This was an interesting book. It was a bit sad, mysterious, and spooky all in one. The audio book was super quick to get through. I enjoyed the narrator, although at times I couldn't tell between a woman and male character. It didn't take away from the book though.

After the tragic death of their eleven-year-old son, Adam and Ella are fighting to keep their family from falling apart. Then comes an opportunity that seems too good to be true. They win a competition to live for free in a breathtakingly beautiful mansion on the Cornish Lizard Peninsula. There’s just one catch: the house is supposedly haunted.

An excellent story with enough suspense to keep you listening. As with any haunted house or ghost story, things are not always what they seem and the ghosts that haunt you are not always the dead as they are memories you cannot bury.

I listened to this as an audiobook and I was a little ambivalent about the narrator. His voice sounded too old for the main character and he would not consistently use the same voice for a character even when in the same paragraph. It didn't detract from the book, just annoyed me.

Thanks to @netgalley, Dreamscape Audio, and Ben Cheetham for allowing me the chance to listen to this audiobook in exchange for my honest and unbiased opinion.

I did not finish this book. I struggled to get to the 25% mark, when I finally gave up. There are far too many unimportant details and not enough plot for me.

I appreciate the opportunity, but this one just wasn't for me.

Very suspenseful novel. It was well-paced. The narrator was easy to listen to, provided good voices for the characters. and added mood where appropriate.

I received this title in audiobook format and while the story was not what I expected, it was still enjoyable to hear. I had requested this one under the impression it was a horror novel, but found it to simply be a ghostly mystery instead. The book is more so about the troubled family living in a haunted house vs the haunts themselves. However, the unsteady family dynamic still keeps listeners on the edge of their seats wondering what could possibly happen next. Anytime I made theories about where the plot would go I was wrong, but I think that's a good thing. If you like a book that you can not easily guess the ending, you may enjoy Don't Look Back.

The narration is done by a man with an accent, so that may take some getting used to for listeners. In my personal experience I have found many of the books I listen to are narrated by American women, so I wasn't sure if I'd like this narration at first. However I adjusted quite easily and found no problems with his telling of the story.

Thank you to the publisher, author, and Net Galley for sending this sharing this with me to review!

I want to review this audio book in two parts.

First - the narrator. I did not like this one. He seemed over animated. His character voices were awful. The book often said things such as "Adam chuckled" and then the narrator would chuckle. It was so distracting and unnecessary. I tried speeding the audible up and slowing it down. This often works when I run upon a narrator that I don't find enjoyable. It didn't help for me. I know I would have enjoyed this book more had I read rather than listened to it.

Second - the story. The book is slow paced and very little actually happens until about 60% in. The book ends with a few major holes in the story. I find this frustrating. Still, the book moves along at a steady pace. It gives just enough creepy vibe that it kept me interested in the outcome. The ending was solid enough - would have been better had those few holes been filled. Overall, Don't Look Back was enjoyable but I don't believe it is memorable.

Thank you to Net Galley and the publisher for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

ʙᴏᴏᴋ: Don’t Look Back (Fenton 1)
ᴀᴜᴛʜᴏʀ: Ben Cheetham
ᴘᴜʙʟɪᴄᴀᴛɪᴏɴ ᴅᴀᴛᴇ: March 29, 2022 (audio)

Atmospheric | Slowburn | Ghosties 👻

sᴜᴍᴍᴀʀʏ
After the devastating death of their son, this family needs a new beginning. They feel haunted by his memory and seek a new start.

Unfortunately their new start has a very different type of haunting 😳 Adam and Ella don’t believe in the supernatural. When they hear that their new home is rumored to be haunted by those who have died and disappeared there, well Adam and Ella shrug their shoulders and move in anyway… You shouldn’t shrug at ghosts. They have a habit of making you believe 👻

ᴛʜᴏᴜɢʜᴛs
This tale catches your attention from the first page! From there it maintains tension as it builds an atmospheric haunting in the English countryside. Around every turn the layers are peeled away. I could not turn this audiobook off! 😱😱

The physical copy was published in 2018, but this audiobook will come out March 29th. So get your headphones ready, kick back with a drink, and prepare for a beautifully unspooled journey of creeping horror 👻😍

I requested this one because it might be an upcoming title I would like to review on my Youtube Channel. However, after reading the first several chapters I have determined that this book does not suit my tastes. So I decided to DNF this one.

Fascinating book for the most part ! Kept me interested and the narrator was spot on.

Not a horror story, as I presumed. More of a mystery and character study. Depiction of a family with issues.

