Alix E. Harrow’s Multi-Genre Starling House Builds a Home Inside a Story

It’s an exciting point when a reader can begin to identify common themes and motifs in an author’s body of work. Though I first came to Alix E. Harrow’s writing through the fairy tale remix novella A Spindle Splintered, looking backwards and forwards across her books, patterns emerge. A woman locked away in an old house, escaping through literary portals in The Ten Thousand Doors of January. A coven offering their powers to the suffragette movement in The Once and Future Witches. Sleeping Beauties and Wicked Queens fragmented across retellings. Her latest novel Starling House collects variations on each of these devices, yet despite any familiar glimmers it’s still something wholly new, and undoubtedly her best work yet.

A modern Gothic thriller set in a downtrodden Kentucky coal town, Starling House is satisfyingly creepy while being animated by more than one love story—the one you might expect, between two compelling misfits, but also between a sentient house and its inhabitants. It’s a masterful meditation on the stories that make and unmake us.

Opal dreams of Starling House, the imposing old house calling to her with its warm amber light every night. But unconsciousness is the only time she can give over to such vulnerable yearning; in her waking life, she must look after her asthmatic teenage brother Jasper, working dead-end cashier shifts and engaging in petty thievery in order to get him out of Eden, Kentucky, and into a better life. Only one of them can afford to make it out, and Opal has long since given up on herself.

But the evening that she allows herself to walk past Starling House’s gates, she meets the house’s sole inhabitant, Arthur Starling, who is determined to be the last Warden of Starling House. Until Opal talks her way into a job as housekeeper—for the egregious amount of money Arthur is willing to pay her, of course, but maybe also because she’ll finally get to set foot indoors and scratch her imagination’s itch. What should be a simple job changes the course of Opal’s life, both unspooling a future she never dared imagine for herself as well as unwinding the narrative she’s always believed about her unfortunate life.

The bones of Opal’s story, while initially mundane, have the heft of dark fairy tale: A town, overtaken by a wealthy and powerful clan who have shaped it to their will and collected the fortune in their faraway castles, leaving the actual residents defenseless against the curse they put on the land. A collection of dark fairy tales descending into the Underland, its author long disappeared, either a guide or a warning. Two orphans whose entire world is a motel room, with its transitory guests and permanent water stains, trading a single laptop back and forth into which they try to research their pasts and rewrite their futures. A flame-haired mother, rendered mythical in memory, taken too soon by her unnatural hunger that has left her children starving. A creeping mist that envelops all who encounter it in the kind of ill luck that seems merely cruel in the moment but laughably pathetic in retrospect.

The mist is where things start to get supernatural, though even it could be explained away by the transformation of a land ravaged by coal mining, just like the mineral-heavy air that clogs Jasper’s lungs and the spreading stain over the river that everyone ignores but will never jump into. But then there’s the sentient house. It quickly becomes clear to Opal that Starling House is at least charmingly haunted, and then disturbingly so, and that it has something to do with The Underland, the collection of disturbing fairy tales written by E. Starling, which she hasn’t let herself indulge in since her mother Jewell drove their car into the river and drowned.

Opal is so fixated on snatches of her memory of Jewell that she fails to notice that she has two surrogate mothers in Bev, the surly hotel owner, and Charlotte, an out-of-towner who has temporarily posted up at the local library while researching her book about the dark history of Eden. In fact, there’s a lot that Opal doesn’t know, either because it’s cruelly kept from her or because she simply doesn’t want to acknowledge it.

Harrow excels at a story that enfolds other people’s stories within it; each retelling comes at a key point, and the style in which it is related teaches us something new about Eden and its history, while reflecting the tone and experiences of the teller. To that end, the novel’s footnotes immediately grab the reader’s attention, for how it quickly becomes clear that they are not Opal annotating her own narration, but someone else adding details. My only complaint is that they peter out far too soon; I would have loved for them to remain such a strong dimension throughout the entire book.

