Kinda creepy... I guess

We follow our main character Billie, who lives in New York with her husband and daughter post-pandemic. Billie had a restaurant that she shut down because of the pandemic and her mom also moved away so there isn't much left for her and her family. Lucky enough she gets an offer from the Mayor of Juliana, Georgia, who gives her an offer she'd be crazy to turn down- a home in Juliana for $100! After making the move things are working out really well, Billie fits right in. There are just a few things that don't seem just right and slowly it all comes out.

I loved the concept but I was so disappointed. There wasn't one character I liked and I found the plot just wasn't as interesting as I hoped. There were times when I hoped for a different outcome but no such luck, I might have come into this book with way too many expectations which probably clouded my rating.

Thank You to Emily Carpenter, RBmedia and NetGalley for the audio-digital ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Actual Rating 1.5

Billie lives in New York with her family receives an email from the Mayor of Juliana, Georgia, offering her a home in Juliana for $100. Deciding it's a great idea, Billie and her family move right away, finding the town to be everything promised, and even starting a new restaurant. But then they start to feel like something isn't quite right, and their marriage falls under strain. Just what did Billie get her family into, and will they be able to make it out?

The characters of this one weren't well written. The protagonist wasn't likeable, but she wasn't written to be unlikeable. This made it quite difficult to relate to her or really care about anything that was happening. She was constantly demanding things, overreacting, and throwing little fits about things, on top of making decisions that she obviously gave zero thought to.

The writing of this one was the biggest detractor for me. The author overly relied on telling rather than showing, with a lot of "I did this, I felt this, I thought this" kind of writing. There was a romance subplot that just didn't work. It felt forced, came out of nowhere, and just made zero sense other than it being necessary for a plot point. The ending was also like the end of a cozy mystery rather than a horror, though none of the book really strayed into solid horror territory. There was some okay atmosphere and tension at points, but it got buried under all the other negatives.

I'm an outlier on this one, so if the premise sounds interesting to you don't take my word for it. My thanks to NetGalley and RBmedia for allowing me to read this work. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

This was the perfect Gothic horror located in a small town. When you're offered a deal that's too good to be true, you go for it right. Well, that's what Billie decides when she moves her family to a new town for a $100 massive old Victorian style home in George after the pandemic. Anyone would welcome a fresh start. The town is welcoming yet creepy. Her and her husband aren't quiet on the same page. There are so many unraveling mysteries throughout the story that you want to jump right in and shake Billie out of the story yourself. I devoured this book.

This book held my interest and I did listen to it in parts of two days. Billy Hope, her husband Peter, and their daughter Meredith move to a town called Julianna in Georgia. They are leaving NYC for the calm, quiet, and safety of a smaller town that has offered an incentive for people who want to move there. Billy had a well-known, and well loved restaurant in the City but the Pandemic hit, and like many other businesses, she had to close the doors. When she receives the email, it sounds wonderful.. They end up buying a house and 12 acres for only $100. Pretty soon, Peter, a therapist, starts having insomnia. Billy starts flirting with the man who owns the antique store next to her new restaurant. Their cat starts acting strange and things seem too good to be true. Weird things have been happening in Julianna for a while. Women and children lost their lives during the Civil War. Does this have something to do with what is going on now? Since this was a quick read, this would be great for the beach. Get this and thank me later

Thank you to NetGalley and RBmedia for the opportunity to listen to the audiobook Gothictown by Emily Carpenter and narrated by Cassandra Campbell.

Peter and Billie Hope decide to move into a Victorian house in a town known as, Gentle Juliana.

Billie in particular is eager for a fresh start for her family. Especially after several upsetting situations happened one after the other, including the 2020 pandemic.

After the Hope family moves and begins to settle in their new home, the town is everything imagined… until it isn’t.

Haunting nightmares, misunderstandings and several town secrets begin to weigh heavy on both Billie and Peter.

I would call this a slow burn mystery.
Definitely engaging and keeps you curious.

Gothictown
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Wow, what a ride. So many twist & turns. It was a total different read for me. I loved it. I couldn't stop turning the pages! Go get this book & take this adventure.
Thank you NetGalley

I love the creepy small town with secrets trope. 😍 this books was suspenseful and entertaining. The characters kept leading your theories in different directions and the ending was satisfying. I also loved the narration.

