I had just been talking with someone about books that find new ways of reinventing the haunted house trope and wow— did VELKWOOD ever! Wildly inventive with a fun mystery to solve!

For years, documentaries and investigations took place in the Velkwood Vicinity where homes disappeared behind a veil that only three survivors could enter. Twenty years after Velkwood disappeared, Talitha has avoided it all. Her mother and sister disappeared, and she’s just been drifting ever since. When a researcher finds her and offers to pay her to go back, to enter the vicinity, Talitha accepts, claiming she’s only doing it for the money. Talitha, her best friend Brett, and Grace escaped twenty years ago, and no one knows what happened that night. Talitha returns, seeking answers and closure.

The summary told me I’d like this because I’m a fan of Yellowjackets, and it wasn’t wrong. It’s a weird premise, but I was willing to suspend belief in order to dive into Talitha’s world. I wanted to know what happened at Velkwood and if it was possible to save those still there. I wasn’t overly invested in the characters, but I did like them, and I think the book was satisfying enough with delivering on the premise. Occult, paranormal stuff is my jam, especially such stories about women.

This book is a spooky treat. It follows Talitha who is being asked by a researcher to go back to her home street. A street that is known to be haunted by the day everything changed for her and her friends Brett, and Grace. She must return to face her past. As usual, I do not like to dwell too much on plot bc I want you to read it unknowingly but I’ll say everything I loved about this book. If you’re a fan of Hill House or Bly Manor then you will thoroughly enjoy this one. It has ghosts, mystery, and suspense. The story touches on many topics such as abuse, homophobia, and the bystander effect. This was a pretty quick read and I am looking forward to more work from Kiste!

This was a decent horror that felt more literary than anything. I loved the idea of a haunted neighborhood and time being manipulated whenever our main character was there. The writing in this was very descriptive and haunting.

While I enjoyed the book for the most part I found parts of it predictable and it wasn't as scary as I hoped. The romantic elements in this were interesting but a bit too surface level for my tastes.

I wish that we would have seen more of the 3 characters together and got a more detailed depiction of what happened in their pasts.

Overall, this was a solid story and I could definitely see myself reading more from this author.

《 thanks to Netgalley and Saga Press for this ARC in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own. 》

The Haunting of Velkwood is a scary, haunting, engrossing, and evocative meditation on history, memory, and tragedy; family, love, and friendship; identification, understanding, and acceptance; and truth, choice, and accountability. It is a novel and refreshing perspective on the suburban gothic. It is an incredible achievement that readers will love and consume. It is a compelling and unforgettable story that genuinely moves and enthralls.

3.5 stars. I liked this book, but it wasn't the horror novel I was expecting. It was more sad than scary. The story was good, but it was about people being haunted by their pasts more so than a real ghost story. I mean, there were ghosts, but it just didn't have the spookiness I was looking for. If you're looking for a very unique love story though, this is a good choice.

The Haunting of Velkwood by Gwendolyn Kiste had an intriguing premise that was not fully realized. I honestly don't have much to say about it because the book felt unfinished and somewhat haphazard. There were several times when a character abruptly changed their mind with no indication of a good reason other than it served the plot of the story. Also, the author couldn't settle on a genre. Is it scifi? Mystery? Supernatural? Something else? The lack of focus was distracting and didn't feel purposeful, just lazy.

This book gets all the stars! I love a haunted house story but this goes a step further. The entire neighborhood is haunted and no one knows why. It’s been a mystery for years and there isn’t a scientist or researcher who can figure out how to break past the veil surrounding the affected area. Talitha, Brett, and Grace were outside of the neighborhood when it turned into a ghost town but their families were left behind. A new researcher tracks down Talitha and offers to pay her to return to her hometown and help him finally solve the mystery. What happens next will have your jaw on the floor and I promise you won’t figure out the ending!

Not only is this story creepy but the writing itself is hauntingly beautiful. I was easily drawn in by the prose and the atmospheric setting. With the huge mystery surrounding why and how the veil covered the neighborhood, this book is perfect for discussing with friends!

I listened to the audiobook in a day and loved the narration by @jenwrenpickens ! This book is creepy all on its own but Jennifer added an extra layer of spookiness with her voice and delivery. If you’re an audiobook lover, this one is worth the listen!

