A slow burn horror that will have you at the edge of your seat, especially at the end!
This atmospheric horror is set in Italy, has demonic possessions, exorcisms and a haunted house?? Yes please!
When they saw a small town in Italy was trying to start over and had houses for 1 Euro, Tommy and Kate couldn’t pass that up. Especially since Tommy has family in that town. So they picked up and moved their entire life from the US to Italy.
They slowly learn that their new home is known for being called “The House of Last Resort” and was owned by a Catholic Church. Things get really crazy when we learn what they were doing there.
I’d definitely recommend this to horror fans who don’t mind slow burns and love a good atmospheric horror with a twist ending.

Rating: 4/5
I received an eARC for my honest opinion.

What would you do if you were able to buy a house in a small town in Italy just for a Euro? Yes, you have to stay in that house for 5 years but for that price who wouldn’t jump on it. However, what if I told you that the house you bought has some very interesting history and you were not informed of this until after you moved in. Would you still do it?

This book, I don’t know what I was thinking it would be about other than I knew it would be like a horror thriller, but it was something more too. I thought the author did a great job of keeping the reader interested throughout the whole book, I knew I was wanting to know what was going to happen next and couldn’t stop turning the pages. I liked that the writing style was easy to read, and the pace was consistent. I won’t lie there are times that in the book it was slow and then it would pick right and go by so fast. I loved that when reading I would get a sense of creepy/suspense filled, and it was all because of the way Golden set the tone of the events. The twists and turns in the book were great, I do have to say I wasn’t expecting a part that did happen in the book a few times.

The characters in the book, I did not find them that easy to relate too sometimes. I mean the excitement of moving across the world to a small town in Italy I could understand but not the take charge way of waiting to turn the town into a tourist community, and there were other things that I didn’t like how Tommy or Kate would handle situations gave off vibes of “ I’m an American and I know best”…I really don’t know if that is the best way to describe it but honestly that is the best way I can.

Other than some parts of the characters that I didn’t like, I really did enjoy the whole vibe of this book and I will be reading more from this author.

I want to thank NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the opportunity to review this book.

Wow! The end of this book was everything. The House Of Last resort is filled with the best spooky vibes possible. While this book is a bit of a slow burn the atmosphere definitely makes up for it. I loved the characters and the setting. Gosh that damn ending! Fantastic!

I feel like I will be thinking about this book for a long time.
4/5 Stars

Thank you so much to the publisher and Netgalley for sending me an arc in exchange for my honest review.

Would you buy a house for 1 Euro (equivalent to $1.09 USD) if the only condition for living there was staying there for a minimum of 5 years?

What if I told you the house was in Italy and that it may or may not be haunted amongst other things?

Kate and Tommy believe they’ve scored the opportunity of a life time. They bought a house and moved from the United States to Italy. The house was only one euro thanks to the new program the mayor is running to try and repopulate the old Italian city.

This seems like the perfect opportunity for the young couple, and will actually allow Tommy to get closer to his family that lives in the same town. But not everything is as it seems. Secrets are lying both within the walls of the house and within Tommy’s family.

This book was such a spooky delight. I’m Italian myself, so it was really cool to see some of the customs I’ve experienced first hand portrayed in the book! I loved the slow build haunting that took a wild turn in the last 50 pages.

My rating : ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book is coming out January 30th, 2024!

Be sure to snag it if you’re looking for a book filled with ghosts, demons, creepy houses, Italian food/customs, and so much more!

Thank you St Martins's for the review copy! I am newer to Christopher Golden's writing but this was some good creepy horror, his writing was really effective at setting a tone and mood and building up dread/suspense. I was genuinely creeped out by some moments, which is what I want in a book like this, and appreciated the constant sense of unease.

That being said, some of the pacing was for me a little off, the rhythm of the book was slow, but that was generally ok for me, while later parts moved fast and to an action focused end (which is also ok but I prefer when pacing/ending of a book still match the approach of the suspenseful build... it's what Stephen King doesn't do well, a lot of build up and story to a quick action end).

Still a good book, still recommended and I think it's a win for haunted house fans. I also bet this would be good on audiobook, I like a scary audio!

