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Averie reviews the riveting tale, House of Hollow, in all of its disturbing, gory glory.
Book Review: HOUSE OF HOLLOW
By Averie Black
Warning: This review contains major spoilers for House of Hollow and contains minor descriptions of gore.
House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland is a dark fairytale wrapped in feminine energy. This book currently has 4.07 stars on Goodreads and over 42k ratings. In addition, it was on the shortlist for the YA Book Prize and became a New York Times Best Seller. House of Hollow is about the three sisters, Iris, Vivi and Grey who mysteriously disappeared as children and came back with no memory and strange abilities. Years later, the oldest sibling, Grey, once again vanished-- leaving her little sisters to solve the mystery of where she went and what happened to them as kids. This is one of the most enthralling books of the post-COVID era and deserves some more recognition.
Regarding the tone of House of Hollow– it is very dark. Though beautifully written, there are many uncomfortable flashbacks, with the girls eating cat food like wild animals or sleeping with their fingers on each other's pulses. Sutherland does a wonderful job of creating an uneasy atmosphere fit for the horror tag put on the book. However, the book never takes itself too seriously. The girls have a sarcastic, dark sense of humor that would poke at the absurdity of the situations they were put into. One particular character, Tyler, could be pointed to as the comic relief with his overdramatic narcissism, expensive taste and acknowledgment of being the only sane person who was roped into the Hollow girls’ story. The writing is smooth and venomous with lush descriptions of freakish dresses and disgusting details of gore. The use of flowers, fashion and the fact that the story is centered around the relationships between the three sisters makes the tone seem very focused on dark femininity. One of the most memorable, chilling quotes from House of Hollow comes from Iris talking about Grey walking in revealing clothing at night: “She moved through the world like no other woman I knew.” Because of how strange the plot and characters are written, the tone seems effortlessly beautiful.
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The book was never boring, and even in some of the more mundane chapters, there was enough disturbing imagery or nasty flashback scenes to make every chapter feel action-packed. Normally, it takes a few chapters to become enthralled with a story, but from chapter one the book had already sunk its teeth into the reader. It is a fast book and semi-short with a total of 304 pages but nothing feels rushed for even a second.
"My sisters. My Blood. My skin. What a gruesome bond we shared."
Image by William Warby on Flickr
There are four main characters: Iris, Vivi, Grey and Tyler-- Iris being the protagonist. Iris is the youngest Hollow sister. She is quiet, school-orientated and obedient, which makes her character arc even more satisfying. Throughout the events of the book, she comes into her own power, using it to overcome her tormentors and become the strong person she wanted to be, rejecting the brutal strength her sister was pushing on her. Iris's arc was done well and painfully. It took discovering who Grey truly is to let go of everyone’s opinions of her and to use her power in her own way. Iris is easy to relate to because she is the most realistic of the Hollow girls. She is a wonderful person to attach to anyone who considers themselves quiet or a doormat.
Arguably, the second most important character is Grey, the eldest Hollow sibling. She is the mysterious big sister that has always known her power. Grey walks down alleys at night, goes out partying, gets into fights with their mom, writes essays on what she's interested in instead of what was assigned, and eventually dropped out of high school to become a famous model. She is willing to do anything for her sisters. Unfortunately, the “anything” part is taken into insane territory. Grey is a static character who doesn’t really change over the course of the story, but that's okay because that is the point of her character. She is the type of person who is willing to do horrible acts for a noble cause. Grey, despite her quirks, felt like a real girl that came with these strange powers.
The middle sister, Vivi, felt the flattest. She felt a little more like a caricature and was the character who got the least attention. Her character was also static, but with the amount of life-changing events that took place during the book, she also should have been affected in some way. This could have just been because Iris was the narrator of the story, but even through Vivi’s actions and dialogue, she didn’t seem as affected as she should have been. Her personality seems to be centered around this punk rock, bad girl with a tragic backstory stereotype. Vivi’s character could have been more fleshed out especially since her sister’s personalities were so strong. Tyler is the most enjoyable character. He’s the only male lead and Grey’s boyfriend. Tyler is used very cleverly to lift the serious mood to something lighter. He’s a well-rounded character that uses a lot of sarcastic narcissism while having many people and things he cares about. When he dies at the end of the book, he even accepts his death and tells Iris not to tell Grey about him being present as a ghost to prevent Grey from trying to resurrect him. The characters, despite Vivi’s flatness, were all very charming and any reader would come to care for them.