This is the second novel I've read from this author and I'm not sure if I'll continue reading her work. It's not that I completely don't enjoy the stories, but there's something about her writing style0 that just doesn't excite me. So far, I really enjoyed the story ideas, the other book was Reluctant Immortals, it helps that they are well written, and the characters well developed. But t they tend to drag on a bit too long. I start losing interest about halfway through because of the slow pace. I really wish I could get past that because the writing is good and the stories are very unique.

This book was requested by a previous Lesbrary reviewer who did not finish or review it. In order to keep my Netgalley feedback up to date, I am submitting this review marking it as a DNF, though it was another reviewer who requested this.

The Haunting of Velkwood pulled me in at the start but I soon became bored. The book is on the shorter side so I finished it but if it had been a hundred pages more, I would likely have DNF it.
The supernatural element wasn’t really scary or eerie. It was slightly interesting at times but the twist was evident early in the book and it seemed to drag on longer than necessary, muddled by an unrequited love story that only managed to annoy me.

I have posted this review on Amazon, Goodreads

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6308432483

And Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/p/C6PUJaXAUl7/?igsh=MXhkbmh2NGd4dG11Zg==

I was hooked from the start. Something about the tone of the story spoke to me on a level that few books do. There was a bone deep weariness in Talitha Velkwood that resonated with the bone deep weariness in me, and it kept me invested in how the story continued to unfold. The mystery behind what happened on Velkwood Street 20 years ago sucked me in, and I couldn't stop reading until everything was revealed to me.

This book is a quintessential slow burn atmospheric horror, with deliciously gothic touches that I found wonderfully satisfying. It's horrific rather than horrifying, I never felt scared but I definitely felt unsettled more than once. I loved this book, and absolutely look forward to reading more from Kiste in the future.

Thank you Netgalley for my copy of “The Haunting of Velkwood”, by Gwendolyn Kiste.

I enjoyed “The Haunting of Velkwood.” There is something about her writing style that grabs hold of me.
The neighborhood mysteriously disappeared turning everyone inside into ghosts and allowing only three teenage girls, Talitha, Brett and Grace, to escape. Years later, Talitha Velkwood is approached by a researcher, Jack, to go back in and help him research the events. In an attempt to save her 8-year-old sister, she reluctantly agrees.
“The Haunting of Velkwood” is a slow burn. However, Kiste created a melancholy creepy atmosphere and a plot that kept me intrigued. As the story develops and reveals its many layers. Kiste really tapped into childhood traumas that are carried into adulthood. There is a side story of a broken friendship between Talitha and Brett. This side story was not anything surprising, but it did tell an emotional tale about healing, friendship, and confronting ghosts of the past. “The Haunting of Velkwood” was a thought-provoking novel with a great atmosphere. The veil behind small neighborhoods was lifted. Kiste shows us their need for conformity and hiding things that do not fit into a socially acceptable mold.

20 years ago, Talitha Velkwood’s neighborhood disappeared overnight. She and her her friends Brett and Grace were the only survivors. It became a sensation, a news story, and an urban legend.

Talitha tried to forget, to build a life, until Jack, a researcher, approaches her to go back. Talitha must decide if she’s ready to confront the ghosts of her past, or stay trapped by them forever.

***

This was a great premise, but the story didn’t quite deliver. I never felt invested in Talitha or her relationship with her little sister, Sophie. I found Brett, and even Enid, to be much more interesting, compelling characters. I feel like I never got below the surface with Talitha.

I would call this story “suburban gothic.” I liked how the generic American subdivision acted as a stand-in for the classic creepy castle. Sometimes the scariest things happen in the sunshine, as this story demonstrates.

Covering themes of abuse, depression, regret, sexual identity, parental expectations and more, this ghost story is trying to do a lot, with varying degrees of success.

Check out this book if you like horror with a strip-mall background.

My feelings on this one are probably going to change and shift a little the more time I have to sit with this one and think about it, but I also want to get my thoughts out before I start to forget things.

It was beautifully written for sure, and I love the premise of an entire neighborhood being haunted, not just a single person or house. The relationship between Talitha and her little sister Sophie is so sweet and heartbreaking, but the real bright spot of this one is the fraught relationship between Talitha and Brett; childhood sweethearts in a place that only wants to break them, that DOES manage to break them both in different ways.

Overall though, this one for me was just kind of meh. The first half stretched on for far too long, and nothing much really happens. It’s only when Brett and Talitha finally come together that things really start to take off, and by then the novel is almost done.

I feel like this one could actually make a really cool, interesting limited series. Especially in the hands of someone like Mike Flanagan! I’d love to see what he could do with it.