I enjoy Christopher Golden’s work, so I was really excited about The House of Last Resort. The ominous title, the old Italian home, the cute little village, catacombs and promise of horror, it all sounded great but unfortunately it fell flat for me. It’s incredibly slow, which I’m fine usually, but it went far beyond the typical slow burn and simply just didn’t work this time. I can’t say that I liked any of the characters, and it wasn’t scary in the slightest. I loved the setting and the premise, and I see a lot of others who really enjoyed this so don’t let that deter you. The House of Last Resort will be published 1/30. Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for my eARC.

I loved this book. The setting comes alive with the descriptions of the older buildings and streets, especially 'The House of Last Resort'. There are two POVs, a husband and wife Tommy and Kate, who give up their life in the USA and embark on a journey to Tommy's roots in a sleepy town in Italy where his grandparents still live. Without knowing the history, they buy an old house for a single Euro as part of a local program to revitalize the town. The history woven into the story is elaborate, well-crafted, and revealed in tantalizing bread crumbs. The creepy vibes begin in the opening pages and build throughout into a wonderfully terrifying story.

Incredibly bland - I had high hopes for this novel based on the premise but the writing was very lackluster.

Boston natives, Tommy and Kate, have transplanted their lives to Becchina, Italy on an offer that sounds too good to be true and impossible to pass up. The dying town has begun selling homes for one euro in the hopes of rebuilding its populace with fresh blood, provided the buyers commit to living there for a minimum of five years and spend at least fifty thousand euros on renovations. For Kate and Tommy, it's a once in a lifetime opportunity and one that also allows them to reconnect with the little bit of family Tommy has still living there. Not all is bella fortuna for the happy young couple, though, for the house they have purchased has a dark and sinister history. Known to the locals as la casa dell'ultima risorsa, the house of last resort was previously owned by the Vatican and lies above the small town's bone-filled catacombs.

Christopher Golden's The House of Last Resort is a slow-burn horror, with the bulk of the narrative centered around the mundane. We spend plenty of time with Tommy and Kate as they begin righting their house and getting their affairs in order as they settle in, reconnect with his grandparents and cousin, Marcello, and meet the other recent immigrants to Becchina who jokingly refer to themselves as the imports.

Sprinkled throughout are moments of the uncanny -- Kate and Tommy are greeted by an earthquake upon their arrival at the front door of their new home, doors that are locked or stuck seemingly open on their own, mysterious power failures dog their nights, and the house is infested with rats. These initially minor happenings are enough to sustain interest, but only just, and it's not until the last third of the book, as we're thrust into a diabolical climax, that the narrative finally gains momentum and intrigue. The catacomb-centered finale is rife with wonderfully descriptive flair that recalls some of Golden's macabre scripting alongside Mike Mignola's comics, to the point that I couldn't help but wish for some Mignola illustrations to go alongside the climax. Once he digs into the horrors only previously hinted at, Golden conjures up some fantastic, evocative, and highly effective and memorable imagery.

Getting there takes a heck of a lot of patience, and the first three-fourths of the book is a slog saved only by those brief flashes of eeriness as the secrets surrounding the house are slowly and meticulously doled out. The resolution isn't particularly impactful, either, due to its expectedness, and where The House of Last Resort really suffers is in its predictability. While Kate and Tommy are hoping for the adventure of their life, Golden seems oddly content to play it safe. There is a neat reveal behind how and, more importantly, why Kate and Tommy wound up with this particular house, but all others feel like foregone conclusions. I do appreciate Golden's lack of pandering toward Christianity, though, with the Church getting a bit of a shellacking here and there (and rightfully so, given their less than stellar history toward human rights since its inception) and the hokey "God saves" messaging of so many other Christian-focused stories of similar vein, like The Conuring films, in an attempt to appeal to the masses. The rest, unfortunately, feels like paint-by-numbers horror that has been finely tuned for maximum mainstream appeal.

Have you ever heard of those little Italian towns that are trying to revitalize themselves by offering homes for a single Euro in exchange for the promise that buyers will stay for a minimum amount of time (five years or whatever) and put a set amount of money into renovating their new/old home? Well, THE HOUSE OF LAST RESORT is about that … but in its worst case scenario.

