Obviously The House in the Pines was a had me at hello since it featured not only a house on the cover, but also a house in the name. How could I not immediately want it, right? Then I started reading it and not only do we have a triple whammy of an unreliable narrator (she’s an insomniac . . . because she’s going through Klonopin withdrawal . . . . and she’s boozing to take the edge off/help her go night-night). Again . . . . I was really intrigued by this story. It pulled me in from the start. I enjoyed how Reyes structured the telling of the story. There are both past-and-present timelines, as you slowly piece together what happened between Maya, Frank and Aubrey that summer and how that has impacted Maya's life ever since.

House in the Pines by Ana Reyes - Book Club Chat Review: The House in the Pines by Ana Reyes - Book Club Chat

PENGUIN GROUP Dutton and Ana Reyes provided a complimentary digital ARC of this novel via NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own. Publication date is currently set for January 03, 2023. This review was originally posted at Mystery and Suspense Magazine. Seven years later, Maya lives in Boston with a loving boyfriend and is dealing with the secret addiction that has allowed her to cope with what happened years ago, the gaps in her memories, and the lost time that she can’t account for. Maya asks him if Christina ever talked about a cabin because she needs to go there to find out what happened to her, and possibly to Christina.

In my spoiler-free review of House in the Pines, I talk about how I am going with option A, and I think the book is really more a book about recovery from trauma than a thriller. Ana Reyes’s debut is chilling, atmospheric, and addictive—a perfect thriller. I didn’t want it to end.” If you could please stop being so cute and coming off as such a nice, friendly person to make it easier for me to avoid your terrible book club selections I would really appreciate it. If you can’t do that, then when it comes to the options you select for us to read, I’m telling you . . . . . Isn’t it interesting two healthy young women dropped death after talking with the same guy? Is he death whisperer? Is he an evil magician? Maya, stressed by this YouTube revelation, goes to dinner at Dan’s parents house and gets so drunk that she throws up.

House in the Pines - IMDb The House in the Pines - IMDb

Is this a new Frank murder victim? I don’t think Gary or Ruby or the fire are ever discussed at the end. Or did I miss it? Can we just be DONE with the unreliable drunk woman in the window of the train across the street crap at this point? It is suuuuuuuuuuch a dead horse that has been beaten to a pulp. the book) suffers from doing way too much at the same time […] I really struggled with following this narrative, and the drinking/pill popping trope is so overused at this point. However, I do think there’s a reader/audience for this book. The synopsis is calling it “utterly unique” and I can see that because as the story develops after the halfway mark, it is indeed very different than I expected. Readers will either love or hate the ending, which will make for great book club discussions.”

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Maya finally feels able to face her past. She throws herself into an investigation, not only of what happened to her and Aubrey all those years ago, but also to the young woman at the diner. Things I didn’t like: last third of the book was vague and a little pointless. The big revelation was way too much far fetched for me. I didn’t buy it! And the conclusion is a little vague, semi satisfying. In the present, Maya is with a new detective. She recorded Frank at the bar but no one (except Maya) can understand what he is saying.

The House in the Pines by Ana Reyes | Goodreads

Many thanks to NetGalley, Dutton, and Ana Reyes for an ARC of this book! Now available as of 1.3!** Aubrey had been talking to Frank when she died for no apparent reason, and Maya is convinced the Frank killed her. This story follows Maya. When Maya was a Senior in high school, her best friend Aubrey, died suddenly, mysteriously and with no identifiable cause, directly in front of Maya's eyes. The only other person around, a young man named Frank, fled the scene. The House in the Pines is a fast-paced powerful thriller that really pulls the reader unlike anything I have read before.”Some cultures blame such deaths on evil spirits. The mind will always try to explain what it can’t understand—it will make up stories, theories, whole belief systems—and Maya’s mind, Dr. Barry said, was of the type that saw faces in clouds and messages in tea leaves.” So we’re meant to think that Oren tried his hypnosis techniques on his son, Frank, who apparently learned them and used them to murder two people by causing their hearts to stop. So thanks to my mad girl crush on Reese that I’ve had since I was a child and she starred in The Man in the Moon, I can’t resist her siren’s song and her (nearly always) awful book choices. In all honesty, I live in perpetual fear that I will miss out on another Paper Palace which earned a rare 5 Star from me and was one of the best things I read that year. Buuuuuuuuut, most of the time they are pretty crappy and this was no exception.

House in the Pines - Jen Ryland Spoiler Discussion for The House in the Pines - Jen Ryland

Maya has no idea the can of worms she opens will bring about more questions than answers and she must face that there were many things she can't remember about her relationship with Frank when she was a teenager and if she does confront him again it could be her life at stake this time and there won't be anyone there to save her.Maya recalls (not sure if in the past or present) that her mom (Brenda) met her dad and his family on a church trip to Guatemala. Maya’s grandparents were Brenda’s host parents. Brenda and Jairo fell in love and she got pregnant, but then he died, shot by the Guatemalan army. The House in the Pines is an excellent mystery/thriller that kept me intrigued from the beginning. What happened wasn’t what I’d expected, which is always a treat. The main character struggled with very real, relatable things in her life, which made her feel close the entire time. And her curiosity fed my curiosity. […] I also enjoyed the twist on present and past tense. In the present timeline the author wrote the book in past tense. In the past timeline the author wrote in the present. It was a very clever way to give an immediacy to the past (especially as the character began to recall events).” After the funeral, Maya’s grandfather gave her a book that her father was writing called “I Forgot I Was The Son of Kings.” Maya takes it home to Pittsfield and starts to translate it. Frank tells her he has been to Guatemala as well.