
Member Reviews

This was a very readable and darkly disturbing debut. with a good kix of characters- Pete Darling eill stay with me for some time!
I enjoyed the little historical details, and although "the crucible" and other stories about independent women not being tamed by men did spring to mind, the author managed to make it her own.
Thank you to netgalley and Henry Holt for an advance copy of this book.

Beautiful, eerie writing. When Little Nettlebed's ferryman—and contender for world's worst person, in my opinion—takes a dislike to the Mansfield sisters, strange things start to happen in the village. Soon rumors spread about the girls transforming into dogs and the mysterious barking does not help...
The story has a slow, luxurious pace and tension and mystery abound. I was very invested in the fate of the Mansfield sisters and enjoyed the read.
Thank you to Henry Holt & Company and NetGalley for the opportunity to read a copy.

In a small English village, summer is turning to drought, the river is drying up, and rumors are running a little wild. Pete, the local ferryman whose business will dwindle with the river, claims that five sisters have turned into dogs, and are responsible for various canine violence around town. It takes a little while for the gossip to take hold, but once it gets the minster's attention, it really does. Is Pete just making up another one of his stories? Is there something odd about the girls? And how to explain the happenings? It all gets a little conspiratorial and witch hunt-ish, a cross between old time Salem and present times, when apparently all you need to believe something totally outlandish is for someone to say it loudly and often enough. Of course, there's a bit of a twist at the end- although not an altogether shocking one.
Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for the arc!

I'm not going to lie, when I was at the halfway point, I kept thinking - "I'm enjoying this, love the writing, but literally nothing is happening." Cut to me at the end of this getting a little teary eyed lol. This is a slow-burn but it's well worth it.
The writing is beautiful and intentional. There's a quote about truth in here that I absolutely love -
"THE TRUTH IS LIKE A WATER CREATURE,” HE CONTINUED. “TOO LARGE FOR ANY SINGLE MAN TO CATCH. HE CAN TAKE HOLD OF ONE TENTACLE, OR A SILVER TAIL, OR A FIN, BUT HE’LL NEVER CATCH THE WHOLE CREATURE. NOT ON HIS OWN”
The comparisons to The Crucible and The Virgin Suicides are spot on. This is a study on town gossip and rumors and how one man's mistrust and disdain for these girls leads to irreversible damage. The more I think about this, the more I love it. It may end up being a five star read for me, but for now I'll give it four stars.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy for review!

A nice addition to the ‘Girl who’s a dog’ narrative, as well as the ‘insecure man ruins Everything’ narrative.
‘The Hounding’ didn’t really inspire any new thoughts, but it held it’s own and did poke at my unusual girl sore spot in my chest. Perhaps the scapegoat aspect of the Mansfield sister’s story, how easily the townspeople believe the unbelievable because it’s easier, and it feels vindicating- that was interesting. Along with our villain being a miserable man who obsessively tears down a woman for seeming ‘above him’ - interesting and apt. The way the girls are envied, stifled and unable to do anything ‘right’ in their misogynistic community was depressingly authentic. The writing flowed well and I liked it.
Sometimes a girl just needs to run around outside and bark, honestly.
4.5 stars.

Can't stop thinking about this one! This is a book that is bizarre in the best way. It would be great for a book discussion group! Is it about misogyny? Is it about transformations? Is it about gender expectations? This is a book that when midway through you'll think - what is happening? Keep going. What a ride. When you finish reading, let me know so we can discuss!

2.5 stars rounded up. This bizarre little book had so much potential, but in the end, I think it fell flat.
What initially drew me to the book was the cover. I think it’s so lovely, and combined with the synopsis, I thought this could be a top book of the year.
I wish that one of the povs that we got was from the girls because we only ever hear their perspective from outsiders. I think that was supposed to make it even more mysterious, but I just felt confused a lot. It was clear that these girls were unique and quirky, and for that, a lot of people in the village hated them. It’s the classic “you should smile more” situation. I think if we’d had an insight to the girls’ thoughts and motivations, it would have made it so much more compelling. Instead, when it ended I literally said, “that’s it?” Ultimately, it was a bit of a disappointment.

