The House of Drought by Dennis Mombauer is an eerie eco-gothic that centers around a colonial mansion in Sri Lanka that sucks the land dry around it and follows different generations of people inhabiting the estate and trying uncover its mystery.
First off, it’s really refreshing to read a gothic that takes place outside of the UK or America, and the setting was wonderfully atmospheric.However, I think this novella mainly falls victim to attempting to do too much and in too short amount of pages because, as it stands, the story feels unsatisfying incomplete. I still have so many questions regarding the mythology behind the Sap Mother and the house's connection to her.
The novella also gets bogged down by a 5 whopping POVs, so the majority of the characters feel indistinctive and tend to bleed together. Honestly, this would have been a much tighter and compelling of story if it had stuck with the twin's POV in the past and just 1 POV in the future trying figure out what happened to the twins and the house.
Thank you, Stelliform Press, for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Book Details:
Publication Date : June 11, 2022
Publisher : Stelliform Press
IBSN: 1777091780
Pages : 122
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