Book Review: The Birthing House

This is quite possibly one of the worst books I have ever read.  A friend loaned it to me together with an entire bag of other books.  She went through them quickly with me but she admitted she bought a few of them simply because of their covers.  They do all have very cool and impressive covers, I must admit!  I do remember her saying some were not so great, but I couldn’t remember which.

After reading it, I’m pretty sure this has to be one of them.

Great cover indeed, to look at it you think ooooooh, SPOOKAY!!! but yeah, not so much.  The cover is actually the best part about it, so whoever whipped that one up deserves some kudos as they are quite possibly the only reason this book ever sold in the first place.  So, well done cover person!

To read the blurb on the back of the book, it sounds fantastic, have a read:

When Conrad Harrison impulse-buys a big old house in Wisconsin, his wife Jo doesn’t share his enthusiasm, reluctant at the idea of leaving their LA life – so Conrad is left to set up their new home as she ties up loose ends at work. But Conrad’s new purchase is not all that it seems. Soon Conrad is hearing the ghostly wailing of a baby in the night, seeing blood on the floor and being haunted by a woman who looks exactly like Jo. With his wife away, Conrad becomes obsessed by the pregnant girl next door, Nadia, who claims to be a victim of the evil in the house. The crying leads him to a bricked-up body, and the mystery of the Birthing House unravels, pulling in Jo, Nadia and leading Conrad to a nightmarish conclusion…

Sounds awesome, right?!  To read that, you’d think this is not a book you want to read in bed at night.  I did though, and I spent every minute of it waiting for the good bits that never came.

There are so many things that frustrated me about this book and if you’ve also read it, continue on.  If you haven’t read it and don’t want me to spoil things for you, stop here because this is going to be a no holds barred kinda thing.

1. Conrad, the main character in the book, is an idiot.  From the very start I couldn’t connect with him or understand him at all.  Who goes and buys a creepy old house in the middle of nowhere without even consulting his wife?  His relationship with his wife was rocky at best, and his reactions to the things she does and says are so incredibly childish.  One minute he hates her and is swearing at her through the phone, the next minute he can’t get enough of her.  I know many love/hate relationships do exist but this was absurd.   It was the same with the pregnant girl next door, out of nowhere he really wants her and his wife may as well not exist.  The relationship between those two was completely unrealistic and creepy.  It didn’t help the reader like Conrad any more, that’s for certain.  In fact, there were no characters to like in this book, they were all either creepy, weird, immature etc.   Not in good ways either, or in a way that did any favors to the book.

2. Calling this book scary is like the longest stretch possible.  At best it was slightly tense at points, but it was so ridiculous and poorly written that you never got sucked in enough to be affected by anything he wrote. 

3. There was potential for the author to make this a great story, but he only took things part way. Then it seemed to drop off, leaving us wondering what the point was of that particular part of storyline.  Often there wasn’t a point at all, it was like useless information that never lead to anything just added to bulk up the book.

For example, the photo album he was given by the previous owner of the house.  There was so much potential there to make something of that, to have it get more and more creepy as he turned the pages.  Instead, what happens?  He opens it up, gets freaked out by a photo he thinks is his wife, and whiffs it in the fire.  That’s the end of that.  The photo album supposedly contained the history of the house, it could have gotten more scary and intense as he went through it, but instead it gets burned and that’s it, it’s over.

There was also potential there to make something more of the back story with the previous owners of the house.  He went into detail describing the man, his wife and their deformed children.  He even had a lengthy conversation with the man at one point, listening to the man drivel on incoherently.  You read all this nonsense assuming at some point it will fit into the story and make sense, but like everything else, nothing ever comes of it.   You expect that at some point in the storyline with the previous owners becomes relevant, but it doesn’t.  It’s all for naught because you never get any sort of explanation about how the children became deformed, how they managed to live in the house so long or why they left.  Pointless.

Another thing that confused me was the angry neighbour, Steve.  There are a few times that Conrad comes in contact with Steve and he seems angry but you never find out why.  Does Steve know something that is going on in the house? Is he upset because of Conrad’s relationship with the pregnant girl?  Who knows, it’s just there and is never explained, like so many other things in the book.

4. The whole story of Alma.  How did this have anything to do with the photo of Conrad’s wife in the book?  Did Alma just look like her?  Did Alma do that to freak Conrad out?  Was Conrad somehow connected to the doctor in Alma’s past?  What in the bejesus was going on?  You get the story about Alma and her mother with the doctor, but how does that connect with Conrad?  What actually goes on with Conrad in the end before the police show up?  Did Conrad do all the horrible things or did Alma do it to make him crazy?  What drew Conrad to the house in the first place, did Alma have something to do with that?

It’s not like your usual cliffhanger type of book where it leaves you guessing in regards to what actually ended up happening with the main character.  This book confuses you the whole way through, makes you think that all your questions will be answered in the end, and then the ending is an entirely new kind of crazy.  Nothing gets wrapped up, it just makes less sense as you go on.  I actually slammed the book shut and swore when I finished reading it, it was that bad.

I honestly can’t imagine what the publishers were thinking when they picked this up. 

So given all of this, if you want to give it a read, by all means do so!  Then maybe you can explain it to me!