This house of grief was truly fascinating! It was a long read for me because although fascinating it wasn’t revelatory n any way if you were familiar with the case (which I wasn’t when I started the book initially) but must everything in the book can easily be found online. However, that in no way diminishes the time effort and care that went into creating this book. I feel it was more fluid then chronological but overall it was excellent as far as covering everything that happened and the resulting verdict. It’s honestly a great read for anyone interested in true crime and I highly recommend it.

A good read but I found that it repeated itself in places which made it a bit hard going for me. Other than that it was a good book to read.

I normally really love true crime stories and they can be told in so many way but I struggled with this one. While I found the story intriguing and debated the guilt of this father accused of killing his three children, the writing style was so hard for me. I wanted a clearer distinction for the timeline. I felt like the story ran on and didn't have great breaks in it. I found myself confused and having to re-read and them skipping parts. Like many others in the reviews I was looking for more insight into the authors thoughts and experiences. Unfortunately this one just wasn't a hit for me at all.

"This House of Grief" is getting its U.S. debut after originally being published in Australia in 2014. Helen Garner is well known and beloved in Australia, a celebrated novelist, an icon "on par with Joan Didion or Annie Ernaux in her home country". I'd agree with those accolades after having first read "The Children's Bach" and now "This House of Grief". The two are worlds apart in subject matter (sprawling family drama vs. courtroom proceedings) yet they both proceed with the efficiency and keen insight Garner brings to her subjects.

In 2005 a father was charged with the murder of his three sons after the car he was driving flew off the road and into a dam. On Father's Day. Garner had journalist credentials and sat in on the court proceedings, detailing the arguments and testimonies, the accused's behavior and demeanor, the witnesses, the jurors, the whole system. Garner interrogates not only the evidence but also her response to it, her visceral reaction to the chaotic and mundane facts presented in the case. She involves herself in the narrative as the observer, the decider of guilt and innocence, if only in her own thoughts, and pulls the reader into that mindset with her.

"My head was full of a very loud clanging. Nothing expert, nothing trained or intellectual. Just a shit-detector going off, that was all. The alarm bells of a woman who had been in the world for more than sixty years, knowing men, sometimes hearing them say true things, sometimes being told lies." We're sitting right next to her, listening to every word, making up our minds.

My thanks to NetGalley and Pantheon Books for the ARC. "This House of Grief" was published in the U.S. in October.

This is the type of 'thoughtful true crime' that I appreciate. It deals with an awful crime and the subsequent murder trial, but it doesn't have the sleeziness or gossippy nature of a lot of the work out there. The central question is still: did he do it? Which is good and keeps the tension throughout the book.
But there are also broader questions, especially on the design of the justice system and the idea of putting a jury in charge to determine guilt in a situation where very little is clear about the truth of what happened.

* I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley. Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for this book. All thoughts are my own.

2.5 stars

I thought the case itself was really interesting, but it also felt very surface level. It didn’t feel like anything I couldn’t find if I just googled the case.

Also, my ebook had really poor formatting and I hope it’s not how the final book is, but there were no chapters at all. Everything felt like it just kept going and going. It would have been a lot better if it was set up to have those chapters for a better mental break point and pause point.

I felt fairly blah about this book so I probably wouldn’t recommend it, I’d probably just tell my friends to Google the story.

I rarely do not finish a book, but I just could not get through this one. The writing style was slow and boring, the main character added nothing to the story and the terrible-ness of the plot line just made it too much to keep going. Maybe I'm missing something because some reviewers seemed to love it, but this story was not for me.

I'm sorry about those children but this book was so boring. I couldn't concentrate, it was so slow and plain. I generally like true crime books because of the way they're written, but this is the exception.

Typically the trial is the most tedious part of a true crime story. It's repetitive, slow, and flat. But this trial came to life, and I honestly can't say whether I would've been confident in the outcome either way. We have our gut feelings, but surely that can't be enough. There's evidence, but so much of it is contradictory or reliant on the honesty and integrity of others. But like her barrister friend said, there are decisions to be made.

Robert Farquharson, a divorced Australian father of three boys, drove them into murky waters late one Sunday and left them there to die. The author covered both of his murder trials and it is those trials which are the subject of this book. Garner gives a detailed account. of her feelings and experiences as well as what she observed in others, including family members, barristers, witnesses and the public.

Little is said about what occurred outside of what was presented during the trial. It is the experience of attending the trial itself including the tedium of mind numbing technical testimony. Unlike notable trials in the US, the intimacy of the courtroom led to a certain familiarity with the boy's family, with the author sometimes sitting with them during the breaks.