3 stars. I wanted it to be higher. The start had good promise, but the deeper the story got the farther from what I wanted. It is good though, well written, characters that were relatable in ways that are different from normal. It was just middle of the road to me.

I loved this one! While reading this I was also reading "Cults Like Us." So it was a whole immersive experience. I love books about weird small towns. The narration was perfect.
The ending was weird though.

This was a easy listen and the narrator had a very good voice.
I liked the story and the general premise but I thought it would have had a more 'gothic' feel like the title suggests but the story didn't really delve into that and it didn't have a gothic feel.
The characters were really good but the author could have gone a bit deeper to get the spooky feel which was missing.
The language, dialogue and description was really good. I could picture the town clearly. It was well written and with the Twists and turns of the story easy to keep track of for an audio. Though it didn't blow me away, I did enjoy it.

I want to thank Netgalley and the author for gifting me the audio version. I was excited to read this boom. I was drawn to the cover and synopsis... I was kind of disappointed. The story is very slow. I was thinking it would have more suspense or even super natural, and it really didn't. I also didn't like how weak the main couples' characters were so weak. I found that if the MFC mom went and joined a cult that for sure this whol situation was too good to be true... I feel like this novel should have taken place back in the 1800s. All in all, I didn't hate the book. I was just expecting more..

I really enjoyed Gothictown, I'm not quite sure how the title relates to the book because it's very modern story and it didn't really get into the cult details of the town 'guards' except for what our main character saw. I loved how fast paced the audio felt for me, I feel like I binged it and didn't get bored at all. I didn't really like the characters as people but were very invested in their story in this small town. They were flawed and lacked communication but they loved and it really good. I was so sad when 'redacted' was found in the lake that I'm still thinking about these flawed characters over 24 hours later. I will definitely recommend this book to horror/suspense readers.

Billie Hope is a NYC restaurateur whose life is in shamble. So, when a tiny Southern town offers her a gorgeous old mansion for $100 and a grant to open a new restaurant, she’s like “Sure, why not? Sounds totally normal.” Spoiler: it is not normal. The town is sketchy.

I listened to this one, and the narrator ate. She gave each character their own vibe without overdoing it, and made the Southern charm feel extra eerie in all the right ways. Even when the plot dipped into slow-burn limbo, she kept it engaging — 10/10 would let her read my grocery list.

The atmosphere? Chef’s kiss. The story? Kinda wandered like it was lost in its own spooky neighborhood. I kept waiting for a big reveal or a twist that would make me scream (or at least gasp), but it just kind of ...vibed. Constant mild suspense energy.

That said, if you like slow-creepy, eerie-town-core with strong haunted-house aesthetic and just enough tension to keep you curious, it’s worth a listen. Don’t expect chaos — this one haunts like a ghost with social anxiety.

Overall, it was a good read.

Thank you @Netgalley and Publisher for the ALC!

The first half was a bit slower than I would have preferred, especially already knowing from the beginning what is going on, but the story really starts to pick up in the end. This story made me feel way more than I anticipated, I truly felt everything Billy was going through and it wrecked me. I was a bit let down in the end when I never got to see a gothic dark goddess/demon version of Juliana, but the overall imagery from the dreams and visions were spooky. What a shock that in the end, tax evasion was the key all along. Also, a bit odd we never find out what happened to Alice, at this point I would assume Major killed her, but his character was so back and forth I never really knew where he stood until the end. Thank you so much for letting me review this ARC!

First of all: Gothictown?! Say less.

I'm not even sure I fully read the description before requesting, but when I finally did (just before pressing play), I was nervous my expectations were too high. I love horror in every format, but gothic horror has my heart. And as a lifetime resident of the American Deep South, the Southern gothic genre ticks quite a few of my boxes.

I needn't have worried though, because Gothictown blew me away from start to finish. Carpenter blends small-town charm with eerie suspense in a way that felt decidedly natural. The story follows Billie Hope, a New York City restaurateur who relocates her family to the picturesque town of Juliana, Georgia, after a pandemic-era offer that seems too good to be true. What begins as a fresh start quickly turns into a nightmare as the town's shiny veneer of Southern hospitality begins to chip away, revealing the sinister secrets at the core of the Hope family's seemingly idyllic new home.

