Review: The Death House
15:59
By Sarah Pinborough
Source: Gift, e-book
Genres: Young Adult, Horror, Science Fiction, Dystopian, Romance
Goodreads Synopsis:
Toby's life was perfectly normal... until it was unravelled by something as simple as a blood test.
Taken from his family, Toby now lives in the Death House: an out-of-time existence far from the modern world, where he, and the others who live there, are studied by Matron and her team of nurses. They're looking for any sign of sickness. Any sign of their wards changing. Any sign that it's time to take them to the sanatorium.
No one returns from the sanatorium.
Withdrawn from his house-mates and living in his memories of the past, Toby spends his days fighting his fear. But then a new arrival in the house shatters the fragile peace, and everything changes.
Because everybody dies. It's how you choose to live that counts.
My review:
The concept of this book struck my attention straight away - people get sent to a creepy house to get murdered? Yes please! Although this book had been described like The Fault in Our Stars, I just ignored that because I’m a very open minded person (ha ha no), and the synopsis of this book pulled me in.
I can really see the similarities to TFIOS. They were both about living and dying, and if you enjoyed TFIOS (which I didn’t), you will almost definitely enjoy The Death House (which I did).
One of the reasons why I didn’t enjoy TFIOS is because it had no plot. This book didn’t either, which was a bit annoying, although it was really short. I flew through it really quickly - it only took a few hours to read, but it stayed with me.
I disliked every character in this book. They were all so unrealistic and boring, and had no originality to them at all - they had no depth. All of the boys were typical - they all had really set ‘personalities’ and did exactly what they would do at the start and end of the book - no-one developed at all, which made the book boring.
The character who I hated the most was Clara. She was so cliche and dull, although her character was meant to be free-spirited, wild, and happy. There was no way she would actually be with someone as boring as Toby. I was bored by her because she has been done before so many times. Her character stayed the same throughout the whole book.
This book should not have been described on Goodreads as Horror, Science Fiction, and Thriller. It was mostly romance - there were barely any elements of Horror (it wasn’t scary at all), Science Fiction, or Thriller, which was really disappointing. And the romance was a bit cringey too!
The ending really made this book for me. I know, if you’ve read this book, you will be screaming what?! but I feel like it needed to be done. It fit in well with the story, and made it much more worthwhile. It had meaning, and made the book loads better. Without the ending the way it was, I would have given this book a really low rating, but with that being the last thing I read, it made me like the book much more. The ending was the thing that separated this from TFIOS.
Overall, I enjoyed this book. The majority was boring, but it picked up at the end and it really gave me something to think about.
My reaction:
My rating:
Hello! I'm D - a dog-loving feminist from the UK. You'll probably find me with my nose in a book or playing my clarinet
2 comments
This is kind of a pet peeve for me though . . . when books are basically boring the whole way and then only at the end they decide to pick up? It kind of makes me hate them more LOL. (I'm such a grump)
ReplyDeleteHaha, I guess it does feel a bit like a cheat's way out for me to give it a good review! :)
DeleteThanks for commenting! I read and respond to every comment, so make sure to check back to see my reply. Have a nice day! ☺♥