I have an off and on relationship with the Fable book club I am a part of. Because I am participating in this but also working through my own TBR list, I at times do not read the books at the same pace as everyone else. Two book picks ago, the group voted to read The House Across the Lake by Riley Sager and after being intrigued by the Read Window-style plot synopsis, I wanted to read it on my own time. And I do, in fact, regret it.
Book Review: The House Across the Lake by Riley Sager
The last time I remember feeling this drained and utterly dumbfounded by a book was the one-star rated Sometimes I Lie by Alice Feeney. I genuinely feel as though this book has a premise that leaves a gift-wrapped thriller adventure on the author’s doorstep, and Sager decided to hijack it and shoehorn in an entirely different plot. To help you understand what I mean, this is the synopsis:
Casey Fletcher, a recently widowed actress trying to escape a streak of bad press, has retreated to the peace and quiet of her family’s lake house in Vermont. Armed with a pair of binoculars and several bottles of bourbon, she passes the time watching Tom and Katherine Royce, the glamorous couple living in the house across the lake. They make for good viewing—a tech innovator, Tom is powerful; and a former model, Katherine is gorgeous.
One day on the lake, Casey saves Katherine from drowning, and the two strike up a budding friendship. But the more they get to know each other—and the longer Casey watches—it becomes clear that Katherine and Tom’s marriage isn’t as perfect as it appears. When Katherine suddenly vanishes, Casey immediately suspects Tom of foul play. What she doesn’t realize is that there’s more to the story than meets the eye—and that shocking secrets can lurk beneath the most placid of surfaces.
The House Across the Lake. Riley Sager. https://www.amazon.com/House-Across-Lake-Novel/dp/0593183193
Reading that, you’re probably having the same thoughts I did — this sounds like Alfred Hitchcok’s Rear Window (1954) at first glance. And it is! I immediately got those vibes within the first several chapters and I enjoyed watching this possible-murder-mystery play out from the perspective of a literal outside viewer — our main character, Casey, spies on the Royce’s house out of boredom and curiously, but slowly starts to notice strange things and suspects Tom of murder. That is the tone, style, plot, and mission of the book for the entire first half to three-quarters.
And then the author, frankly, decides he is finished writing a murder mystery and instead goes for paranormal horror.
What you need to know about The House Across the Lake is it is not Sager’s debut novel (which makes me suspect this may just be his style) and it is a book that wants it both ways; it wants to be a domestic thriller and a paranormal horror story. But instead of marrying them together cohesively, or even remotely coherently, decides to start with one, transition into another at the climax, and then pull the rug out from under the reader again to go back to a thriller in the last two chapters. Keeping in mind the very last chapter is an epilogue, so this secondary surprise lasts only one chapter.
Like I said before, the main plot of this book, I think, develops very well and I loved it at first. I appreciated the pace, the characters, how the mystery unfolded, and I could see it going places. For crying out loud, we even have a scene of Casey breaking into the Royce house to look for evidence of a now-missing, presumed-dead Katherine. But as soon as I got to the three-quarter mark, and I found out ghosts are involved — I was scared that was going to take over the whole plot and ruin it. Regretfully I was correct. This twist does not fit the book’s vibes and basically takes an off-handed campfire story from the beginning chapters and turns it into the entire climax. Having spooky campfire stories as a thematic background for a lake house murder mystery is great for just that — a backdrop. But having it take over the plot was not set up from the start and does not match the book style.
As soon as I got to this point in the book, I had to go back and reread (or re-listen) to prior chapters to make sure this supposed “plot twist” (or story hijacking, as I call it) could actually be feasible and actually make sense. It sort of does, since the story is vague enough, but really what is all this ghost and possession nonsense? Parts of the climax could work on their own (Casey’s past, her husband’s demise, etc.) but not when it’s combined with the sudden integration of paranormal elements. The whole last quarter of The House Across the Lake feels very overcomplicated and like the author suddenly felt pressure to shoehorn in more stuff to raise the stakes. When there is already a murder mystery.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, in the literal eleventh hour of the book, the second-to-last chapter as mentioned above, the book attempts to resume the original story as if no ghost hijacking actually happened. That story was abandoned several chapters ago…the author made that clear….and now we’re back at the last minute to attempt to tie up loose ends? Note, my predictions from the start of the murder storyline were correct, but that victory is tainted because of the direction the author went with this.
The only reason why this book is not joining the one-star rating club is because I enjoyed the primary premise and there is a way to still read it without all the unnecessary plot threads. I enjoyed following the mystery; I enjoyed the suspense; I enjoyed watching our main characters attempt to figure it all out and catch Tom in a murder scheme; and I enjoyed Casey not being the only one to suspect something bad happening to Katherine. So here are my recommendations for how to attempt to enjoy this book depending on your tastes:
- If you prefer a murder mystery thriller story: Start the novel like normal, stop at the beginning of the chapter called “I move from door to door….” [the chapters are not numbered in this book] and then skip ahead to the beginning of “Night has fully fallen…” Some things will not make sense, but you’re better off for it.
- If you prefer paranormal horror/thriller: Start the novel like normal, read through it all, and then stop right at “Night has fully fallen…” before going right to “Later.” There is a more complicated way to experience this book, but that involves skipping around a bunch of chapters and will probably ruin your entire experience anyway since it’ll be even more confusing.
Personally, I didn’t sign up for a CYOA book. I did not care for The House Across the Lake as a whole and apparently a lot of other people on Reddit and GoodReads didn’t as well. I considered DNF’ing it when it was clear ghosts were going to take over the climax, but just had to hold on to the end to get my last questions answered. I was severely disappointed.
My Hot Takes (Spoiler Warning)
- Playing around with timelines and transitioning from past to present is a cool way to craft a story. I will give Sager that.
- Take a shot (of water) every time “across the lake” is in the book. If you use alcohol, you’ll be dead.
- When I got to the last quarter, I gave up on logic and totally lost my suspension of disbelief and was just along for the ride. If you plan on reading the whole thing, you should plan to do that as well.
- This book literally tries to make us feel sympathetic toward a serial killer and Casey takes on way too much responsibility and emotional weight for drowning a serial killer. She is feeling way too bad about this and she should not.
My Rating: 2/5 Stars