4.5 Stars round up
This haunting feminist historical tale simmers with quiet rage, and I loved it for that. The Hounding tells the story of women simply existing, minding their own business, only to be vilified for being “not normal” in the eyes of their community. It’s an infuriating and all too familiar narrative about how rumors, fear, and patriarchal control can spiral into cruelty, especially when directed at girls who never stood a chance.
The writing is beautiful and lyrical, full of simmering tension and sharp truths. Purvis captures the slow, suffocating dread of mob mentality with precision, and the story’s ambiguity only adds to its impact. The ending, in particular, was brilliantly timed and left me thinking for a long time and will no doubt continue to do so.
I did wish for a bit more character development between the sisters to deepen the emotional weight, but honestly, that’s a small gripe in an otherwise powerful story.
If you’re drawn to unsettling, quietly furious stories about the societal cost of misogyny, and don’t mind a bit of weirdness, The Hounding is a short, sharp read you won’t soon forget.
Many thanks to NetGalley, Henry Holt and Co., and Xenobe Purvis for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

Misogyny, class, and a drought-ridden summer collide in this literary tale about five sisters in an eighteenth-century English village whose neighbors become convinced they’re turning into dogs. In a format reminiscent of “The Virgin Suicides”, we never get the perspective of the Mansfield girls themselves as paranoia heightens around them, we see them only through the eyes of the men who—whether they love them or hate them—are unsettled by their difference. The expectations placed on the girls, and their diversions from them, drive conflicting feelings in these men, and heighten tension until it becomes real horror.
The prose in this story was beautifully done and the format served the plot extremely well. I found the themes to be slightly heavy-handed at times. But overall, I thought this story was a well-executed take on the dangers of misogyny and a lovely debut!

I feel like I really loved the concept of this one, but not the execution. The idea of seeing the girls' story through the townsfolk's points of view was really cool, but I don't think the girls interested me enough to make up for it.

decent writing, i feel i really enjoyed this but i think the comparisons of to virgin suicides made me have a different idea of what it was going to be. either way i loved the read

A simple morality tale that you've kind of read before. The story is told from maybe to many perspectives but they each add depth to the story that is necessary because the plot is thin. I wasn't ever quite bored but I didn't feel very intrigued by the story either. Still it's a solid novel that I can see many enjoying.

This seamless blend of Virgin Suicides and The Crucible was expertly executed among a fresh and yet familiar setting. Unreasonable hatred towards young women fuels the plot and..... WHEW!
The five Mansfield girls are each unique and special, but their biggest crime is behaving like it. The ferryman's obsession with them triggers an absurd series of events, bring unsettling rumors to the surface.
I really enjoyed this novel, and Purvis' writing style. Her portrayals of the girls through different villagers' eyes painted an incredibly layered and nuanced picture. As a 21st century young women, I related to the Mansfield girls and I felt as though I knew and understood each of the other characters.

The Hounding is a debut novel by Xenobe Purvis that chronicles a particularly sweltering summer in a 17th-century English village, where a rumor spreads that a group of standoffish and rebellious young sisters are transforming into dogs. We alternate within the heads of several other members of the community, from the girls’ loving and blind grandfather and caretaker, to a love-struck boy helping on the farm, to the kind-hearted childless bartender appropriately named Temperance, as everyone struggles to make sense of these five weird girls, and yet never actually see from their perspectives.
The metaphor of women as dogs is obvious - with even recent cultural touchstones as the book-turned-movie Nightbitch and Sabrina Carpenter’s upcoming album Man’s Best Friend floating around the culture. With that premise along, I came into the book expecting an unsettling tale of paranoia, fearmongering, body horror, and the ways women are forced into submissive roles in society and will be in turn demonized for straining against them. What I got was…essentially that, with lots of the color drained out. There's not much horror here, not much vivid imagery, not much energy at all, like the book itself is too tired from the heat to do much more than shrug.
It’s not that the book is bad, per se - everything is perfectly competent, and yet I never could tell what about this version of this idea compelled Purvis to write it. It’s a blunt metaphor, simply assembled and pointed to, without any new angle or insight. Nowhere is this bluntness more evident than in it’s central villain figure: the mysogynistic, likely gay and repressed drunkard Pete. Pete never thinks in anything other than the most obvious, unsubtle ways possible. This isn’t to say that the world isn’t filled with Petes - it definitely is - but every time we slip into his head he’s only thinking the most pointed “I hate women and myself!” thoughts. He, like most other people in this story, aren’t really characters in a grounded psychological drama. They stand in for various ways to be positioned within the confines of gendered expectations: the parental figure who loves their daughters’ idiosyncrises but tries to rid them of it because the world won’t let them have it, the well wishing older woman who loves their bravery but is powerless to stop the town’s anger, the boy who actually likes these strange girls but can’t concieve of them outside his romantic intentions. This would be okay if the book was going for more of a surreal, mythic atmosphere, but as it stands, it’s a lukewarm middle ground between realism and mythic that fails to have the strengths of either.
The Hounding just never achieves anything beyond what its initial premise promises. A group of young girls are incoherently different from the restrictive world around them, and the petty judgments of their fellow townsfolk turn from dislike to fear to violence. It’s a spare novel with simple prose that leaves any confirmation of actual supernatural transformation vague. Personally, I find these kinds of stories boring and cowardly. It’s like several generations of writers feel that it’s too gauche to portray the supernatural, so they have to leave us like the spinning top at the end of Inception, forever caught beween a dull reality and a winking dream. It just leaves me cold, wondering what was the point of the whole endeavor.
This review has ended up being a little harsher than maybe I intended originally. Like I said before, I think the book is perfectly competent, but it sits as an example of a type of book I’m just not much interested in.
Rating: ** 1/2
The Hounding is set to publish August 5th, 2025.
Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts expressed are my own.