There is also, I was delighted to find, a thread of romance glinting through Starling House like a sparkly vein of ore. Opal and Arthur’s dynamic is what I imagine Wuthering Heights to be like, having never actually read the book but having Kate Bush’s ethereal ballad of the same name stuck in my head on repeat while reading: him stalking the limits of Starling House property, punching a pane of glass rather than let her into his heart, and her at the gates shouting it’s me, I’ve come home, I’m so cold, let me in your window.

Dual narration is typical of many romances, but blending first-person and third-person is more unusual. Harrow balances the perspectives with aplomb, with Opal stubbornly narrating every unsavory detail of her life as something of a challenge to the reader, yet clearly missing some key information, versus Arthur’s attempts at emotional distance when relating his own grievous failings as Warden of Starling House. It takes Opal’s prying into his life to spotlight his sacrifices (covering his body with tattooed runes) and his bravery (wielding a sword that isn’t even his birthright), wrenching open a space for forgiveness for both of them.

Though it’s a later-stage reveal, it hopefully isn’t too much of a spoiler to discuss one of the most heart-wrenching aspects of the book: that Starling House calls its Wardens to Eden, offering a home for the homeless. It’s such a poignant twist on the Gothic horror stories in which the reader marvels at why so many people would come to the same haunted house. Maybe in those tales the house is luring victims, but here it’s begging for people to keep the lights on. This unexpectedly emotional dimension amplifies Opal and Arthur’s climactic journey into the Underland, making you care about a couple descending into Hell in a way we haven’t since Orpheus and Eurydice. (Related: Harrow has written an excellent retelling of exactly this in a similar context, though its hopeful ending is painted much bleaker than Starling House’s more tender outcome.)

Harrow writes so stirringly about not just the unexpected joy of finding yourself in a story, but also the terror of it—of being perceived, of someone else layering their own impression upon your narrative, of having to transform from reader to protagonist. What an incredible accomplishment then, to have penned an absorbing book in which so many readers can behold themselves.

3.5/5 -- Rounded up. This was the perfect dark, eerie, atmospheric read. I saw it described somewhere as "cozy horror" and I think that description is so accurate! It felt like a Gothic Fairytale laced with elements of fantasy, horror and magical realism. The character of the Starling House itself was one of my favorite depictions of a haunted house ever. I really did enjoy our main character Opal and felt she was determined and brave. The reason for my rating is that I didn't really believe or enjoy the love story aspect as much as I thought I would. However, overall this book is spooky and unique and clever. I highly recommend reading the physical copy for the footnotes & illustrations.

Harrow has such a way of bringing magic into the world. This story was so intricate and woven together so well that I fell in love right from the start. I felt that the characters were written well and had a nice development throughout the story. The plot was mysterious and dark and kept you pulled in with every twist and turn. The world building was fun and beautiful. The magic system is absolutely brilliant, I loved the multi generational pull that the house had on different people. Over all this was the perfect book to kick off my 2024 reading!

There is just something about Harrow's writing that I'm obsessed with. Her worlds are so beautifully written and it's so easy to just fall into them. Opal and Arthur are such interesting characters and Starling House itself is such a fun character all its own. If you're a fan of The Hazel Wood, this has a very similar vibe, but ramped up to 100. this is not what I'd normally expect from the Reese Witherspoon bookclub, but it's a great gateway book into Harrow's writing.

who will rot with me in an old house made of dreams

These characters mean so much to me. Opal and Arthur are both so thorny and stubborn and unbearable and they take care of each other with so much determination that I couldn't stand it.

I love a haunted house story. And this one was even better because it was about a haunted house on the edge of a small town and the townspeople only know what amounts to myth about each new occupant of the house. They also know bad things happen in their town. And they blame it on the Starlings who own the haunted house.

The magic system of this book was such a creepy delight. I love sentient objects (houses, the whole town, etc.) and this one was no different. The house itself is maybe the most loveable character in the book. Opal is drawn to the house and becomes its caretaker all while Arthur - the last living Starling tries his best (it's not a very good best) to try to keep her away while he figures out how to end the house's magic.

