3 stars

I’m not sure if I enjoyed this book or not. I do like the concept, but I feel like a a lot was lost in translation. Or maybe I just wasn’t in the proper frame of mind to truly immerse myself in this one. It wasn’t boring it just didn’t grab me the way I had hoped.
Also maybe I’m missing something as I didn’t know there was a first book.
I’ll probably give it another try after reading the first one later on.

I went into this book blind having not heard anything of the first book. I found this book to be interesting; however, I feel as though the mystery of the book was explained very quickly and there was no ability of the reader to try to "solve" anything it was already done for you. It was engaging and I did like the style of the lost spaces within the houses, I do wish it had been a bit more atmospheric and mysterious. Immediately following this book, I did read the first book and found it to be quite different in tone, which makes me believe that the second book was more of a translation issue regarding tone than anything involving the story. Altogether, I did enjoy it and enjoyed it enough to read the first. If there is a third book, I will also read that as well. The book was quick and fun to read.

Thank you to Netgalley and HarperVia for providing this free arc in exchange for my review!

As someone who has read the manga adaptation of this story I went in kind of knowing what I was going into but this ends up being better than the manga that is based on it. Not quite scary but definitely unsettling and the whole idea of the strange floor plan causing a mystery is a very unique premise.

Strange Houses is one of the most uniquely written books I’ve ever read. I felt the exact same way when I read Strange Pictures by Uketsu. This author’s writing style just sucks you in and has you flipping page after to page to get to the bottom of the mystery. I was instantly sucked into this strange story about a houses floor plan. At first glance it’s just a floor plan but upon further review the strangeness begins to come out. I was intrigued in the beginning but by the middle a lot of it felt to crazy to believe. Turns out the ending was insane. I felt left wanting more. I felt like I never truly grasped what was going on. There are a ton of different characters introduced at the end that also threw me off. Overall I still really liked this one. Something about this author’s writing style will always have me coming back for more. It’s a reading experience like no other.
3/5 Stars

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

Uketsu is a master of writing the twisty mystery. A cozy fun read for a dark and windy night that will leave you scratching your head and hoping the author writes their next book fast!

This was another fun one from Uketsu! I loved "Strange Pictures," and this one was on my most anticipated list as soon as I saw it was coming out.

This story follows the puzzling architecture of a house and what that architecture might suggest about the people who live there.

Straight away, I'll say that when comparing directly to "Strange Pictures," this one falls a little short. I found that the shifting perspectives of "Strange Pictures," helped inform the reader of past events, and what role our characters played in them, without it feeling too convoluted. To me, the biggest struggle of "Strange Houses," is that it relies a lot on characters in the current story line telling stories that take us to a different time line, while then jumping back to the current timeline and then making more jumps to different characters, back and forth. The story telling just felt a little clunky and confusing, sometimes.

Having said that; the story is a fun and engaging one. It still felt reminiscent of "Strange Pictures," and I do think that fans of that novel will enjoy this one.

Thanks to Harpervia and NetGalley for this arc

SURPRISE
INCEST
and I’m not tagging it as a spoiler because it’s not important to the plot. Just an odd incest worm in a …. Red delicious apple of a book.

look you know how in improve you say yes and? That what this book was.

It’s mostly dialogue and most of the dialogue goes a bit like this.!

Person A: what if THIS OUTLANDISH THING HAPPEND

Person B: yup that must be it I can’t think of a single objection to that!

Me as a reader: uh,.. sure. Ok. Why not.

It’s certainly interesting and if someone told me it was their favorite book I would believe them. I also probably wouldn’t ask them for book recommendations. I’m pretty sure this has a manga and that might have been a better formula.

I will say I put another book by this author on my library’s hold like 10 pages in so it is compelling.

I didn't realize when I started reading this that is book is what the manga by this author is based on. I actually read the manga before I read this so that took away a little of the mystery and suspense of this book but that my fault. That being said I still really enjoyed reading this as a novel. Also when I read the manga I really enjoyed the twist and turns I just accidentally spoiled myself for the books.

“Uketsu’s real name and identity are unknown. He only ever appears online, wearing a mask and speaking through a voice changer. His innovative mysteries challenge readers to discover the hidden clues in a series of sinister drawings.”

Our narrator, a freelance author, is consulted by a friend because he "know[s] a lot about weird things." The friend is looking to buy a house with a strange dead space in the kitchen. A small place has been purposely built out, but with no access it appears to have no purpose. The narrator meets with an architect friend, Kurihara, to try to figure out its purpose. After examining the house plans, Kurihara finds more abnormalities. Why on earth would a children's room be built without windows? Or double doors for entry? The pair begin hypothesizing and decide that the house was built to commit murder.

