One thought on “The Evening Spider”

1. Fascinating true historical mystery told in diary epistolary format, interspersed with contemporary 1st person narration, both about newly married women with infants living in the same house Sounds complicated, but it wasn t once I got into it then it ended up keeping me turning pages late into the night Loved, loved, loved how it all turned out.

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2. 1885, Northampton Lunatic Hospital Frances Bernett is retelling her story to a visitor Frances is a young wife and a mother who started to question her memories and her sanity after her child was born Could her pregnancy have hurt her sanity And, her obsession with the true murder trial of Mary Stannard seems a bit odd.Present day Abby is a new mother and she has adjusted to motherhood just fine, but then she starts to have odd experiences in her house It feels like there is something, someone i [...]

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3. I won t add a book to my to read list unless it has an average rating of 3.9 stars or higher The exceptions are a if it s the start of a series and the ratings get better for consecutive books or b the book just sounds so interesting I just HAVE TO add it this is rare Obviously, this book fell under B It just sounded so good, I just had to give it a chance And it had a great cover Great cover, great premise, it has to be good, right Sadly, no This book was NOT a thriller, it was not suspenseful, [...]

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4. Three stars An interesting read that falters with an abrupt ending and unconnected story lines Abby is a new mother, living in an old house She fell in love with the quaint old home that had been in the same family for 125 years, but now, she isn t so sure about her house Abby has been hearing strange sounds on her daughter s baby monitor, and she has the unsettling feeling that she isn t alone in her home When she starts digging, Abby comes into possession of a journal, written by Frances Barne [...]

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5. Do you like spooky houses and historical murders and mysteries Then this is the book for you Abby is a new mother in a big home, and she thinks things are going well, until she starts to develop strange sensations that seem to be tied the house In investigating the house s history, she reads the diary of one of its former occupants, Frances Barnett, who was later an inmate at a mental institution Is the ghost of Frances behind the strange happenings Told from the perspective of both women, The E [...]

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6. I had been researching my family history in 16th century connecticut and then picked up this galley that had been on my nightstand waiting for the perfect time to be read It was the perfect time Based on an actual murder trial this book consisted of many things I love a haunted house, an unreliable narrator, diary entries, newspaper clippings, meetings at a library A perfect package

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7. The Evening Spider is an engaging read I loved a lot of its parts the mystery pertaining to several old court cases Frances psychotic break Abby s pending breakdown a haunting a dead woman s journal actual court documents the novel told from two different perspectives from two different lifetimes This is fascinating read for sure.But the sum of all its parts left me frowning Frances seems to be a huge catalyst to Abby s own issues But that became evident towards the end So there are actually th [...]

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8. Somewhat disappointing unresolved sort of ghost story and what felt like a very abrupt ending.

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9. Find my full review at aliteraryvacation.When I read the synopsis for The Evening Spider I immediately reached out to the wonderful ladies at TLC Book Tours and asked to please be a part of this tour It had so many elements I love in one package historical setting and true crime psychological suspense possibly ghosts with nefarious plans creeping around a creaky old house, terrifying a new mom Jackpot Now having finished I m a little torn about how I feel about the story overall Did I enjoy it V [...]

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11. 3.5 starsI love Emily Arsenault s books They re incredibly creepy and also incredibly smart This one is sort of a ghost story, and it s actually chilling.There s so much going on in The Evening Spider that it s actually hard to discuss in any detail without the risk of spoiling things So here s what I can say I very much like Abby and empathized with what was going on with her.Because of the way this is written, I had some very real questions about what was really happening and what was in Abby [...]

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12. I will admit that when I began this novel, I had high hopes for it The buildup was slow yet enticing and I was eager to see how the story would unfold Unfortunately, this novel let me down big time The I read, the I felt like Abby was simply delusional Most of the time, nothing was even happening to her and she created the eerie situation through her own actions Just as the novel begins to pick up the pace, it starts to go in a weird direction that just seems rushed and abruptly ends While eve [...]

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13. Emily Arsenault is a new to me author and the cover of this book caught my eye and when I read that it had an element of the paranormal, specifically ghosts, I wanted to read it Despite all of the pretty negative reviews, I actually liked the book I didn t have trouble following the two different narrators and time frames, Frances in the 1880 s and Abby in the present BUT reading the journal written by Frances in the 1880 s Maybe that is where readers became confused I admit that at first when A [...]

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14. I enjoyed this book very much I ve read a couple of Emily Arsenault s books, and her characters are always complex and relatable, especially the two women in THE EVENING SPIDER It combines true crime from the 1800s with a modern day ghost story There are two young mothers living in the same house than a century apart, a secret diary, a grizzly murder, and troubled ghosts trying to make contact I loved the spooky Gothic atmosphere, and trying to figure out who was doing the haunting, and what be [...]

