A horror novel set in modern-day rural Vermont. Helen and Nate, a pair of thirty-something suburban teachers, come into an unexpected windfall of money and decide to quit their jobs and start a small farm, complete with building their own perfect home that's designed from the ground up with their personal tastes and needs in mind. So basically every Millennial's dream.

Unfortunately the spot of countryside they buy for this ideal house comes with a local legend: back in the 1920s, an isolated woman was accused of being a witch and lynched by the townspeople. (Yes, the 1920s are crazy late for witchcraft trials, but the fact that it happened only a few generations out from the present day ends up being necessary for the plot.) Now this witch supposedly haunts the bog where she was hung, appearing as a white deer that lures people to their deaths, getting them lost in the woods or drowning them in bogwater.

Helen and Nate's new neighbor is a young girl named Olive, who's obsessed with the story of the witch and believes that somewhere on their property she left behind hidden treasure. Olive's mother has recently disappeared – presumed to have left her husband for another man – and Olive thinks that if she can find the treasure, her mom will return.

All of this makes for a fine setup for some thrills and chills; I particularly liked the idea of a haunted house story where the house is brand-new – still in the process of being built, even! Unfortunately The Invited ends up flat and fairly boring. I picked it up because I'd previously read McMahon's The Winter People, and though I had some problems with that book, she absolutely succeeded in crafting an atmosphere of suspense and horror. Those writing skills are nowhere to be found in The Invited. In addition to a dragging plot with extremely obvious twists, the characters are so bland and one-dimensional. I had the biggest problem with Helen, who is a historian/history teacher; we're told over and over that she longs to live in the simplicity and wholesomeness of the past. But her image of the past seems so... uninformed; it's history as imagined by someone whose sole source of information is the Hallmark Channel. Everyone I know who has actually studied history is far too aware of the rampant disease, dirty water, prejudices, violence, etc, to take such a shallow view of it.

Overall, there's nothing acutely wrong with The Invited, but it's an extremely meh book.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3009230967

This book was creepy and twisty. I made sure to read it on my Kindle in the dark for extra creepy vibes, which made it even better. The pacing was great and the characters, story, and history behind the story really drew me in. I love Jennifer McMahon's books, and The Invited was no exception!

Thank you very much to the publisher and Netgalley for a free advance copy in exchange for my honest opinion.

I'm so sorry but I was not able to get into this one. I've decided to put it down for now but may revisit later. If I do, I will come back and update my review. Thank you for the opportunity to review this novel. I love her work and look forward to trying it again - perhaps later this year during the fall.

I have read other Jennifer McMahon books and in my opinion this is her best work yet.

Helen inherits some money from her father’s estate, enough to buy land and build the historic home of her and her husband’s dreams. They quit their well paying, steady jobs in Connecticut to buy land - 44 acres of land that includes a bog, a ghost story and rumored buried treasure. As Helen uncovers more and more about her land and the women who lived on it, we see that the mysteries of the past are coiled around the mysteries of the present.

Told from multiple perspectives and from multiple timelines, this book could have been muddy with a less skilled storyteller, but McMahon excelled and the complex storyline.

This book has it all. Witches, ghosts, murder and buried treasure. I couldn’t put it down. Highly recommend!

Nate and Helen were eager to escape the hustle and bustle of the city. Thanks to an inheritance from Helen's father they were prepared to do just that. After searching the countryside for the perfect house, they decided to build a home themselves and they found the perfect piece of land. The work is harder than they anticipated, but their spirits are still high. They have hopes and dreams. Helen had always dreamt of living in a historic house but settles for pieces of history, like the wooden beam made from a tree that once hung a local legend, Hattie Breckenridge. After placing the beam in their new home, all sorts of strange occurrences start to happen, some of it they can attribute to the neighbor girl, Olive, who at first, will do anything to keep Nate and Helen from completing their home. She is afraid that their home will prevent her from finding the lost treasure tied to her mother's abandonment. Both Nate and Helen become distracted from their goal. Helen starts to see things in the night, the ghost of Hattie Breckenridge and becomes obsessed with what happened to Hattie and her descendants. And Nate starts to chase an impossible quest of tracking down the albino doe. Their obsessions are starting to come between them in a destructive matter. Is their unraveling due to supernatural forces or just plain old humans with sinister motives?

