This is the perfect October, spooky season read. It’s eerie and disturbing from start to finish. The characters are unreliable. Creepy things are happening. There’s a lot of memory loss and weird conversations with strangers, making it disturbing along the way.⁣
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When Sarah, a well known social media influencer decides to buy a house that’s been known to be haunted with plans to renovate, she soon discovers she may have taken on way more than she expected.⁣
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Her cat, Reaper adds an extra eerie appeal always meowing and acting strange in different areas of the house.⁣
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The builders are acting bizzare, accidents are happening, news articles about different deaths appear.⁣
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From start to finish this has you on the edge of your seat unsure if this house is haunted, if Sarah is dealing with a psychological disorder, if the neighbors killer- you have no idea! ⁣
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Well, I got to Chapter 4 and had to call it with this one. The protagonist is extremely annoying, whiney and not someone I’d like to spend any more time with. The plot is slow and repetitive, and I'm only on chapter 4. I’m sorry, this isn’t my cup of tea at all.

This book felt a bit like a fever dream - sometimes that's a good thing and sometimes it's not. This book went back and forth. The setting and creeps are great - some of the character decisions and plot lines leave you scratching your head a bit. But overall, a good entertaining read.

I AM OBSESSED WITH THIS BOOK!!! Oh my gosh, there are not enough good words I can say about this one.. by far my favorite read of the year. When I first started reading it gave me season 1 American Horror Story vibes, but then as the book goes on it reminded me a little bit of The Watcher, with the neighbors being sketchy about the house situation!!
The Stranger Upstairs was well written, spooky, creepy, addicting, and in my opinion, mind blowing! The ending 1 for sure did not see coming. I 1,000 times recommend this book to everyone and definitely give it a go this spooky season!

Eerie, Thrilling, and keeps you guessing. So addicting, you’ll want to stay up all night reading. I was on edge throughout this thrilling read.

Sarah and her husband buy a murder house, and you can imagine how that could go wrong. However, Sarah isn’t exactly mentally stable. She and her husband have a strained relationship and a lot of secrets. A lot of the time we the reader have no clue if there are things going on in the house or if it is all in Sarah’s head. Which to be honest is what makes it worth reading.

I liked that the author slowly revealed one secret at a time so that there was always new information about our MC. It makes the book addicting.

I read it all in the middle of the night while my family was sleeping and it made it all the more thrilling to read. I finished it pretty quickly which didn’t let me predict the book, but there is no way I could have guessed all of this.

“Most people sweep monsters under the bed. I pull the covers back and let them crawl in.”

Debut author Lisa M. Matlin’s “The Stranger Upstairs” is a fast-paced, creepy psychological thriller/horror novel.

Self-help guru and social media influencer, Sarah, and her husband, Joe, have purchased the infamous Blackwood House - the location of a murder/suicide - for a bargain price. The plan is to renovate the dilapidated home and resell for a profit, while chronicling the repairs on Sarah’s popular Instagram page.

But, nothing is as it seems, and the house has a different plan.

With some genuinely scary moments and a plot that pulled me right in, I truly enjoyed the book and look forward to more from this author.

I love thrillers where the house becomes one of the central characters in the story line. Sarah buys Black House because the price is low then finds out the cost is much, much higher than she is willing to pay. This debut thriller puts Lisa M Matlin on everyone's TBR radar in a hurry.

3.75
The Stranger Upstairs by Lisa Matlin is a dark mystery set near Melbourne, Australia.
Sarah, marriage therapist and blogger, convinces her husband Joe that they should buy a house in the upscale town of Beacon. The house is a bargain because it was the site of brutal murders 40 years before, but that does not deter Sarah, because they need money and she wants to fix it and flip it for a tidy profit. Of course, all does not go as planned. There are mysterious occurrences, possible poisonings, and hostile neighbors.
The tale is told from Sarah’s first person POV, and she is a conniving, snarky person who is hard to like. There are a few other characters who were either unsympathetic, evil, or just plain weird. I could not become invested in any of them.
While the story starts out slowly, it does pick up and is a reasonably engaging mystery with several mind-bending twists near the end. The literary device of alternating Sarah’s POV with her blogpost and with TV news reports makes the story more dynamic and kept me engaged to the end!
Overall this is a good psychological suspense novel with much promise and good descriptive writing, a great deal of interesting information about Australia’s flora and fauna, and a dark foreboding vibe. It suffers from unlikeable characters and an uneven plot.
The writing is skillful enough that I would look for Ms. Matlin’s future novels.

Thank you to Bantam/Random House and Netgalley for the ARC. This is my honest review.

This book caught me from the beginning. I love a good thriller and you don’t get more suspenseful than a spooky murder house! Ominous, gothic, and chilling - this was a wonderful fall read and I can’t wait to see more from this author. Also, the cover is breathtaking! Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for this ARC.

The Stranger Upstairs gives off immediate horror-read vibes. The quick synopsis is Sarah Slade, a therapist, and Instagram influencer, buys a murder house to renovate and use as the substance for her upcoming book. Sarah’s life holds many secrets, including her past and crumbling marriage. As she begins to redesign the home, the home seems to fight back. The storyline details her decaying life’s plans inside her newly bought decaying home. In general, this was a good mystery/thriller read, perfect for the approaching Halloween season. I’d suggest this one to people who like creepy paranormal or atmospheric thrillers. 3.5 ⭐️
Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing for an arc copy for an honest review.

Wow what a great book! This book was truly filled with so much suspense and kept me on my toes until the very last page! I was so invested in trying to figure out how everything was going to be connected and I couldn’t put the book down. Sarah Slade is not who she says she is and I was invested. As a reader, watching her take on different skins was intriguing. You never knew who she really was and what she would do next. 100% recommend this book to everyone. I also suggest really reading the authors note at the end of the book!

