Scary Read #2: The September House Review & Thoughts

“It’s almost October." 

In the world of The September House, we would all be very happy that it is now October. I debated posting this blog on the last day of September, but decided we all needed the fresh perspective of a new month. September was a tough one for me, though luckily not bleeding walls and a screaming house kind of tough. I realized that the medication I had been taking since July 1st was actually making me way worse, and stopping it (with consultation from my doctor) was such a relief! 

I didn’t write a pre-read post about The September House by Carissa Orlando (2023) in part because of how quickly I squeezed it into the end of the month (which included waiting patiently for it to be available from the library) but also because I really didn’t know enough about the book to feel like I could fill a whole post. This truly feels like my first scary read since I decided Sour Cherry doesn’t count as horror. I will however share my pre-read sticky note thoughts before I cracked open the book.

I wrote: “I think this book will score at least two ghosts and will freak me out. I’m intrigued by the psychological aspect that will show up since the author has a doctorate in clinical psych.”

I feel like in hindsight I should’ve guessed the “psychological aspect” earlier, but I was too distracted by the opening sentence of chapter one “The walls of the house were bleeding again” (7) and everything that followed for 136 more pages to even consider it!

I never thought I'd say that I enjoyed a scary book as much as I did, but The September House is so tongue-in-cheek that I was more intrigued by the main character Margaret than I was scared of the residents or happenings of the house. After three Septembers in their very haunted house, Margaret and her husband Hal have mostly figured out how to survive by following rules (well Margaret has at least) - don't get too close to Elias, don't light fires in the fireplaces, and definitely don't open the basement door. 

“I used to worry over the walls, getting a bucket and soap and scrubbing until my arms were sore, only to see my work undone the very next day. By the end of the month, it got so bad that I could rub the sponge over a crack in the wallpaper and watch a fresh blob of red leak out of the open wound that was the wall over and over again. The wallpaper is ruined, I fretted, but it never was. It all went away in October. So now I just allowed the walls to bleed and waited patiently” (8). 

Oh, to be so calm! And this is the approach Margaret takes for almost everything in the book when it comes to the house. The only thing she fears is Master Vale, the monster that lives in the basement and who you realize is responsible for all the pain and torture in the house. 

With a looming fourth September Hal decides to leave, but Margaret refuses. When he can't be contacted by their daughter Katherine, she takes it upon herself to come investigate, smack dab in mid-September. As Katherine traces her father's last whereabouts we are also slowly unraveling the backstory of the house and the not-so-minor disagreements between Margaret and Hal. 

A note that the rest of this post does contain spoilers! It’s just impossible not to talk about the aspects of the book and not share a few details, though I purposefully avoid what I think are the two *major* spoilers so you can still have some surprises.

I noticed a constant references to cycles, Margaret regularly ruminates on the idea that everything is cyclical. The house is a challenge every September, but the rules make it survivable. The author even uses similar phrasing to mirror the house and Hal. On page 30, the phrase “I wouldn’t have stayed” is pointing out that had the ghosts shown their faces right when Margaret and Hal moved in, she wouldn’t have stayed in the house. Then, on page 142, she repeats the same phrase but instead of ghosts it is the crux of the whole book. 

“Of course Hal didn’t start putting his hands on me right away. I wouldn’t have stayed.”

And boom! This is where I was shaken out of my not-so-cozy ghost book and felt like I’d been sideswiped by a car. A few chapters before this moment I thought to myself, 'wow what an interesting story, I wonder what the twist is'…it’s abuse. Whether in her relationship or in the house, if she just does the right thing and follows the rules everything will be ok. 

“...it was almost enough to make me think I’d solved it, that I’d finally figured out the right combination of behaviors to keep everything happy, blissful. Of course, nothing lasts forever–that’s just the cyclical nature of it all. However, if the rules were followed, the good times could last longer” (198). 

Apparently on Horror Reddit this book is not reviewed very highly because the general consensus is that domestic violence is being used too often in recent years as the backbone of horror. As this is only my second book in the genre (the first being Sour Cherry) I was actually incredibly impressed with the comparison of a haunted house to domestic violence. It reminded me of the memoir by Carmen Maria Machado In the Dreamhouse (2019), which details her abusive relationship through vignettes based on narrative tropes, some of which are horror-related.

I think the pairing is necessary, especially when people are more likely to believe a ghost story than they are women. 

As I neared the end of the book I almost threw it across the room thinking the author was going to blame it all on psychosis, some sort of “and it was all a dream while she was in a coma” sort of ending. Luckily it wasn’t, in fact Margaret probably got one of the best endings a main character of a horror genre can get. 

“I saw the whole cycle of it, the violence that started and ended everything, the moon and the sun coming around and around, but I kept fighting because I would be goddamned if I was going to be part of it for one second longer. I’d been moving in wretched little circles for as long as I could remember and I was not about to have it all end like this, snuffed out in the basement only to flicker back, likely in September” (326). 

Hell yeah, breaking cycles!

General trigger warnings - lots of discussion of blood and mangled body parts, details of how people (especially children) were murdered, and also an entire layer of domestic violence (physical and emotional abuse especially). This is definitely horror. 

Final Scaredy Cat Rating - One and a half Ghosts 👻.5 (Barely Scared, a little queasy).

The writing and light tone (despite the dark and intense subject matter) definitely saves this one from being truly scary, and honestly I could use a ghost housekeeper in my life. The extra .5 is definitely because the graphic nature of the deaths will still probably haunt me for a little bit. Especially at the end when Margaret recalls witnessing one of the children’s deaths through a flashback and when Margaret is comparing how people are dying to how a spider dies when sprayed with insecticide - not pleasant. 

Look forward to more spooky reads (and maybe a spooky show) in October and many more months before our next September.