Nate and Helen are kinda living out mine and my husband's dream. Escape the hustle and bustle of our lives, find a plot of land in the country, and build our dream home. However, Helen and Nate can keep the ghost and crazy people. I really liked both Nate and Helen - at first. The longer they spend building their house, the more I struggled with liking them. I thought that Helen had a weird obsession with Hattie and I thought that Nate was a jerk to her about it. I did like the way they both interacted with Ollie, after their initial meeting, they were both kind and supportive of Ollie. I wasn't all that surprised by the big reveal, but that is okay, I was more interested in the ghost story than I was the mystery. - CLICK HERE FOR SPOILERS -

Bottom Line - Usually I am a big chicken shit when it comes to ghost stories, but for some reason, I was in a mood. If you ever find yourself in the mood for a good ghost story, you can't go wrong with Jennifer McMahon.

Details:

The Invited by Jennifer McMahon
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Pages: 368
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday
Publication Date: 4/30/2019
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I was sorely disappointed with this novel. I don't normally come across novels I don't like but this one, was lacking. I couldn't stay focused on it as it was a slow read. However, I still recommend this to others to try, as just because McMahon was not an author for me, doesn't mean someone else won't love her style.

~Becca, Reviewer at Cover To Cover Cafe

I found myself enjoying this novel. It is more mystery with a pinch of paranormal thrown in -
Helen and Nate give up the fast-paced city life and buy some land in small-town rural Vermont. They decide to self build their home on the land. The land has a tragic past and a haunted reputation. Helen digs into the past as it presents itself into her present. The story is slow going at first. Then the young neighbor girl, Olive, enters and the plot thickens from there. There is a lot more depth to the mystery than first perceived. It's a fun read!

I really enjoy this book! Just the right amount of spookiness without being hokey or silly. The author has excellent skills as a story teller, both with character development and scene setting making it a real page turner.

I received this book in exchange for a honest review from NetGalley.

I have absolutely loved everything I have read by Jennifer McMahon and this book is no exception. The twist and turns are always exciting, her characters are interesting and have depth and heart, and in the end everything is about history and families/found families. I think that this is my favorite of her books that I have read. This could be because of the exceptional amount of lore and history she developed for this small town in Vermont that I now feel a part of. Overall truly great book!

Helen and Nate have given up the hustle and bustle of busy suburban life to build a house on land in the Vermont woods.  The deal on the land was one they couldn't pass up and it seemed the perfect spot for the house of their dreams.  It isn't long that they realize the land had a dark past, one riddled with violence and death.

Helen, a former history teacher, becomes obsessed with learning more about history of the land.  Local history tells a legend of Hattie Breckenridge, who lived and died on the property.  Helen begins filling the house with local artifacts that are tied to the land and the three generations of Breckenridge women.  Though she knows each of the women died suspiciously, she feels that returning these pieces to the house will bring peace to the spirits of the Breckenridge woman.  Though it does, it also unleashes a series of mysterious occurrences.  Is the spirit of Hattie Breckenridge attempting to scare the young couple away from her precious land or a messenger of warning? It's up to Helen to decide, before the chain of mysterious deaths continues.

Jennifer McMahon is one of my “insta-buy” authors.  The moment I hear of a new book, I add it to my must-read list.  This may be one of my very favorites, for I do love a nice ghost story.  This book is filled to the brim with all the things I love about a spooky read: isolated location, mysterious path, twisted family histories, haunted objects.  You really can’t go wrong.  With it, McMahon adds her trademark ability to spin a excellently crafted story. She excels at creating young female characters, particularly young girls, and that is once again proven with this most recent title.

This is the perfect book to curl up and read on a dark and rainy Spring afternoon. You’ll want to read it in one sitting, I guarantee it.

If you haven’t read McMahon’s books yet, what are you waiting for!?