This was so damn weird. It's vaguely reminiscent of Danielewski's House of Leaves, although I don't know if I can pinpoint exactly why. Then it abruptly turns into a weird family tale of loss, curses, and secrets. I'm honestly not sure what I just read. But I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Thanks to Netgalley and HarperVia for the eARC of Strange Houses by Uketsu.

Strange Houses is about an author that is on a speculative journey to understand a house with a very peculiar floor plan. His research leads him into a rabbit hole of one family's dark and violent history. Themes in this book include misplaced tradition, family curses, spiritualism, murder, and secrets.
This was a spooky book! There is a Russian doll element to this story, and at first it reminded me of House of Leaves. The blueprints and family trees were helpful in visualizing what the author/main characters were referencing. The format of this book reads almost like a transcript of an interview, which makes you feel like you're digging into the mystery alongside the author.
Another element of this story that adds to the intrigue is that the author Uketsu's actual identity is unknown. He remains anonymous and appears only online wearing a mask and speaking through a voice changer. I have not read Uketsu's other novel, Strange Pictures, but I want to after reading this one.

Thank you, Uketsu NetGalley, for the ARC. I leave this review voluntarily and happily. Also, thank you publishers for your hard work!

Another phenomenal book. I loved the first one, and this one didn't disappoint at all. It's just as unique as the first book. I live them pictures and drawings that are put in the book as you get a better understanding of what's being talked about. Plus, you are also trying to figure out the mystery that's going on. I love the writing style that this is. Yes, I understand that this was translated to English, but even so, it's refreshing in a way to me. I did have a hard time at one point following who was who, but going back, i got myself caught back up again. This is a book I couldn't put down as I needed to know what was going on with the houses. It was just amazing how it all turned out.

There are some strange unknown spaces in some floorplans. What do they mean, and what are they? Throughout these pages, you will learn more than you may want about these houses and the family that lived inside of them. Plus, the people looking into them are they truly safe? Read and find out.

This writer continues to send out amazing work. I hope to see more in the future as they have me as a permanent fan. I love the mysteries and strangeness they put into the books. It makes me crave more each time I pick up one of their books. This book definitely earth each of its stars.

I adored Strange Pictures, but this one paled in comparison

Strange Houses is a mystery novel about the floor plans of houses, uncovering a multigenerational tale of a Japanese family. The story starts when a friend of a writer, who's a fan of the macabre, is considering buying a house in Tokyo and asks for the writer's opinion, sending him the floor plan. The writer decides to get a second opinion from a friend who's an architect, and together, they realise that this floor plan is very strange indeed. They come up with a few hypotheses about the family who lived there based on the layout of the rooms.

I was really excited to read this book, after loving Strange Pictures, but I was left feeling quite deflated. I didn't think the conclusions made from the floor plans were believable; they felt very far-fetched because there wasn't enough evidence in the floor plans to support them. Given that this was the very premise of the novel, it made the whole narrative feel out of reach for me. I really liked the concept of this story, but I ended up not being a fan of its execution.

Thank you very much to HarperVia and NetGalley for the e-ARC!

An insidious familial mystery, I had a lot of fun with Uketsu’s previous work Strange Pictures—particularly the way illustrations and diagrams were an integral part of the storytelling, rather than being relegated to superfluous, mood-building art. So I was eagerly awaiting the Western translation of his follow-up, Strange Houses, and I have to say—this one is even more up my alley!

My affinity for Strange Houses is perhaps partially personal. As someone who studied architecture, I’ve always found floor plans fascinating—constructed in objective lines and symbols, stripped of personality, and viewed from a godlike, all-seeing perspective far removed from actual human experience. There’s something inherently ominous and eerily utilitarian about them. Strange Pictures leans into that feeling—by simply adding or removing lines from a drawing, the space transforms, revealing hidden rooms and pathways for the perpetrator to commit their crimes.

Narratively, Strange Houses is much more streamlined, presented as a singular storyline rather than the fractured-yet-interconnected anthology format of Strange Pictures (which I found unnecessarily convoluted). If I were to nitpick, while the reveal in Strange Houses lands thematically, it’s so deeply rooted in generational family ties that the sheer effort of tracking how everyone is related—especially with all the Japanese names—slightly dulls the impact of the climax. It’s ironically the one case where a family tree diagram would’ve been useful (laugh)! Lastly, the resolution remains fairly open-ended (even the novel itself points out that some questions are still unanswered). While I personally enjoy this kind of ambiguous closure, I know it might not be everyone’s cup of tea.