There are some legitimately creepy scenes in this book. It took me a little while to really get into it, but at the 50% mark I read the first hair-raising line that really sucked me in. It’s like The Exorcist, but with rats and catacombs and ghostly priests and crucifixes and scary-as-hell demons who lurk around for centuries.

My conclusion: I won’t be visiting the Catacombs of Paris (or of any city), ever, thank you very much.

If you like stories about demonic possession and haunted houses, this is the book for you.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for an early digital copy of THE HOUSE OF LAST RESORT in exchange for my honest opinion.

The breeze coming through the windows aired the old place out, breathing new life into its worn interior. They walked through each room, admiring their new home, and imagined all the possibilities they could bring to this place. They looked at each other and smiled, full of joy, but little did they know the dangers that lurked in those walls.

The House of Last Resort is a horror following a young married couple who move to Italy and intend to fix up an old home and bring vibrance to a dying small town. They have hopes, dreams, and great ideas to revitalize… until they find out the true history of this place.

The Haunting in Connecticut travels to Italy… that’s one way I’d describe this horror story. The horror elements were fantastic and 100% creeped me out (which is what I wanted), but the pacing was a little off for me in this one. It’s slow moving, but the last 25% of the book was intense. I loved the small town Italian setting and the exploration of the dark side of religion and the unknowns religion experienced in the earlier centuries. It was an entertaining read for sure.

If you’re a fan of haunted houses, dark religious horror, and enjoy horror movies like The Exorcist or The Haunting in Connecticut… then I’d recommend picking this book up!

I don't read a lot of horror or horror adjacent novels so this one came along at the right time and caught me in the mood for a story like this.

The writing is good, it's detailed and atmospheric although it does tend to repeat itself a bit. Not in an egregious way but enough to notice that a particular scene or feeling has already been described.

As the tension built so to did my interest. It's genuinely creepy and there were times I was rapt and nervous. One thing I appreciated, especially in the second act is how the characters act and respond to things. They acknowledge how weird it is or how off putting rather than completely ignore it. It felt refreshingly real compared to many other works.

That being said, I don't think it quite held it together during the climax. All the tension and atmosphere gave way to an action movie ending and dialogue that felt out of place.

In the end, it's still a pretty good book and a good read but ended up falling shy of being a great one.

Sincere thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

I haven't read a decent horror in awhile and one of my fav tropes is an old world/religious horror.

As someone with Italian roots, I loved that this took place in a small Sicilian town. The atmosphere was fantastic and I have to say, if I was offered a deal like they were - I would totally have take the leap and moved too - although maybe not to that house.

This book was creepy. So much so, that I found I was less inclined to read it when the sun went down, haha.

The last 20% of the book was a like - meh. I didn't like the rats aspect of it and kept imaging some cartoon situation that was more "comical" than scary.

Overall a great read! I will definitely need to check out more by this author!

A ghost story with a promising start.

This is my second novel by Christopher Golden and I'm starting to see a pattern. While the stories are a slow burn, he does a great job at building tension and uneasiness. You know something is wrong!

However, it builds, it builds, it builds and then the twists and reveals happen but it's kind of flat. I did not like the way what was happening was revealed in the end, right after the earthquake. But after the passage with * that * character, it started picking up again.

Overall, it was very intriguing and well written but it did not captivate me enough. A little something was missing for me and it didn't turn out to be a gripping page-turner. That being said, it was good and entertaining but just not memorable for my taste.

“He still couldn’t feel anything divine in the world. But this - the way his skin crawled, the suffocating pressure in the air, the quickening of his pulse - he felt all of that and no longer hesitated to put a name to it. There could only be one word - evil.”

Tommy and Kate leave their life in Boston behind to move to Italy, to be closer to Tommy’s elderly grandparents. They find a fantastic deal on an older home there and are excited at the prospects for refurbishing it. Tommy’s Nonna is furious that they bought the home, which Katie and Tommy think is a little odd. Until they find out that the house used to belong to the Catholic Church. It got its name - The House of Last Resort - because people who were rumored to be demonically possessed were sent to the house as a last ditch attempt at exorcism. Creepy to think about, but there couldn’t possibly be any truth to it…could there? Sure the house is a little creepy, and has a bit of a rodent problem, but that’s just because it's old and abandoned…right?