Many thanks to NetGalley for providing me a copy for an honest review.

This was an interesting tale, as I've never before read one about people building their own haunted house. The build up was a bit boring, but it improved massively about halfway in! I had to put it down for awhile and come back to it, but I'm one of those that always wonders how a story ends if I don't read it through. I am glad I read the whole thing, but the conclusion left a bit to be desired for my tastes. I found the characters mostly boring or irritating, bar Hattie. Her story was the only thing that really kept me reading. I really struggled to read Olive's POV chapters. The twist at the end slightly shocked me, but I kind of had a sneaking suspicion it might end that way. I can see the appeal for some, but it wasn't really my thing. The writing and scenery itself kept me mildly interested, so I would likely read another McMahon story.

I love books about haunted houses, but this was the first time I've read one where a haunted house was actually being built. I really enjoyed this book. It never quite reached the spook factor I was expecting, but I certainly didn't mind. The writing was captivating and the characters were compelling. Thrillers need to be well written for me more than they need to have suspense or crazy twists. And this one had just enough mystery to keep me on my toes. I really recommend it if you're looking for something with a slower pace.

After reading, and loving, The Winter People, I was beyond chuffed to pick up and review The Invited by Jennifer McMahon. Unfortunately, I believe the expectations were my downfall, and possibly the downfall to others who’ve gone into The Invited after The Winter People. McMahon casts aside the horror and the supernatural in favor of a slow burn Gothic lite suspense novel that was beyond predictable.

The Invited suffers due to two major reasons, the expectations set up from McMahon’s The Winter People, and the classification as a horror novel. I love American Gothic as a genre, whether it’s Southern Gothic, PNW Gothic, Southwestern Gothic, etc, etc. I think using the untamed landscape in cohesion with the supernatural to reflect internal horrors, especially within families, is such a great tool that makes for compelling fiction. If The Invited had been marketed as a NE Gothic novel, I honestly might still have been disappointed, but not as much as I was going into this expecting a horror story. I believe The Invited tried to be both and failed to do either convincingly.

Olive was a great character and protagonist, possibly the only great character in the novel. She has a driving force that is relatable and a personality that is likable. Apart from Olive, the remaining characters felt one-dimensional caricatures, stand-ins for a cookie cutter plot. We have Nate, the scientific, unbelieving husband, convinced his wife is losing her mind and someone we’re meant to dislike, yet I had only sympathy. He asks his wife, the second protagonist Helen, what would make her happy after the death of her father and then tries to do everything to make it happen. Even as she lies and changes, he remains, desperate to ensure Helen is okay. Helen, meanwhile, I found to be growingly unlikable. Perhaps it was because I understood the plot and ending at about forty percent into the novel, or perhaps it was how obsessed she became with the suffering and deaths of others. She felt a bit like Katherine from The Winter People, secretly selfish leaving a bad taste in the mouth. Where her character started as wanting to build a house to be happy, to remind herself of her father and childhood, she simply became a one-dimensional character used solely as the vehicle for McMahon’s plot.

Speaking of plot, it was so watered down that it didn’t serve to satisfy as either a Gothic novel, or a horror novel — barely even worked as a mystery. Readers can guess exactly what the plot is within the first thirty to forty percent of the novel, and once you do, it’s a slow drag to the finish. There’s never a moment of, “Oh! I was wrong!” Instead, it simply became a checking of boxes, counting down until you can finally shout Bingo at the end. The supernatural elements as well were severely lacking, which again, do it a disservice as either a Gothic novel or Horror novel. The supernatural elements felt like garnish on a bland and outdated dish, unnecessary and unable to lift it to the next level. The family secrets were uninspiring, the mystery overdone, and again the characters just could not get it done.

When I first started this review, I thought this was a decent book, but the more I think about it, the more I realize just how badly disappointed I am with The Invited by Jennifer McMahon. I can’t blame it solely on expectations being high, or on expecting something along the lines of McMahon’s previous novel. The disappointment lies solely on the predictability of plot, the unlikable and one-dimensional characters, and a lack of the supernatural, which marks this as a failure to live up to either the horror or Gothic genre. If you simply want an easy mystery thriller to read, then by all means, you will enjoy The Invited. If you’re looking for spooks, or something to actually think about, go back to The Winter People instead.