Overall, Strange Houses is another strong entry in Uketsu’s unique mixed-media mystery catalog. I believe there’s already a sequel out in Japanese—here’s hoping the publisher brings it to translation soon!

It's an OK read, but not as good as Strange Pictures. I don't know if the translation is to blame, but the dialogues seemed very forced.

4.5 rounded up because I'm such a sucker for horror books that feel like low budget cult classic films. Reading this literally feels like watching an early 2000s Japanese horror film on YouTube. It's almost cozy in its eerieness.

I LOVE this author. Their writing is fantastic, and it always keeps me on edge. And that tid bit at the end?! Chefs kiss*

A nameless narrator gets roped into examining floor plans for his friend's potential house purchase, only to discover bizarre "dead spaces" hidden between the walls. With his architect buddy, he embarks on a puzzling investigation where they stare at diagrams and somehow leap to wild conclusions from almost nothing. The prose has that mechanical quality I've come to expect from Japanese translations - not unpleasant, just that distinctive flat-affect style I've noticed over years of reading translated works. The characters possess about as much personality as the floor plans they're analyzing, serving mainly as vehicles for the puzzle-solving. Their eye-rolling, far-fetched deductions in the face of minimal evidence was utterly ridiculous, but the sheer absurdity of it all kept me turning pages. I'd honestly be more interested in checking out the manga adaptation, which probably makes the diagram-heavy mystery solving more visually engaging than reading conversations about floor plans.

How awesome to get to dive right back into another unsettling story by Uketsu. This one unnerved me even more than Strange Pictures. The theories of the secret passages, an imprisoned child, murders and dismemberment. This definitely works better as a physical book rather than eBook but still an incredibly engaging reading experience. I want more of these books! I recommend you read Strange Pictures and Strange Houses in one sitting. Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC

I did not, unlike the majority of the population, read Strange Pictures when it came out. I have since bought it. I really enjoyed the writing style of the interviews interwoven with the floorplans. I think that even in the digital version, this formatting did a really good job with the images, showing them overlayed on one another. I think that in some cases the interviews were difficult to parse, specifically in that the names (to the left of the transcription) were centered amid the words and not at the very top (at least the way it appeared on my phone) and sometimes I realized part of the way through a paragraph that a sentence was spoken by the next person.

I think that this book was really fun and really spooky from the beginning. I did think it was a bit of a jump that the first guess would be a murder through internal passageways and that that theory would be accepted so readily. That felt a bit off either tonally or pacing-wise (sometimes the tonal nature of non-American works do feel that way as well to me so I could chock it up to that). But I do enjoy a creepypasta-esque horror, and had a lovely time reading the book.

It did take me a while to finish the book as I was so disturbed (as someone who lives in an older house with an odd layout) by the idea of what lay in the dead spaces that I was unable to read at nighttime (when everything feels much more real). This, to me, is the hallmark of a good horror novel, and I am really glad that I picked this up. I hope to read more from Uketsu in the future

Reading Strange Houses by Uketsu felt like stepping into a dream—and not the comforting kind. More like the kind where everything looks familiar at first, but you can’t quite explain why it feels wrong. It’s eerie, disorienting, and quietly horrifying in a way that crept under my skin and stayed there long after I closed the book.

Each story revolves around a different house, but they’re not just settings—they're living, shifting things. Uketsu has a talent for turning the mundane into the terrifying. Hallways stretch too far. Rooms lead to places that shouldn’t exist. And behind every door is the feeling that something wants you to open it.

What really impressed me was the emotional undercurrent beneath the horror. These houses aren’t just strange for the sake of being strange—they reflect grief, guilt, loneliness, obsession. There’s a melancholy at the heart of each story that makes the horror hit harder. It's not just about being scared; it's about confronting something you're not ready to name.

Uketsu’s storytelling is minimal but deliberate. The language is clean, almost sparse at times, which only makes the creeping dread more effective. There’s no over-explaining, no forced jump scares—just a slow, sinking feeling that nothing is quite what it seems.

Strange Houses isn’t a traditional horror collection. It’s more psychological, more atmospheric—less about gore or monsters and more about what’s hiding in plain sight. If you enjoy stories that feel like urban legends whispered at night, or if you like your horror with a side of existential unease, this is absolutely worth your time.

I’ll never look at a hallway—or a house— quite the same way again.