The novel's pacing is perfect; Carpenter builds tension with increasing speed, balancing mystery and suspense with some truly chilling moments. The town of Juliana was deliciously captivating, with its dark lore, twisted history, mysterious secret rituals, and creepy yet oddly likeable residents (until they weren't).

The narrator was perfect. I can't imagine anyone else doing a better job. Once I started listening, Gothictown wouldn't let me out of its grasp until I listened to the entire thing. Highly recommended!

Gothictown by Emily Carpenter is a slow burn horror that had me turning pages and unable to put the book down! Cassandra Campbell’s narration is fabulous!

The creepy atmosphere of Juliana, Georgia is excellently woven by Carpenter. The characters are realistically flawed, many of whom are very unlikable. While I found it difficult to fathom that a staunch New Yorker and restaurateur would purchase a grand home and acreage in Georgia for $100 and not be overwhelmingly suspicious, Billie Hope and her family leave the big city behind.

The town of Juliana exudes all the Southern charm of small town Georgia…and then things get creepy…and weird. The town is a character itself, albeit a strange one. Its tragic history and its struggles to thrive in a post-pandemic world were compelling. Even with all the space and acreage, the walls of Juliana start closing in quickly.

I enjoyed the nod to Shirley Jackson as well as the way the town elders twist the Bible verse from Psalms to suit their needs.

Billie’s repeated mentions of her mother living a cult-like existence resulting in Billie’s abandonment issues seem like an unnecessary plot point - especially when Billie can’t recognize the cult of Juliana.

I wished the nightmares, paranormal events, and links to the tragic victims were developed more strongly. I wasn’t a fan of the tied-with-a-bow ending scene in the restaurant as it almost seemed trite.

Thank you to Kensington Books for providing an advanced review copy of this title as well as RBmedia and NetGalley for an audio version of this title for an honest review.

I really enjoyed Gothictown and Emily Carpenter's writing style. The eeriness of Juliana grew so insidiously that it was easy to see how Billie was tricked into thinking she found her paradise and there were some genuinely disturbing moments that really stood out as phenomenal character development. Overall, I think this book is amazing and can find only one shortcoming: it felt predictable. There was a moment that seemed like it should've come as a shock to the reader, and certainly came as a shock to Billie, that I had easily guessed before the seed was even planted a chapter or so later. However, the impact of that moment on each character was phenomenally written and allowed for real growth and development of both Billie and the plot. I would definitely recommend Gothictown to anyone who likes a thrill or a creepy southern town.

I love a good Southern Gothic Novel and Gothictown by Emily Carpenter fit the bill. I listened to the audiobook and the single POV voice actress did a great job expressing the situation to where you truly believed she was the main character telling you what happened.

If you saw a house for sale in a small town in Georgia for $100 dollars each, would you jump at the chance to move your entire family and start over or would you think it sounds too good to be true?
Right, well many families jumped at the chance and things are quite what they seem.

This was a spooky tale of small-town politics, the good ole boys' system and a little bit paranormal hysteria. I think it is a great book for fans of Gillian Flynn.

Thank you NetGalley for the advanced audiobook of Gothictown by Emily Carpenter.
#gothictown #netgalley #audiobook

Billie moved with her family from New York to a small town in Georgia. She felt a fresh start was exactly what she needed. Slowly the towns secrets came to the surface when they needed to stay buried and this put Billie's family in danger. My only complaint was the cheating I almost didn't finish the book because of Billie cheating on Peter. I decided that this is something I committed to and would keep reading and I'm happy I did. I can say I will forgive the cheating, still didn't like it, but it was necessary for the plot to the story. This was a very enjoyable book and I would probably recommend it to friends after a few clarifying questions. I know most of my friends would DNF this book as soon as the kiss happened and I normally would too.

So this is a solid book. Character development, description of the setting and the storyline all worked beautifully. I definitely was glued to the words being read to me. The narration was done exceptionally well. What I don’t love was the constant going back to the space and time it all began and telling it over and over again. I also didn’t love the ending. I mean the ending itself was fine, but for some reason the final part of the ending seemed a little preachy. Overall, I enjoyed the book and would recommend it, but it’s not my favorite.

Thanks to NetGalley and RBmedia for providing me with this ARC in exchange for my honest review.