A family takes a chance on a free house to live in with many complications. They must sell their current house, cannot change anything and must let the owner control everything. The house is not the treasure it seems to be.
I recommend this book. Thank you for the ARC ! This is my honest review

As much as it seems like it would be a dream to win a house in the Cornish countryside, I would not want to win this house.
A family tragedy has Adam and Ella and their son Henry ready to make a new start and this unexpectedly opportunity comes their way and they win the chance to stay in this gorgeous home. The catch is, it has a reputation for being haunted. Things soon begin to start happening-weird, sinister and even spooky things to the point that the family feels like it’s cursed. Can they make it work or do they need to get out while they still can?
There were parts that I didn’t get the point of, but the audiobook more than balanced that out. It was well done and kept me engaged throughout.

Don't Look Back is a slow build, atmospheric and, at times, intensly suspenseful story. Adam is a practical man. He doesn't believe in Ghosts, haunted houses, anything supernatural and he isn't sure if he even believes in an afterlife. What he does believe is that if he moves to a new place to live, he can escape from the tragic memories that are haunting him and his family. While they were rough housing, one of his twin sons died accidentally, shattering his family's happiness.
While trying to figure a way to begin to heal, Adam answers an online questionnaire that is an application to live in Fenton house. Fenton house is hours away from London, in a country village and it is supposedly haunted. Since Adam doesn't believe in ghosts,, it sounds like the clean break he has been searching for.
Once his family moves into Fenton house, Adam sees an improvement in all of them. It seems the change of scenery is working as he had hoped....until the house starts to reveal its secrets. The ending twist of the story left me hanging...in a good way. I am already looking forward to reading the second book in the series. Ralph Lister did a great job narrating. He was the perfect voice for Adam.

Thank you to Dreamscape Media and Netgalley for the opportunity to enjoy this Audio-ARC.

AUDIOBOOK(Great Voice)
Following a tragedy, Adam and his wife Ella stumble on a unique opportunity to live in a historic mansion free of cost! As finalists for the competition they learned that the mansion is supposedly haunted but the family decides to move forward with the plan. They move in with their son and immediately begin to suspect they are not alone....

This book is for you if you love a haunted house tale, like a creepy slow burn or just enjoy horror writing! #DreamscapeMedia #Netgalley

I have never read a slow burn horror before, but i can now saw i thoroughly enjoyed it!

Similar to HoHH, a family moves into a large, "haunted" house as a change of scenery after the loss of one of the sons from an accident. From there, the family finds secret passageways, some uncomfortable realizations, goths, and much more!

I received an audio ARC of this book and i found the narrator enthralling - he provided different voices for all of the characters, and really narrated the emotion going on with all of the characters. I saw that this is the first book of a series - i can't wait to see what happens next.

I LOVED this story! This was my first net Galley audiobook and I look forward to listening to more. The narrator did a wonderful job and best of all the story held my interest from start to finish. I am so glad to see that there's a second book in the series. i would definitely recommend this book to anyone who likes a slow buildup and a scary haunted house. I look forward to reading Benn Cheetham's other books as well. Thank you Net Galley for the opportunity to listen to this audio book.

First things first. I love this authors writing. It felt somewhat realistic. I also felt like the narrators voice really helped with the atmosphere of the book. The happiness in the beginning made me smile. I could feel the excitement with them. Its funny because I'm moving soon and this has given me a lot of thought on that. I see the comparison with A Haunting of Hill House but I also see the books originality. I marathoned this book all day while packing and it was a eerie delight.
Now the downsides. Wish I knew more about Henry's nightmares. As well as more detail about well everything. Less dialogue and more description. The author writes so well but I love when books like these makes you feel like you're in the enormous beautiful mansion as well.
I will post more later today on my instagram and tiktok.

4/5 stars. I quite enjoyed this book.

ARC Audiobook provided by NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

“Don’t Look Back” is part supernatural, part mystery, and part thriller. The book opens to the horrific and tragic death of one of Adam and Ella’s twin sons, Jacob. The other son, Henry, survives. Months later, the family is still reeling from the loss of Jacob. Everywhere they look in their London home, they are reminded of Jacob and of his violent death. Adam, a writer, has been facing writer’s block since the death. Ella and Henry are barely holding on.

Suddenly, the family is presented with a contest that has the dream opportunity to live for free in a mansion far from their London home and all of the dark memories that surround it. They enter the competition, and no surprise, they win. The catch that surrounds the house is that there are strict rules they must abide by in order to remain in the mansion. Oh, and did I mention: the mansion is supposedly haunted. A previous suicide and a missing family have given the mansion, Fenton House, a reputation of being the quintessential haunted house. However, the family isn’t thwarted and happily moves in.