"I cried because my mother thought my sister was dangerous and I cried because a part of me knew it was true."
While there is a romantic relationship between Tyler and Grey, the sisterhood between the girls was the main dynamic. They are uncomfortably close-- sleeping in the same bed, sensing where each other has been, and even pointing out that Iris was obsessed with Grey when she was younger. Iris used to track all of Grey’s movements and mimic her. She even broke her finger with a hammer because Grey broke her pinky. The strange closeness of the girls really adds to the creepy-crawly sensation of House of Hollow. Since Grey was missing for most of the book, the relationship between the girls had to be conveyed through flashbacks and word of mouth. It was not as effective as it could have been, but due to the nature of the plot, Sutherland did the best with what she had. The relationship between Vivi and Iris was a little shaky since one of the quirks about the girls is that all three of them need to be together in order to feel a sense of completion. While Iris and Vivi are out on the town together, Iris is thinking, “It almost felt strange to spend time alone with my middle sister, just the two of us… whenever we met up, it was almost always the three of us together.” However, it does not come off as if the same would be true for Grey and Iris. Due to Iris’s slight obsession with her oldest sister, it seems like Vivi and Iris are not as close as they claim to be.
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Tyler and Grey, who have the only romantic relationship in the book, are also a little unsettling. Both Vivi and Iris kiss Tyler. When it came to Iris, Tyler reciprocated the affection and allowed the kiss to go on for a while before reminding her he is in love with her sister. Grey’s manipulative personality makes it seem like she’s only with Tyler because he is not affected by their powers. She also was not a very good girlfriend, disappearing for days at a time without telling anyone and refusing to share anything about her past with him. On the flip side, Tyler’s first instinct upon Grey’s disappearance is that she must be cheating on him and to throw a drunken hissy fit. Their relationship does not seem to be the healthiest, as are most relationships when one member is a changeling lying about who they really are.
"'This seemed like such a good and noble idea ten minutes ago," Tyler said. "I forgot that I'm not a good or noble person."'
Image by Picryl
Sutherland makes the reader want to root for the Hollow sisters. However, there is always this nagging intuition to not trust them. Most avid readers are conditioned to believe the main characters are the good guys defeating the bad guys, but since the very beginning, the siblings are not painted as the heroes of the story. This struggle pays off when the big twist comes– they aren’t the good guys, they aren’t even the Hollow sisters, they are the monsters that drew little girls into the Limbo-like wasteland they came from. There was not a ton of foreshadowing, at least not the kind where readers could piece everything together before all is revealed. When Iris sees something growing out of her scar, she uses Grey’s knife to dig it out, revealing something grotesque just below, “It was skin, I realized as I leaned in for a better look. More skin. A second layer beneath my own…” Yes, this is technically foreshadowing. However, no one is going to read that and think, oh yeah obviously they were sewn into someone else's skin. The foreshadowing could have been a little more aggressive, but the plot twist was not completely out of the blue so that is a major plus. One of the more heartbreaking twists was that their mother, or as they called her, Cate, knew that they were not her daughters. Regardless, she still loved them like they were her own. When Iris, Vivi and Cate finally reunited, it was a very bittersweet moment that felt so rewarding.
House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland is one of the most wonderful, heart-wrenching books filled with disgusting imagery and captivating characters. Though they were not the heroes of the story, the Hollow girls will ultimately wiggle their way into any reader’s heart, one way or another.
"...the three of us were all born in the middle of storms. Grey was lightning, Vivi was thunder, and I was the sea in a tempest."
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