Okay so I’m not a scary movie person. I have nightmares after Disney movies so no way I’m going to put myself through a terrifying film.
And books, well, while I love a thriller, or even a slightly gory crime. Pure terror books are not for me.
So I have no idea why I picked up We Used to Live Here (Ironically in a Blue Mountains book shop rather than my own). Something about the cover and that fabulous tag line
‘You let them back in, you shouldn’t have…’ I mean HOW ominous??
We Used to Live here tells the story of a young couple Charlie and Eve who flip houses and scored a killer deal with an old house in a remote location.
Eve, is well, a little kooky, her internal dialogue is voiced by a cymbal clapping monkey toy she had as a child. She is nervous about everything, anxious, and yes perhaps a touch paranoid. I can relate!
One day as she’s working on the house, there’s a knock on the door and a man stands there claiming he used to live there, and asking if he and his family can have a look around.
Against her better judgement Eve lets them in. And yes, it’s a big mistake.
As soon as they enter the home weird things start happening, meaning the family just never really leave, it’s all oddly believable, and you’re unsure throughout whether Eve is being overly concerned or whether it is genuinely concerning.
Charlie comes home and it looks as if the family might finally leave, but then Charlie goes missing and things take a rather manic turn.
As Eve seemingly loses her grip on reality, the reader is thrown into an odd, disturbing dreamscape, not sure if what’s happening is in Eve’s mind or actually happening. Is something terribly wrong or is Eve just imagining it.
I read this book in a day. Unable to put it down, on the edge of my seat quite literally. At one point I gasped out loud and my partner was genuinely worried about me.
I don’t think I did a wee for 7 hours that’s how gripping it was, and when I finished it (it keeps you guessing until the very last sentence of the book) I felt absolutely terrified. I ran around the house putting the lights on!
Such an entertaining, and scary and weird read that has stuck with me.
Highly recommended.