It gets dark, it gets bloody, there are terrible rich people, there is some of the angstiest pining you will ever read. Alix E. Harrow writes books for people who want to be hurt and she does it well.

Would recommend to EVERYBODY!!!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my ARC!

Five stars, five stars, five stars. Alix E. Harrow never disappoints, and this magnificent new addition is no exception to that rule. From the perfectly-captured atmosphere of an Appalachian coal town to the vivid characters and their very real-life struggles in addition to their supernatural run=ins, I loved everything about "Starling House," and cannot wait to see what Harrow comes up with next. (I'll also be recommending it to literally everybody I know.)

Tenacity, bravery, and loyalty!
26yo Opal fiercely takes care of Jasper, her teenage brother, and has been his guardian since their mother drowned twelve years ago. Opal is bound and determined to give Jasper a promising future away from Eden, Kentucky. She earns money with part time jobs until she starts cleaning for Arthur Starling, the owner of Starling House. She knows there’s something off about the house but she doesn’t care. Opal just wants to earn money for Jasper to attend private school and Arthur pays nicely, even though the longer she stays there, the more she sees the strange goings on and can’t seem to pull herself away.

Likes/dislikes: I love Opal’s tenacity, bravery, and loyalty to her brother. The I was pulled into the story because of the mystery surrounding Starling House. I like how the author shared the background of the community, characters and Starling House.
Language: R for 172 swears and 63 f-words.
Mature Content: PG-13 for implied sex, off page.
Violence: PG-13 for self harm blood sacrifice.
Ethnicity: The ethnicity falls to white Jasper has a brown skin father.

I LOVED THIS BOOK SO MUCH!!

This story was the perfect blend of fantasy and gothic. It felt so atmospheric and engaging, I had such a hard time putting this one down! Although the action was slow burn, the stakes felt so high that the pacing felt quick. I loved Opal’s feistiness and bravery, and I was so happy to get to spend this time with her.

Alix E. Harrow has such a knack for world-building. I have loved every single book of hers and I can’t wait for more!

I cannot believe I forgot to review this. This was one of my favourite reads of last year! I love the growth of the main character, I loved the darkness, I loved the slow burn romance!! It was creepy and beautiful and I devoured it!

I ushered in winter’s first frost with Alix E. Harrow’s STARLING HOUSE (Tor, 320 pp., $28.99), which is perfect for when you want that Shirley Jackson creepy manor sauce drizzled over the small-town romance plot, in a way that’s probably not healthy but is absolutely delicious.

Some people say the bad luck in Eden, Ky., is just the usual accidents and environmental damage of mining coal. But others blame Starling House, built by the author of a children’s book featuring eerie beasts who are all mist and teeth.

Opal, an orphan, can’t care about the rumors: She’s too busy cobbling together a semblance of a life in a local motel, where she’s raising her younger brother, Jasper. She refuses to let this bright young man spend the rest of his life wheezing in a town that only worsens the asthma it gave him.

So when a series of ill-advised rebellions leads her to the doorstep of Starling House — Opal is furious and unscrupulous in a way that’s a joy to behold — she talks her way into a job as the housekeeper.

Arthur Starling, the house’s owner, is reticent with his words but overly, suspiciously generous with wages and gifts. It’s almost like he’s trying to repay a debt. Possibly it involves the many graves on the house’s grounds, or the sword he carries around at night, though Opal is supposed to leave the house before sunset. Opal’s never been good at following the rules, though — and the more Arthur tries to push her away, the closer she wants to get.

Harrow has shuffled the familiar Gothic motifs like an adroit Vegas dealer. Opal is the meddling, sullen housekeeper rather than the innocent new wife or governess; there is a catastrophic fire, but not where you’d expect; the house is threatening and powerful, but not half as sinister as the mining company’s representative. It’s a gorgeous, vicious howl of a story, and if I had a time machine I would have already given a copy to my younger self.

This book was magical! I couldn't stop reading it.

