I got this hardcover from Better World Books.

It opens with a grisly discovery: the axe-murder of the wife in a young family who'd recently moved in to a farmhouse they'd bought via foreclosure. The writing's lovely, and the atmosphere increasingly spooky - not merely for the family tragedies (yes, plural) and the painful results of economic disaster but for ghostly presences in the house itself.

[Some spoilerish bits below...]

From this rather impressive beginning, the book did seem to meander a bit, though. It flashes back to show us the central characters throughout their relationships, and gradually revealing just how appalling a human being one of those characters is - revelations of a lack of personal and professional integrity, to start with, which began much farther in that person's past than initially apparent, and on to greater crimes, chilling and bleak.

And it kept on coming, interspersed with developing friendships between the members of the community - many of whom have personal tragedies of their own to bear - which only ramps up the tension as the narrative gets closer to that opening scene.

And then... well, after the long, strange trip to that point, I was a bit let down to see that the investigation of the crime was frustrated by a lack of hard evidence, with the story following the surviving characters for years and years. And while there is some resolution - and a sense that any lingering spirits (which may or may not have actually existed) are at peace - it wasn't quite what I'd hoped for. [It also featured what seemed like a plothole to me; evidence that had supposedly been lying around the empty house all those years, despite the initial police investigation, subsequent house-cleanings, several attempts to rent the place, and even real-estate showings. How was that still there? I suppose one could credit that ghost...]

I left this book in the Little Free Library on this sunny day; hope someone enjoys it!

[See other recent releases in NH here.]