This book surprised me. I cannot go to much into it because I don't want to give anything away. All I have to say is WHAT A TWIST! Actually a few. But I did not see it coming. For this debut book by Lisa Matlin I hope to see more from her in the future!

Thanks NetGalley and the publisher for the advance ecopy.

If you want a fast paced read with lots of twists and turns this is for you.
Im a long time reader of thrillers and I’ve read all the tropes. This wasn’t different than a lot of what I’ve read in the past. That being said, I wasn’t disappointed. I was tricked a few times and other times if it had been a bear it would have bit me.
All in all a propulsive read. I look forward to another book by this author.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for an early copy in exchange for a honest opinion. 3.5⭐️

I love a haunted house story and will happily try any and all of them that come my way. When I first heard about The Stranger Upstairs, I was immediately drawn to it for the haunted house element, but also the sketchy main character running from their past reeled me in. Always a sucker for secrets!

Matlin does a great job of bringing Sarah to life for the reader as we slowly get to know her, receive hints about her past, and watch her struggle to deal with whatever is happening in her new home. The fact that she was supposed to be a self-help influencer added a fun plot device, but I wish it would have been fleshed out a bit more. The book talks about how Sarah bought the house to flip and gain fame, but that got lost in the book once it started getting deeper into the story.

All of the mysterious events happening in the house felt very realistic and paranoia inducing. This isn’t a gory story, so if you’re worried about that with your creepy house, you’ll be safe here. This is more of a spiraling out of control story built on a mountain of suspicion. Without giving away too much of the plot, I will say that Matlin did a great job of keeping me guessing and giving shifty eyes to everyone in this small town.

The cover for this book may be fun and bright, but it’s a solid spooky season contender for your TBR!

The Stranger Upstairs starts off as atmospheric and daunting. Is it a haunted house? Is it a group of neighbors who will stop at nothing to have the murder house removed from their lives? What it turns into is something much more confusing - is it an unreliable narrator? Or multiple unresolved storylines? I was hooked from the beginning but overall felt a bit unsatisfied by the ending.

This book was so wild. I absolutely was sucked in and loved it. Unhinged, unraveling female main characters? Is it so 2010's? Yes. Is it still absolutely one of my favorite types of characters? Also yes. I read this book basically in one sitting. I say basically because I read this while sick in bed, only stopping when I would randomly fall asleep. I don't know what it is about reading a creepy book while sick and feverish, but it heightens the whole experience and I ate this one up.

I actually guessed one of the conclusions super early into the book, but then I second guessed everything with every flip of the page. It certainly didn't take away from the experience. The final conclusion was a little confusing, but I refuse to think too deeply about it because my reading experience was quite the perfect ride.

Thank you Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, Bantam and NetGalley for my ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Wow, talk about dysfunctional relationships! I feel pretty normal after reading this story of a couple who are not who or what they appear to be. Many hints are dropped that these are not their real names and that there is a past no one is willing to talk about.

There is a house in a most desired town that they (actually Sarah) decides to buy, in spite of the fact that it is called the murder house. A prior family lived there until the father killed the mother and attempted to kill the daughter before killing himself. Since then, no one has wanted to buy the house until now. Sarah sees the chance to renovate and flip the house for a lot of money, but hubby Joe admits that the house scares him.

Joe is in and out of the house and the marriage and not at all a happy hubby. Sarah is also a therapist under false pretenses who is counseling people in their marriages while she has no control over her marriage, the renovations or the house itself, which doesn't want to be renovated. Who is behind all this? Who leaves her notes knowing things about her that no one else knows? Who is/was Amanda?

Thank you NetGalley for an advance reader copy. Opinions expressly freely here are my own honest impressions.

This book intrigued me from the very beginning. Would you buy a house where a murder was committed? Well in this thrilling book a social media influencer does just that to renovate and flip it but she doesn't plan on horror that ensues. great debut from this Author, can't wait to read more from her.
Thank you to Netgalley, Random House Ballantine Bantam and the Author, Lisa Matlin for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Haunted house book that is much more of a psychological thriller, this book had some creepy elements but the storyline was all over the place. Sarah Slade is a therapist that recently bought the Black Wood House, a house which was sitting empty for many years due to a murder happening in the home. A man killed his wife and then chased his daughter down the street as she yelled "please don't kill me" forty years earlier and the house has sat empty since. Sarah moved into the house with her husband Joe, a bartender, and she wants to share her renovation on her social media account. From the beginning, Sarah hints to secrets from her past and the that she and Joe had to leave town under mysterious circumstances.

Joe and Sarah have a strange relationship; they are rarely together and don't communicate at all. In fact, Joe is missing for the majority of the book leaving Sarah to spend evenings alone in the dark, creaky house. She quickly realizes that something strange is going on with the house and her beloved cat Reaper howls and cries at night standing under the attic stairs. I liked the creepy house aspect but Sarah was a very unlikable character. She drinks wine constantly, doesn't eat and pays no attention to her patients at the clinic where she works. Her boss and co-workers are worried about her as she appears ill and often misses work. As the story continues, Sarah reveals more about her past and becomes more and more convinced either the house or someone else is trying to kill her. Sarah also discovers another woman had disappeared a short time before, after buying the house and that the whole community wants the house torn down and hates her for buying it.

The story ends with a surprising twists (more than one actually) but I didn't find them all that interesting and found it hard to root for Sarah. The author explains some of her motivations in writing the story at the end and I appreciate her viewpoint but wanted more of a straight forward haunted house story rather that a story about what was actually happening here. Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for a copy of this ARC in exchange for a review.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this ARC. I really enjoyed this story. It was very atmospheric and just the right amount of creepy. It wasn't like any other books I've read so it definitely stuck with me. Definitely recommend for a good fall read.