The Artist of Blackberry Grange- Book Review

Quick Review:- Mind-blowing paranormal thriller, set in 1920’s, it was fast-paced and a page turner packed with twists.

Overall rating:- 4.5 stars.

Murder, Abandoning a child

For a young caregiver in the Ozarks, an old house holds haunting memories in a ghostly novel about family secrets, sacrifice, and lost loves by the author of The Devil and Mrs. Davenport.

In the summer of 1925, the winds of change are particularly chilling for a young woman whose life has suddenly become unbalanced.

Devastated by her mother’s death and a cruel, broken engagement, Sadie Halloran learns that her great-aunt Marguerite, a renowned artist now in the throes of dementia, needs a live-in companion. Grasping at newfound purpose, Sadie leaves her desolate Kansas City boardinghouse for Blackberry Grange, Marguerite’s once-grand mansion sitting precariously atop an Arkansas bluff. Though Marguerite is a fading shell of the vibrant woman Sadie remembers, Marguerite is feverishly compelled to paint eerie, hallucinatory portraits of old lovers—some cherished, some regretted, and some beastly. All of them haunting.

With each passing night, time itself seems to shift with the shadows at Blackberry Grange. As truth and delusion begin to blur, Sadie must uncover the secrets that hold Marguerite captive to her past before reality—and Marguerite’s life—slips away entirely.

If you like gothic type of historical fiction with a tinge of thriller and horror, then the Artist of the Blackberry Grange is for you.

We have Sadie, who was having an affair with a married man and now her life is nearly ruined when the married man broke up with her. Sadie decides to move in to live with her great-aunt, Marguerite, who used to be a renowned artist but now is on the throes of dementia. The once beautiful mansion is now lonely looking and Sadie decides to become Marguerite’s caretaker. She meets handsome chauffeur Beckett who wants Sadie to leave. Sadie is determined to remain in the mansion. But then, Sadie comes across a mysterious painting her great-aunt had done during her youth–a painting of a man named Weston. And she realizes that Weston’s vengeful spirit is haunting the whole mansion and Sadie might become Weston’s next victim.

I like reading thrillers based in 1900’s and 1880’s–this story goes back and forth between present which is set in 1925 ad 1880’s during Marguerite’s youth days. The supernatural element and the setting of the horror made the whole story more interesting and scarier to read, and I like the theme that Sadie goes back to 1880’s through the painting to get to know Weston and other sisters of Marguerite particularly her grandmother Florence who reportedly was having an affair with Weston. It was fast paced and a page turner.

Overall, I liked this book as it had a gothic horror setting which made the whole story interesting to read. Worth 4.5 stars.