Between work assignments, Sam goes to spend a few months with her mother in the house where she grew up. Sam’s brother has expressed concern about their mother’s recent behavior, and Sam is equally alarmed when she arrives. Her mother has lost a lot of weight. She’s redecorated the house to look like it did before Sam’s grandmother passed away, and she’s started to care about the things Gran Mae emphasized when she was alive. Worst of all, though, is the constant fear on her mother’s face. Sam is afraid her mother is suffering from delayed grief, or dementia, or something, because the alternative – that her dead grandmother is haunting the house – is just too impossible to consider.

Wow. There is so much imagination in this one, set on a background of the most suburban mundane you can imagine. I had no idea where the story was headed. Creepy, but funny, and then…well, off the rails. Does anyone remember that one weird taste of lemon cake book? Where the girl could taste the emotions the person cooking felt while cooking? Then the weird stuff started happening to the brother (won’t say re: spoilers) that was entirely unpredictable? Well, it’s completely bizarre like that, except not whole cloth out of left field like that brother, and this book’s oddities were much, much creepier. Horror, without the gore, and with all the WTFuckery.

And having Mary Robinette Kowal as the narrator – oy, she was good! She could lean heavily into the soft North Carolinian accent without overdoing it, and her little “mew” during the horror portions? *shudder* Excellent choice of narration!

Honestly, I probably listened to this book WAY too fast once we got to the cliff-edge of this story. I was still processing what the heckers was happening when more began to happen, and more, and more. An avalanche of bizarre, inexplicable moments that had no right to exist in a very real world. I have so many questions, and I don’t know if maybe I missed the answers to them in my rush to absorb the story as fast as possible, or if they were meant to be unknowable. Either way, this is another of those books that I’ll definitely be rereading in the future! Kingfisher is proving herself a master storyteller!