When Opal was younger she was endlessly fascinated by the mysterious Starling House that has a long history of creepy and interesting stories about it and it's inhabitants. She would dream about it often but when her mother dies tragically she can no longer live in fantasy. Presently, Opal lives in a motel in a dying town with her younger brother that she cares for. Opal is doing all she can to keep them afloat and to hopefully save enough money to get her brother out of the town. But when she gets a job offer to work in THE Starling House she knows that nothing good can come from this but decides to take the job anyway. With each work day that passes she starts to feel like Starling House is her home and gets more pulled in by the odd owner. However, strange and dangerous things also start to happen.

The writing of this book is so beautiful. Many parts of this book are not beautiful but instead ugly and heartbreaking but it's impossible to not invest in the characters, the town, and the house from Alix E. Harrow's writing. I very much enjoyed how there was a fairy tale mixed with some true crime lore surrounding this house. And the house is a character in itself.

I really enjoyed this book. I actually couldn’t stop thinking about it while I was at work and read as much as I could on my breaks. It’s an enchanted story about a young woman who is not what she seems or who she thinks she is. As the story progresses, she becomes more of the person she really is and learns about herself and her surroundings. She finds out she’s stronger than she knows and she fights terrifying beasts to save the ones she loves. It’s a fantastic, magical story. I loved it!

I immensely enjoyed every page of this book. Opal and her brother have had a rough life, living in poverty and just trying to get by as best they can. Opal has been raising her brother since the death of their mother. She's a high school dropout who only wants to see her brother have a brighter future than she ever will. Opal has long been haunted by dreams of the Starling House. She's always been fascinated by the house and the reclusive nineteenth century author who mysteriously disappeared. E. Starling is quite the legend and her children's book, The Underland, haunts Opal. A not so pleasant encounter with the house's current curmudgeonly owner, Arthur Starling, leads to an unexpected job opportunity and an unlikely friendship. Opal soon learns that nothing is quite as it seems. The pull of the house is strong, and the more she learns its secrets, the more she becomes entangled in the mystery and history of the house and of the town. Opal's nightmares become a reality and she has to decide whether to stay and fight or try to move on.

Atmospheric with a touch of horror, this Gothic novel is everything I hoped it would be. I love it when I come across a book where the house is a character in its own right, and I felt that way about Starling House. It had a life of its own. I found Opal to be a relatable character. She has had to fight for everything she has and does not have much faith in humanity--and with good reason given the hand she's been dealt. Arthur's initial broodiness falls away the more he begins to trust Opal. The growth of the characters over the course of the novel is one of the aspects I liked most as they and their relationship evolved. I confess my initial impressions of Opal and Arthur was of her being barely an adult and of Arthur as much older which wasn't quite on the mark.

While the novel centers around Starling House, the small dying town of Eden in Kentucky, also has a big presence. The author does a good job of weaving the history of the town into the story and the impact of past events on the people and the town of today, including how how Starling House came to be what it is. I found the world building to be intriguing and well done. I only wish there had been more. I would like to have gotten deeper into the house's mysteries and previous occupants. My favorite of Alix E. Harrow's continues to be The Ten Thousand Doors of January, but this was another winner for me.

This book was my Autumnal Inauguration.

It was the perfect book at the perfect time.

I loved the title (and I’d argue MAIN) character, Starling House. How it breathed, and tantrum-ed, and cared for its people? Flawless.

I loved Opel, her honesty, her curiosity, her love for her brother, and her “Yeah, I picked your pocket. So?” attitude.

The whole cast of characters (think Stars Hollow, but with heavy metal poisoning)? The librarian (ALWAYS THE LIBRARIAN), the motel owner, Jasper, even the sheriff (who I can absolutely picture fondling his own belly button)? Fantastic.

My only real complaint involves the mysterious, sinister female character (whose name I CANNOT remember). I wanted way more information on her. Who sent her? Who funded her? From whence did she come?

Thanks to NetGalley, Tor Publishing, Macmillan Audio, and my Seasons’ Pass paraBFF, Alix E Harrow for this stunning ARC.