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15. I ve added this to my fav shelf I know this is suppose to be a ghost story but I m not sure if it s a literal ghost story or a figurative one I feel that Abby was dealing with grief over the loss of Wendy and her grief in a sense turned Into a ghost The bruise on Lucy , the phrase she kept hearing all seem to be grief Francis on the other hand was haunted by the secret she found on her husband which ultimately found her in the asylum The fact the Abby and her family live in the same house worked [...]

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16. I m a sucker for descriptions like the one for this book A gripping blend of psychological suspense and historical true crime This book is not gripping Nor is it suspenseful in any way It s pretty much drivel Abandoned about halfway through.

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17. Creepy at times, a tiny ghost story with a tad conflicting story line but overall a fun read.

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18. Review orginally posted on my blog literaryfeline 2016 01The Evening Spider by Emily ArsenaultWilliam Morrow, 2016Fiction Psychological Thriller 400 pgsSource NetGalley EdelweissThe Evening Spider is set in both the present and the past, following the lives of two women, both obsessed with uncovering the truth.Frances Barnett has spent the last few years locked in the Northampton Lunatic Hospital She shares her story with a visitor, telling of how she came to be there, including her marriage to [...]

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19. A few years ago, I read Emily Arsenault s novel What Strange Creatures and loved the brother sister sibling relationship at its core Her latest novel, The Evening Spider, has a sibling relationship in it as well, although that is not the central issue of the story as it was in What Strange Creatures.The inspiration for this story came from the author hearing what she thought was human voice over her daughter s baby monitor shushing the baby She combined this with an interest in the true story of [...]

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20. Abby is a new mom with time on her hands When she first hears the strange noise through her baby monitor, she s quick to attribute it to anything and everything she can Anything but a ghost, that is But after eliminating the possibilities, she begins to wonder A history teacher, Abby was charmed by the fact that their house dated back over a century What s , the house had been in the same family for much of that time before she and her husband bought it But now she wonders about the house and th [...]

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21. Most of this story baffled me What was the need for the ghost specter And, that odd woman named Fonda There are layers of historic murders in this tale, some with too much gruesome detail i.e the victim being dissected to use as evidence in the trial Later we learn that the woman who s husband placed her in an asylum had witnessed her husband cutting himself to collect blood apparently used to frame a neighbor for a murder where he was one of the prosecuting attorneyswhat a scumbag But, why on e [...]

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22. I was a bit uninterested in this the first few chapters, which can sometimes be a no go for the rest of the book for me, but I am SO glad I pushed on with this one as it turned out to be a really good book The jumping between time period was made better due to the fact that the current character was reading about the past character from her journal The supernatural element was done with a deft hand, with just a touch here and there to make you wonder as you sat on the edge of your seat This is a [...]

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23. I really liked this book all the way through until the end It held my attention which is difficult to do these days I am rating it a 4 because I loved it until the very end.The end seemed rushed and left me with questions 1 What did Florabelle have to do with anything It seemed important enough to be mentioned several times but then nothing ever happens with it.2 If the spirit upstairs is Frances, what is the entity downstairs 3 It seems as though Frances accepts the situation with her daughter [...]

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24. The premise of the book was interesting The interspersal of past and present, two women who lived in the same house and might have both been suffering postpartum depression was interesting The information on the old murders and their trials, the new techniques being developed in forensic science in the 1800s compared with what we can do today was fascinating The whole book had the potential to be really phenomenal But for me, the writing fell short It didn t hold my interest the way it should ha [...]

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25. I m really surprised that I managed to fall asleep last night because this book was terrifying.One storyline is set in 2014 and the other in the 1870 1880 s This book reminded me of Charlotte Perkins Gilman s The Yellow Wallpaper There is a bit of gothic suspense that involves a real life murder ,a ghostly prescence and a woman locked away in a lunatic asylum I was equally terrified for both Abby and Francis It was difficult to split this into reading over the span of two days when I wanted to f [...]

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26. I literally don t understand what happened in this book The premise and beginning were fantastic, but I literally have no idea who was haunting the house, what happened to the baby Martha, and what the unspeakable thing was that Frances did, which were some of the main themes of this book.If someone has read this and understood it please spoil it and explain it to me I definitely missed something I ve never been so disappointed in a book, or felt like I completely wasted so much of my time.

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27. Started off well, but didn t wrap everything up to my liking I had a hard time following the multiple story lines, especially since the Frances story line bounced between the journal and her telling her story to her brother The timeline was confusing at times I felt like the Abby story line just ended without a proper conclusion Disappointing read overall.

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28. 2.5 stars This book is a combo of a historical novel and ghost story it should be everything I love a found journal Suspense A historical crime However, it lacked any good resolution and had too many plot points that were never explained Disappointed, despite the great subject matter.

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29. Deceptively simple, but I stayed up until the wee hours to finish it Nice description of being a new mother The writing is fairly straightforward.

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30. This is a very out of the box, scary, illuminating book So glad times have changed cuz so many women I know would be in the loony bin Very cool that Arsenault based the story on a true case.

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