Jennifer McMahon never fails to thrill and delight me as a reader. She embraces the idea of ghosts as fact and luxuriates in the darkness of men as only an author can. Her latest novel is a thrilling adventure of wrongs made right, racism, witchcraft, and strong women. It is a ghost story with the "are there or aren't there" drama stripped away from its plot; in Helen's new world, ghosts very much exist. Ms. McMahon never ventures near the unreliable narrator trope either, so even though no one seems to believe Helen as she works to understand the ghostly warnings, there is so much more happening in her new sleepy town than we initially understand. This is where the darkness of men comes to the fore, and what follows is a twisty tale of the truth and the lies we tell each other to avoid the truth. Also, did I mention strong, independent women? I believe The Invited is one of Ms. McMahon's strongest novels to date, so if you have not yet had the pleasure of experiencing one of her novels, this is a good place to start.

I have mixed thoughts for this book and concluded that it reads like a spooky cozy mystery.

Hattie is the focus and the motive seems to be on finding Hattie's treasure. It starts when new neighbor installs an old beam from tree Hattie was hanged from. The story gets weirder as new neighbor and Olive digs deeper into Hattie genealogy. At the end, the truth is reveals on who is the remaining daughter left in the genealogy.

I did not have issues reading the book but the plot did not intrigue me. It was strange plot that did not have to involve solving a mystery by building a house on haunted ground. I found the book cover to be misleading as well. I thought this book would be a horror book not a cozy mystery.

Thank you #netgalley for sharing this book with me for a honest review.

This book has such a strong atmospheric feel that at times, I almost felt I was watching a movie version of it. I mean Vermont, woods, ghost? Seriously! Helen's tentative approach to their new life adventure is so counter to Nate's enthusiasm, I couldn't help but feel that Helen's intuition was in its infancy stages as the book started. Olive's character is sad/scary and I felt torn as her story rolled out. So well written, I was drawn into this page-turner from the start.

Thanks to Ms. McMahon, Doubleday and Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review The Invited.

When Helen and Nate go to build their dream home, they are signing up for more than they bargained for! The past is determined to not stay hidden, and the present is about to collide with the events that happened over 100 years ago.

This book was fabulous and I could not put it down! It is a real page turner that will leave you biting your nails!

Oh my goodness. This book surprised me. The way the book started was wonderful. The history element begins on the first page and ends on the last. I might have loved it so much because I can relate to Helen so much. She is a history teacher who moves to a rural town to build a house with her husband who has the complete confidence that they can achieve their dream house on a lot of property. Helen learns that their property has a lot of history. Once she starts digging, everything starts to unfold. It definitely gave me the creeps in some places, though I would consider it a relatively light mystery/thriller. The focus is definitely on the historical aspect which is absolutely lovely for people who love history and mystery.

The Invited was a nice, comfy read. It's a solid, engaging ghost story/mystery that doesn't do anything new with the genre, but does what it does extremely well.
When Nate and Helen buy some land in Vermont where an alleged witch was killed decades ago, and begin building their dream house, strange things start to happen. Is the witch trying to contact them? Scare them off? Is there a more human answer to the mysteries they begin to uncover?
I found myself making time to read this book which is always a good sign and I became invested in the main characters of Helen and Olive. The central mystery gets wrapped up in a very satisfying manner. I'm definitely interested in reading more of Jennifer McMahon's books.

I took a bit of a departure from my usual style of books with The Invited and really enjoyed it. This is a haunting tale of witchcraft and ghosts and is certain to keep you interested to the last page! A young couple get way more than they bargained for when they set out to build a nw home that is mixed in with old elements from the new land they just purchased and its neighboring towns. Just how much of the rumors and gossip about the history of the land is true? I recommend for any history buffs and architecture lovers. This book is sure to draw on your imagination and leave you questioning just how certain you are that you want to bring antique pieces into your home for you never really know who you are letting in.