To eight-year-old Bela, her family is her world. There’s Mommy, Daddo, and Grandma Ruth. But there is also Other Mommy, a malevolent entity who asks her every day: “Can I go inside your heart?”

When horrifying incidents around the house signal that Other Mommy is growing tired of asking Bela the question over and over, Bela understands that unless she says yes, her family will soon pay.

Other Mommy is getting restless, stronger, bolder. Only the bonds of family can keep Bela safe, but other incidents show cracks in her parents’ marriage. The safety Bela relies on is about to unravel.

But Other Mommy needs an answer.

Incidents Around the House is a chilling, wholly unique tale of true horror about a family as haunted as their home.

I saw the trailer for the movie adaptation and wanted to read the book right away! I already had it on my Kobo so I jumped right in.

There were definitely some effective, creepy scenes, and making the story take place from eight year old Bela’s perspective was interesting because from her perspective, things that wouldn’t be strange or frightening to an adult are scary, and vice versa.

I didn’t love the ending though, and I had problems with View Spoiler » the ‘loss of innocence’ scene as the solution at the end, and what read to me like a misogynistic portrayal of Bela’s mommy: it seems like the problems in Bela’s parents’ marriage stem from her mother cheating on her father, who is written as a selfless, wonderful, flawless father and husband, while her mother is written as a selfish, cheating woman who maybe resents being a mother/having a family. A woman’s personhood clearly extends beyond being a wife and mother and I enjoy writing that explores that, but I just don’t think this writer and this story did it well or with any nuance (and I don’t know that they were trying to anyway). « Hide Spoiler

I am curious to see how the movie handles the ending, and will definitely be checking it out, even if the book was a bit uneven for me.