This novel is a character driven slow burn and the characters are really well fleshed out to go along with that. Kiste created a really eerie backdrop to explore some darker sides of suburban life hidden below the shiny surface, reminding us that people can be much scarier than all the spooky elements. I also loved that the events of the book were taking place years after the incident, giving the characters’ the ability to understand themselves and what led to everything a more mature approach.

Big thanks to Saga Press for the ARC of this one!

I have never read a ghost story quite like this one.

Talitha has drifted through adulthood, never laying down roots or building meaningful connections; her past still has her very much in its grip. When Talitha was in college, she and her two best friends, Brett and Grace, found themselves at the epicenter of an unprecedented supernatural phenomenon. Their entire neighborhood - people, houses, everything - became a ghost.

From that moment, the outside world could see Velkwood Street, shimmering behind an intangible barrier, but they could never enter. In the fallout, Grace, Brett, and Talitha went their separate ways, each of them having lost everything.

Twenty years later, a paranormal researcher named Jack convinces Talitha to return to the Velkwood Vicinity, where she can finally see what became of the family she lost. Investigating the Velkwood mystery involves delving through all the trauma that Talitha and her friends had left behind.

The Haunting of Velkwood takes a story of friendship, abuse, loss, and trauma and dresses it up as a Creepypasta, with inventive storytelling and punchy first-person prose. Talitha is a mess in such a relatable way, and I was completely invested in her relationships with Brett and her little sister Sophie. My only wish is that we'd had a few more glimpses into the girls' pasts and the lead-up to the events that changed their lives forever. This is entirely a matter of personal preference, though. Kiste sets up enough of a framework for the reader to easily fill in the whole story, but I think some moments would have had more emotional impact for me if that framework had more meat on its bones.

All told, I really enjoyed this book and can't stop thinking about the novelty of the premise. I will eagerly read whatever Kiste comes up with next.

Let's get this out of the way: I LOVED this book. It will definitely be in my top reads of the year. I read it practically in one sitting.

Let's also get this out of the way: I read a lot of horror books. I've read all of Shirley Jackson's novels. Kiste's THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD is the only horror novel I've read in recent memory that comes *close* to Jackson's special mélange of trauma, whimsy, and horror, real horror, hiding--or being ignored--in plain sight. There are dashes of WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE, sprinkles of THE SUNDIAL, a smidgen of HANGSAMAN and THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE, and a generous splash of THE ROAD THROUGH THE WALL mixed into THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD, and the book is all the better for it.

If you like your horror sincere and thoughtful as well as spook-tastic, please give THE HAUNTING OF VELKWOOD a look.

Thank you to NetGalley and Saga Press for the ARC in exchange for this honest review.

Talitha has been haunted the past twenty years, but not in the usual way. Instead of being followed by a ghost, she is wracked with guilt at being one of only three survivors of one of the most unusual paranormal phenomenon ever seen: The Velkwood Haunting. Overnight, an entire street, with only eight houses, became a literal ghost town. The houses can still be seen, shimmering with an otherworldly quality, but nothing comes in or out...until now.

This story is a study in grief, longing, and guilt. Talitha has spent her whole adulthood missing her sister, to the point where she has forgotten to live. Talitha is an endearing character with a heart full of love. The premise was good, and the story was short enough to not get overly bogged down. Unfortunately, for a horror this book wasn't very scary or atmospheric. I feel like more time was spent in Talitha's head and examining her relationships than in actual action. The supposed haunting took a side spot to the rest of the story, which is a shame. Overall, a slow but still enjoyable read as long as you aren't expecting anything too scary.

Thank you to NetGalley and Saga Press for this ARC. I am leaving this review voluntarily and all views expressed are my own.

This was everything I wanted and everything I wasn't expecting. I absolutely loved that this was a horror book that was so much deeper than I ever expected. The real story of this book revolves around grief, guilt, loss, and responsibility. I didn't expect there to be so much story behind what seemed like a generic haunted town story.

When I first started this book, it gave Limetown vibes, which was so much fun since I had totally forgotten that was a popular podcast a couple of years back. This gave the same sort of missing town vibe as that, but obviously as the book continued, a lot of the similarities ended. I love the direction this chose to go since I really wasn't expecting some deeper message about bystanders and how much harm they can cause without even knowing it. This book had be sobbing by the end of it.

Overall I loved it and I can't wait to read more from this author.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.