't be my last!

First line: Her smell sends me tumbling back through time to before.

Summary: In 1978, Dr. Hildreth lives on the property of a state of the art psych ward with her grandchildren, Violet and Eric. One day she brings home a young patient, Iris, in the hopes that time with other kids will help her start talking and progressing on her mental health journey. The children bond during play but especially with their love of monsters. As they overhear whispers at the hospital they start to question what their grandmother is doing with patients like Iris.

In 2019, Lizzy Shelley has created a name for herself through blogs, TED Talks and TV appearances on her monster hunting. However, when she hears about a mysterious disappearance of a young girl in Maine, she is drawn to this location. Is it the monster she has spent years avoiding and also hunting too?

My Thoughts: I really enjoy dual timelines. They make for interesting story lines and make the twists even more fun. I did hear a small spoiler while reading the book so some of the twists did not shock me as much as they might have but there was one part that was really not what I was expecting. I literally gasped when I read it.

However, I did find the story rather longer than it needed to be. It seemed to drag in the middle and seemed almost repetitive. But other than that I found the story to be enjoyable. It has a paranormal hint with still being a contemporary thriller.

FYI: Mental illness and monsters.

This is the 3rd book I have read by Jennifer McMahon. This one was a little slow at the beginning for me but once it started to build up I couldn't put the book down. It was so sinister and creepy. I loved the different POV and the timelines interchanging. I thought the characters were developed nicely and the storyline was easy to follow. I definitely recommend this book to others.