Whew, now this was a perfect horror novel for me! I love isolated/locked room type stories, and Italy is one of my favorite settings, so to have them combined was so fun. The atmosphere in this book played a huge part; the descriptions of the house, its hidden rooms and long-kept secrets, laid all the necessary groundwork for the perfect haunted house tale. Though the pacing was a little bit slow at times, I still was very much invested in this story and wanted to see where it went. I always joke that I am more afraid of the living than the dead, but the idea of evil spirits lingering in this spooky old house was just enough to make me want to keep the lights on when reading at night - LOL!

I believe that evil spirits can exist but I also appreciated how the author presented another question to this topic; broaching the idea of how many of these people in the past were mentally ill and dubbed as “demonically possessed” because there was no other word for their condition at the time. More than the evil spirits, I think all the rats inhabiting the older parts of the house are what really got to me - idk!

Christopher Golden will always be an auto-buy author for me! “The House of Last Resort” releases January 30, 2024. Thank you to Christopher Golden, Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for the ARC!

This review will be shared to my instagram blog (@books_by_the_bottl) shortly :)

After reading All Hallows last year, and really enjoying it, I was very excited to get an ARC of The House Of Last Resort. I’m also very excited to say that I loved this book, even more than All Hallows. The House of Last Resort was extremely creepy, the scene between Kate and Tommy’s grandfather genuinely gave me chills. This book had great atmosphere, I really felt like I was in this small Italian town, seeing all the things Kate and Tommy saw. I will say, this book is very slow burn and it takes a long time to get going, so if slow burn books don’t work for you, you probably won’t enjoy this. This book really worked for me however, and I loved it.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a free e-arc of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Across Italy there are many half-empty towns, nearly abandoned by those who migrate to the coast or to cities. The beautiful, crumbling hilltop town of Becchina is among them, but its mayor has taken drastic measures to rebuild—selling abandoned homes to anyone in the world for a single Euro, as long as the buyer promises to live there for at least five years.

Thank you Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for sending me a review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review! I enjoyed this book. The first half of the book started off slow and I almost DNF’d it but in the second half, the book got better and I was glad I stuck with it. I liked the setting. It was creepy but it wasn’t scary. I felt like I was there. The writing style of this book bothered me in the beginning because it has a lot of descriptions about the setting and a lot of inner dialogue where you are reading what the couple’s thoughts are but there’s not a lot of dialogue between the characters and the chapters were really long which made the book feel like it was a lot longer than it was but once I got used to the writing style, I enjoyed the story.

This felt like it would be better suited for a short story. Although, I will say I appreciate this author’s writing style. I’ve not read any other books by him, but I will check them out.

The House of Last Resort takes a seemingly beautifully location in a small town in Italy and presents a darkness lying beneath. Tommy and Kate have moved to Becchina to an old abandoned home in the town where Tommy's grandparents live. The story starts off by presenting a sense of unease around their new home and revealing a darkness in the history there. By the end, the book really earns it's horror genre label. With claustrophobic catacombs, rats, possessions, ghosts, and more, there is plenty to get under the readers skin. The author's writing style brought everything to life and I will be excited to read what the do next.

The House of Last Resort is a creative spin on an exorcism storyline. It had a slower start, but despite the pace, was still interesting and had some little creepy moments sprinkled in. At a little before 50% things really pop off and get scary. This was such a unique novel and I was gripped from then to the end.

It all begins when a couple move to Sicily for a government program offering young people the chance to purchase abandoned homes for as little as one single Euro, as long as they commit to staying for a certain number of years and putting a certain amount of money into renovating the home in an attempt to repopulate small cities and bring new generations into deteriorating towns.

Kate and Tom jump at the chance for a new start in the Sicilian city that Tom's grandparents live in and they score a huge house to make into their own. However, in traditional horror novel fashion, it's simply too good to be true and things start to go very dark.

I don't want to reveal anything specific, because I loved learning the grim backstory of the house that the couple move into, but just know it's spooky and interesting and all the things I had hoped for. I didn't like rats before, and I certainly don't like them now. 🐀 They haunt my dreams.

This is a must read for horror fans!