I found the self imposed constraints on the narrative led to a sometimes boring and repetitive account I would have liked to have known more about the victims, their family and the lawyers involved.

Helen Garner writes about true crime from the most ambiguous viewpoint, which makes her books so intriguing and thought-provoking. At no point does Helen try to sway your opinion. She doesn’t drop little snide hints (although this crime had thousands of opportunities to do so), and she doesn’t show one party in a more positive light than the other. At the end of this novel, I was thinking, “Oh, sure, even a blind mouse can tell who’s the guilty one here”, but later in the quiet, my mind returned to the individuals involved and I questioned my own quick conclusions. In short, Helen makes you an independent juror, and the weight of your decision makes you feel as if it’s real.
Father’s Day 2005, Robert, who is estranged from his wife Cindy, is returning the kids after a visit. A horrible accident happens on the way home, and the three boys are lost forever. Cindy’s initial response, of course, is shock and horror. After some time, though, she develops a forgiving soft spot for Robert, and stands by his side when the authorities question him as a suspect.
The investigation turns up some interesting behaviors and questionable actions. Friends and family are both divided and strongly opinionated about what actually happened. Helen dives deeper into the backgrounds of the parties involved, and her revelations clarify some suspicions, but they shoot an arrow right into the heart of others. Meanwhile, you, the reader, are not being spoon-fed and directed at what to think. Your thoughts of the incident follow you long after you’ve set the book aside. Your decision weighs as heavily on you as some people who actually bore the burden.
This is a fabulously written account of true crime, the legal proceedings, and the questions that linger long after the gavel hit the bench.
Thanks to Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage and Anchor for an ARC in exchange for my honest review. The publishing date was October 10, 2023.

This book was not for me. I took such a long time to finish and was bored at times. This tragic true crime story was engrossing all on its own but I felt it was poorly executed. There was no structure and the author added too many unnecessary details. The second half of the book was a bit better but overall I was left disappointed.

I received a free copy of, This House of Grief, by Helen Garner, from the publisher and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Robert Farquharson was driving his three sons home, when they were in a car accident, the boys died but Robert survived. Their were trials, so much stress for the family. Such a sad story, 3 lives cut short, at the hands of their father. on Fathers Day!

Absolutely riveting. How something like this can destroy a decade of your life, how like a tsunami it sucks everything it touches into its wake. The author’s writing is brilliant and stunning, her insights both personal and universal—I can practically feel the hard wooden bench under my butt, the charged atmosphere of the court as she sits day after day covering the trial of the father who may or may not have killed his children. A terrible, stupid accident or a revenge fantasy come true?
It's hard too, to read True Crime, and say the things I usually reserve for fiction. But the author’s style is both transcendent and gritty, and this I enjoyed very much. It’s not entertainment—too harrowing, as it covers the deaths of three little boys by drowning. Reporting, literary journalism, the promise of finding out who did it—or did he do it?
The character witnesses are a parade of the many layers in Australian society, the shocked friends, the multiple professionals who time and time again have to return to the courtroom stage with their evidence and their fears. The ravaged mother who’s suffered an unbelievable loss. By the time this thing is over, no one close to the family is the same as when they started.
If you are reader of True Crime, I highly recommend this dark and starkly beautiful book.
Thank you, NetGalley, for a copy of this book to read and review.

I’m sorry, but this is one of the strangest “true crime” books I’ve ever read.

The author, who has no connection to the crime, for whatever reason decides to place herself front and center in this story. I didn’t want her constant interjections, opinions, and all the random minutiae of her observations. I wanted the story.

The writing style was, I don’t know… Odd is the best descriptor I have. Also, it somehow manages to be both dull and irritating.

I just can’t go on with this book. I’d rather read the Wikipedia page and/or Google some news articles.

DNF

I am devastated. What a raw, emotional book. I can't even call it true crime... that seems so garish and small. This is a masterpiece portrayed in tragedy. The courtroom scenes were gripping- every description, every emotion- I could see the woodgrain, I could feel the cool air, I could hear a pin drop.
This is my first outting with Helen Garner. I was picturing Anne Rule, but I feel like Garner's style is much more personal. I got a clear sense of her feelings throughout the trail and her growth and discovery as the case went on.
This is a rough read. A heartbreaking topic. But so well done.

From the publisher: On the evening of Father’s Day, 2005, separated husband Robert Farquharson was driving his three young sons back to their mom’s house when the car veered off the road and plunged into a dam. Farquharson survived the crash, but his boys drowned. Was this a tragic accident, or an act of revenge? The court case that followed became a national obsession.

