This book is in the trash. The trash is in the house. The house is in the woods. This book is in the trash…..

There's a scene towards the beginning when the main character is in class, sees a random dude eating a sandwich, asks for a bite, takes it and then hands it back to him and I will never stop thinking about how bizarre that was.
Overall, this book was fine, some of the writing was really pretty and it was very atmospheric. The style took me a bit to get used to, and I didn't really like the main character all that much, mostly because I felt like we never really get to know her very well, despite the fact that the entire story is told from her perspective. She's very detached from reality the entire time and it feels like she's always hiding her true feelings and self, even from the reader. I didn't understand her motivations half the time.
But once I got used to that style, I felt like it was effective, and it was still a pretty quick read. While I'm not sure if I can say that I necessarily enjoyed this book, it definitely did hold my attention so I'll give it that and a 3 star rating.

This book had so little impact at all on me, its like I never even read it.

Just did not care about the characters or the story. DNF at 50%.

I understand why some people objectively don’t like this story. It’s slow, there’s not much of a plot, and the characters might feel distant and annoying to some. What I don’t understand is why this specific book is disliked so much and so widely when I feel like there are other books with similarities that have much higher ratings. My guess is that the dark academia aspects were stressed so much in the descriptions going around, and a lot of people set their expectations way too high because it’s ~ d a r k a c e d e m i a ~

I love a good gothic story, and I think that Elisabeth Thomas hit the nail on the head with the atmosphere she created with Catherine House. The resolution leaves a few questions unanswered, and while some might find that unsatisfying, I didn’t mind it. I actually thought the main character and her motivations (or lack thereof) were pretty interesting to read, and I liked the side characters too. I listened to the audiobook, so maybe that was why I wasn’t bogged down when it came to the slower pacing. Overall, I think this book receives a lot of unwarranted criticism because it doesn’t live up to the hype that was initially there for some when this book came out, but imo Thomas’s sinister and haunting story really speaks for itself