Of course, strange things begin to occur that make the family question what, exactly, is happening at Fenton House, and what happened all those years ago. As the family begins to learn of the varying secrets that the mansion holds, they realize they might not be alone. Are ghosts real? Are they being haunted? The biggest question is simply: are they safe living in Fenton House, or are they doomed to become part of its dark history?

This author was new to me, so I didn’t have any expectations of what this novel should be. The premise sounded interesting enough, and I love a good haunted house/supernatural/mystery/thriller-type book. Unfortunately, the book fell a bit flat for me. The first half of the book is very slow. It goes through the motions of introducing characters, backgrounds, the contest, and the move into Fenton House. However, nothing of value really occurs. In addition, there are numerous sex scenes that just don’t fit in. I have no problem with sex scenes in a book, but these seem to serve no purpose and didn’t really push the narrative further. They appeared to simply be filler.

In the second half of the book, the narrative finally begins to move forward. Interesting happenings begin that the family just can’t explain or understand. Tragedy strikes, questions are raised, and the family descends into turmoil full of anger, accusations, and fear. Then we get to the ending. First of all, the ending reveals that occurrences that seemed to have no bearing on the ending of this book may have bearing in the next book of this series (this book is noted as “Fenton House #1” after all). Questions are raised that allude to the next book for answers. Secondly, the answers that this book does provide for the subject story are lackluster. I’ve read it all before. It isn’t wholly original. I was, sadly, hoping for much more. Instead, we get a weak ending for this book with a large push towards more books in this series. I believe this just leads to disappointment for a reader. It did for me, at least.

To the extent that my copy was an audiobook, I must say it was narrated very well. The voices pulled you into each character without sounding false. The narrative flowed well and was well-performed.

Overall, I was intrigued and disappointed with this book. It wasn’t a bad book, but it could have been so much better. It is simply middle-of-the-road. I might recommend this book for a young adult reader, or someone new to the genres this book entails. It is an easy storyline and flows well overall, as long as you hang on past the slow first half of the book. For the more experienced haunted house/supernatural/mystery/thriller reader, I would recommend you skip this read.

Thank you to NetGalley, Dreamscape Media and Ben Cheetham for allowing me to review this audiobook, which is set to be released on 03/29/2022.

The audio narration is very well done. I don't know that I agree with this genre as horror, as it is more creepy/eerie than frightening. It was good though, very atmospheric without an overabundance of word fluff (I hate that), it was perfectly descriptive.

The set up for creepiness was perfect...death of a child (1 surviving creepy AF child is left), the family wins a contest to live in a creepy house, the father (Adam) is a writer and is thrilled to be moving into the creepy house with his wife and his son Henry, as he is certain it will help him to get through his writer's block.

Pretty cool book. Would def make an awesome movie.

Overall, I enjoyed the atmosphere of this book because it was super spooky, eerie, ghost/haunted house vibes. So, if you're looking for something like that then this may be a good choice for you! The story began with the death of one of the main character's twin boys. While going through the grieving process and finding it difficult to move on, the family wins the opportunity to live rent-free in spooky, old country manor by the seaside. The manor's previous inhabitants had gone mysteriously missing decades prior and had never been found. The main character is an author who hoped that a change of scenery would clear his writer's block and help his family with a fresh start. Things do not go according to plan...but you probably could have guessed that.

I do think that some elements of the story were a little too predictable for my taste and sometimes the pacing was off. It felt slightly disjointed and I often had to review previous parts of the story to make sure that I hadn't missed something. Overall though, it was a nice and creepy read!

Thank you to NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for providing me with a copy of the audiobook in exchange for my honest review!

I guess I'm puzzled on how this is a horror book. It is more of a mystery that eluded me to think there would be ghosts and some scary parts. However, that was not the case. I kept waiting for the scary parts to happen, so I think I felt robbed when they didn't happen.

There were also several parts of the story that were never answered. So I was left with a bunch of questions. It was also weird some of the random sex scenes. They were just thrown in there. It was kind of bizarre those additions to the story.

Thanks Netgalley and publisher for the digital copy in exchange for my honest review!

Just what I needed. I love books about creepy old houses. At first the book gave me strong Burnt Offering Vibes with a touch of The Shining (just because the main character is an author). Then it turned it around.

A tragedy prompts a family to apply for a chance to live in a huge old house (life goals). Once there, things start happening. Is it ghosts? Crazy people? What is going on?

I really enjoyed this read. It was fast and just what I needed