I wasn’t sure what to expect going into The Hounding, but it completely drew me in. The narrator's dry wit and sharp observations hooked me from the first few pages—there’s something so satisfying about a mystery told with intelligence and just the right touch of humor. I found myself highlighting lines not just for plot clues, but because they made me feel something—curiosity, tension, even amusement.
The atmosphere was one of my favorite parts: eerie without being overdone, and grounded in emotional realism. There’s a subtle thread of grief and identity running through the story that really resonated with me, and made the mystery feel more personal and layered. The pacing dragged just slightly in the middle, but it didn’t take away from my enjoyment overall.
If you like a good mystery with a literary feel and a narrator who isn’t afraid to call things like she sees them, The Hounding is worth picking up. I’ll definitely be keeping an eye out for more by this author.

The Mansfield sisters have always been viewed as a strange in their community, and now the village is convinced they are turning into dogs...

I absolutely loved this!!
This storyline is such a unique read.
I cannot wait to buy my finished copy!

This interesting upcoming novel is one I read a few weeks ago and it continues to take up space in my brain. I just cannot quit thinking about it. A blend of The Crucible and The Virgin Suicides, yet completely original, this novel set in 18th century England, looks at how destructive jealousy can be and how easily the spark of a rumor can spread into a raging and destructive inferno.
I really enjoyed this strange little book. Singular and distinctive, filled with haunting atmosphere and well drawn characters, I was captured by this story. It is a feminist cry to be valued for who we are and not for what society and the patriarchy demands of us. Powerful and universal ideas wrapped up in beautiful prose mingled with elements of folklore, I believe this one will linger with me for years to come. Thank you to @netgalley and @henryholtbooks for this arc.

The Hounding is an interesting read, sold as a combination of the crucible and the virgin suicides, which I guess, but that’s a little blunt. This is a thoroughly feminist narrative set in a small Oxfordshire town in the 18th century during a drought. Misogyny runs wild in this book and in such interesting ways. Told from the POV of those surrounding the five orphaned sisters that anchor the narrative, there is a sense of voyeurism that is both unsettling and fascinating. Purvis is able to set a story centuries in the past, mostly to make comments about modern society. We are one phrase away from these men calling themselves “high value men,” as they drink and gossip and fail at basic tasks.
I really enjoyed this book. It was all the good kinds of weird with a dose of what we as women endure. I think this would be a really interesting read paired with Rachel Yoder’s Nightbitch. One that is completely told from the outside, one from the inside and yet we are all just bitches...

This story has that shimmery, hot feeling that happens at the peak of summer.
Billed as The Crucible meets The Virgin Suicides, this story is seen through the eyes of inhabitants of a small Eighteenth century village and the five girls that are the center of town gossip.
I fell on this story and devoured it. I enjoyed the quirky Mansfield sister and immediately started rooting for them. This book has a large cast of characters. The author fleshed each character out and made them interesting. The changing perspective lets us see in the hearts of the girls and the villagers that judge or defend them. It’s unique and clever and beautifully written.
4.5 rounded up to 5. Perfect reading for the dog days of summer!
Thank you to NetGalley and Henry Holt Publishing for the eARC!