Gothic fantasy can be a big hit or miss for me but thankfully Starling House was the former. With a cursed town, a literally haunted house and prose that creeps into the crevices of your mind, what more could you want? I absolutely adored the eerie vibes this book brought and especially our main character (who was willing to risk it all and is apparently way more courageous than me because I would have run the other way like fifty times) was just an absolute joy. Highly recommend to fans of dark, spooky vibes and settings that stick with you.

Thank you for the opportunity to read and review this novel. Check it out! It is worth picking up and taking home for the weekend! #NetGalley #Edelweiss

I really enjoyed this story and it's influenced me to read some more gothic house inspired books on my shelf. But after Opal was arrested, I was a little confused and couldn't follow the plot as well. That's my only critique. I loved Opal and the house and the storytelling.

Starling House is a contemporary gothic fairy tale about an ugly old house full of secrets, the unfortunate man doomed to be its caretaker, and the desperate young woman who may hold the key to turning things around.

The story is more archetypal than super unique -- heroine Opal struggles to make ends meet, and so takes a job cleaning Starling House so she can earn enough for her brother's tuition. She's scrappy and sarcastic, with enough street smarts for the entire family. Starling House caretaker Arthur is reclusive and beastly -- almost literally: the story often compares him to the Beast from Beauty and the Beast, to the point that in one scene, he saves Opal from wolves and she dresses his wounds. The comparisons to Wuthering Heights also get heavy-handed; 'Heathcliff' must have been mentioned at least a dozen times. 

But somehow, Harrow manages to make it all work. Underpinning the conflict is an evil developer who wants to purchase the land Starling House is on, and this developer's minion flip-flops between bribing and blackmailing Opal for helpful intel. There's also an old children's tale from a woman who lived in the house centuries ago; a story about monsters who live beneath the grounds and are both fearsome and comforting for young girls.

This isn't really the type of story I would normally pick up, yet Harrow's writing drew me in. The author does a great job in interweaving fairy tale elements with contemporary real world struggles. And despite the archetypal associations for some characters, she's also succeeded in creating compelling individuals to root for. I respect and admire Opal's fierce determination to provide for her younger brother, and Arthur's equally fierce determination to be the last person doomed to be Starling House's caretaker. The way Opal and Arthur move through the conflict is very much within an eerie dreamscape, yet also very much infused with tangible trauma, and very real work needed to move past it.

Minor note but it matters: I also very, very much appreciate that both Arthur and Opal are described as unattractive. And not just in a 'they feel ugly but everyone else sees how gorgeous they are,' nor even in a 'they're ugly to everyone but each other,' but that they actually seem unattractive on an objective level. As much as they are attracted to each other, and as much as they admire each other's traits, neither Opal nor Arthur describes the other as beautiful or handsome. And among the other characters, even those who love them aren't complimenting their looks. The whole 'feels ugly but is actually gorgeous' trope is used so often that I very much appreciate Alix E Harrow for letting these characters simply be ordinary-looking, perhaps even ugly. Because it isn't just the gorgeous Hollywood look-a-likes who can save the day.

+

Thank you to Raincoast Books for an e-galley of this book in exchange for an honest review.

100/10 recommend. The language was beautiful, story unique and meta story within a story was fantastically done. I loved the darkness but simultaneously innocent nature of this book. I love Alix Harrow’s writing style so much.

I don’t normally read fantasy, but I love a creepy house. Opal is struggling to keep her head over water. She’s the guardian of her 16 year old brother, lives at a motel, and works sporadic shifts at Farmers Supply in Eden, Kentucky. Her mother died 10 years ago, leaving Opal to do what it takes to survive. Opal dreams of the creepy, historic house on the hill, Starling House. No one ever comes in, no one ever comes out. The most famous Starling, Eleanor, wrote a terrifying children’s book. She disappeared one day, with no trace of her ever found. When the current owner of the house, Arthur, offers Opal a cleaning job, she jumps at the chance to get inside the mysterious house, but what will it cost her? I couldn’t put this down. Opal was a hard woman, but you understand why. I loved her story, and highly recommend this for a late night thriller. Thanks to Netgalley for the free copy in exchange for an honest review.