A parent and their children go into a body of water in a vehicle; the parent survives but the children don’t. This unfortunately is a story we’ve heard before. Robert Farquharson claims he had a coughing fit and passed out. Once in the water, he was able to exit the car and swim to the surface, but his three sons were not. This book about his trial was published in 2014 in Australia; now a new edition has been published in the United States.
I can well imagine what a sensation this was in Australia. I remember the media fascination with Susan Smith in the 1990s after she left her sons to drown. I remember the Jaclyn Dowaliby case in the Chicago area in the 1980s. (That case didn’t involve drowning, but a child reported abducted from her home and found murdered a few days later, and a trial of the mother.)

This House of Grief feels like it was written much longer ago than 2014. It is a call back to classic works of true crime like In Cold Blood. It has a literary feel to it that most modern true crime that I’ve read does not. The author acts as a cool and objective narrator. She has no connection to the case other than reporting on it. She feels emotion – pity, grief – but not passion over whatever happened. Robert Farquharson himself remains a remote figure; I felt I got to know and understand his ex-wife’s parents better than I did Farquharson or his ex-wife.

On page 6, Garner writes, “When I said I wanted to write about the trial, people looked at me in silence, with an expression I could not read.” She is very thoughtful and philosophical as she observes and comments on the trial and all the people involved. The subtitle of the book is “The Story of a Murder Trial,” and the author does write her book as a story (a story with an ending that will not satisfy all her readers).

If you like classic works of true crime, I recommend This House of Grief. If you like graphic descriptions, every criminal detail, and proper closure in your true crime, this may not be the book for you. I read an advance reader copy of This House of Grief. It was published on October 10, and Galesburg Public Library’s copy will be added to the collection soon.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor, for gifting me a digital ARC of this heartbreaking book by Helen Garner - 5 stars!

On Father’s Day, 2005, in Australia, separated husband Robert Farquharson was driving his three young sons back to their mom’s house when the car veered off the road and plunged into a dam. Robert survived the crash but his boys drowned. Was it an accident due to medical reasons? An attempted murder-suicide? Or an act of revenge to get back at his estranged wife?

This is the story of the trial of Robert Farquharson, told in beautiful, eloquent writing that will make you really think about trials, courtrooms, and all those caught up in such stories, which is all of us. It's impossible not to grieve for the loss of those three little boys and the lives they could have lived. But there are feelings for everyone involved, from the defendant and his family and friends, to the investigators, lawyers, and witnesses, and to the jurors tasked with making life-or-death decisions. The author witnessed the entire trial and subsequent appeal, becoming for the reader a part of the story; one of many witnesses in the house of grief.

Well this was the strangest true crime I have ever read…? My rating and review are purely based on the *writing style* of this book, not the actual case. The actual case was… horrifying.

But this book? Wow. I had a rough time with this book.

So the author basically made herself the main character of this story? Which, is fine if you’re, say, Ann Rule and actually knew Ted Bundy or a journalist who was covering the case and got to know the family and ~became part of the story.

But this woman did not have a horse in this race. And yet this entire book was basically just a transcript of every single detail of the trial (yawn already), peppered with *her* reactions to the events. What?!?

I never realized how much I appreciated the very focused and journalistic style of most true crime until I read this book. Because this read so much like fiction that it was hard to believe this was a real case.

This also mostly covered the trial and had very little additional information about the actual case. If you just read the Wikipedia article, you would get about the same information (except I did read the Wikipedia article and actually got MORE info???)

And this book was just boring? I don’t want to know the small, minute details of the trial (including what everyone is wearing????) I wanted information about the actual ~crime and the motivations of all parties. And more info about the victims.

This was a horrible, senseless crime and, in my opinion, did not do right by those little boys who did not deserve to die. I finished this book knowing *nothing* about them except their ages and that they were dead. It would’ve been a much better use of this book’s time to celebrate the lives of those boys than to tell me that the author gasped during the trial or that a witness was wearing a tie.

So this was very much not for me. I wish I’d just stuck with the Wikipedia article and skipped this book.

Thank you to NetGalley and Pantheon Books for allowing me to read this in exchange for an honest review.

With a stream of consciousness that won't take a break, the author dives right into the case.

This was at first engrossing, the reader didn't know what was going on, who had done what to whom, or why.

The author is/can be abrasive in the fact that the court case is all you get. you get no background information unless it is revealed in court.

I had a hard time following along with all that was happening. I did not like the run on narrative of the author. Further, when the conviction was appealed, it was all I could do to not peel off my eyelids...I was so done with the case and the book.

The author was not for me, I didn't like the set up of the book, the never ending snides/comments from the author, and the run on of the court witnesses.

There was a great true crime novel that was screaming to get out, the author could NOT let it escape.