Catherine House

A Novel

By: Elisabeth Thomas

Narrated by: Inés del Castillo

Length: 11 hrs and 27 mins

Publisher's summary

“Elisabeth Thomas had me mesmerized from the first page. Dreamy and brimming with dread, Catherine House will swallow you whole." (Rory Power, New York Times best-selling author of Wilder Girls)

Trust us, you belong here.

A Gothic-infused debut of literary suspense, set within a secluded, elite university and following a dangerously curious, rebellious undergraduate who uncovers a shocking secret about an exclusive circle of students...and the dark truth beneath her school’s promise of prestige.

Catherine House is a school of higher learning like no other. Hidden deep in the woods of rural Pennsylvania, this crucible of reformist liberal-arts study with its experimental curriculum, wildly selective admissions policy, and formidable endowment has produced some of the world’s best minds: prize-winning authors, artists, inventors, Supreme Court justices, presidents. For those lucky few selected, tuition, room, and board are free. But acceptance comes with a price. Students are required to give the House three years - summers included - completely removed from the outside world. Family, friends, television, music, even their clothing must be left behind. In return, the school promises a future of sublime power and prestige and that its graduates can become anything or anyone they desire.

Among this year’s incoming class is Ines Murillo, who expects to trade blurry nights of parties, cruel friends, and dangerous men for rigorous intellectual discipline - only to discover an environment of sanctioned revelry. Even the school’s enigmatic director, Viktória, encourages the students to explore, to expand their minds, to find themselves within the formidable iron gates of Catherine. For Ines, it is the closest thing to a home she’s ever had. But the House’s strange protocols soon make this refuge, with its worn velvet and weathered leather, feel increasingly like a gilded prison. And when tragedy strikes, Ines begins to suspect that the school - in all its shabby splendor, hallowed history, advanced theories, and controlled decadence - might be hiding a dangerous agenda within the secretive, tightly knit group of students selected to study its most promising and mysterious curriculum.

Combining the haunting sophistication and dusky, atmospheric style of Sarah Waters with the unsettling isolation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go, Catherine House is a devious, deliciously steamy, and suspenseful audiobook with shocking twists and sharp edges that is sure to leave listeners breathless.

©2020 Elisabeth Thomas (P)2020 HarperCollins Publishers

Creepy, but not Horror

This is the story of Ines, a young woman with a sketchy background who attends a free college hidden deep in the forest of Pennsylvania. In exchange for free tuition, room, and board, all students must leave their previous life, including families, behind for a 3-yr. commitment.

The actor who narrates the book (also named Ines) was fantastic. She managed to keep an otherwise slow-moving story interesting. There are some thoroughly creepy characters in this book - Victoria (the director of the school), Theo (Ines' boyfriend in the 3rd year), and Baby (Ines' roommate) to name a few. The story seems to hover around an experimental program at the school that the creepier students seem to be involved in. By the end of the book it is revealed that this research involves using students with little or no family or friends (thus unmissed should they happen to die) to create some kind of robot / human/ zombie who has no identity or emotions. Bad behavior at the school gets you a term in the "Tower" (essentially prison) for re-adjustment. After using Theo's key card to break into the experimental lab and setting the animals (rabbits and mice) free, Ines is locked up in the Tower. She is advised that her only means of leaving Catherine is as one of these experimental zombies, thus requiring her death as a thinking, feeling person. The book ends as Ines (with the assistance of her friends) escapes Catherine House to continue running away from her life.

While the narrator makes the story interesting enough to keep you listening, the story itself is very slow. I can't imagine actually reading and finishing this book. Some of the "sessions", a required meditation hour, could easily have put me to sleep (which is not a good thing when you are driving while listening). The ending is such that it seems the author expected to write a sequel, although I can't imagine what the story would entail now that the main character has escaped from the titled school. But it just sort of ended without a satisfactory ending. Nothing is said of what became of Ines after her escape. She muses that it is unlikely they would look for her as she would never tell anyone what is really going on at the House.

Bottom line, it appears an editor went through the book and said, "It ends here". Ines slips out a unlocked door in the Tower and rides away with an employee of the school, presumably to bike her way across America. No dramatic escape. No stress about her impending death. Very flat ending. Essentially the same tone entering the school as leaving the school and only the slightest suggestion of action (unless you consider a "bouncy castle" to be action).

As a lover of horror, post-apocalyptic stories, and thoroughly disturbing characters, I was truly disappointed. The actor/narrator was the high point of this novel, thus the overall "4-star" rating.

I can’t get out of Catherine House

This story was way too long and I’m afraid it went over my head. I got the main part of the story but I really had to Google the book to understand the last half of the book.

Enjoyable read

Great story with lots of brooding gothic elements, and suspense. I wish the reader would have treated some passages with more urgency, picked up the pace of the storytelling in the moments when anxiety was high. But otherwise, very good.

Underdeveloped and disappointing

First, the narrator, Ines del Castillo does a great job. I'm 95% sure she's the only reason I kept listening and liked this to the degree that I did.

The premise of the book is strong. Secluded college. Hand picked students who weather a multiple stage application and interview process. A promise of alumni who run the world. A mysterious element of a hidden science that the college alone owns and studies, kept from the rest of the world and is it real or is it nonsense?

The execution. I mean, dang. I wanted so much more. I kept thinking the book would fill in. The plot points would link together more. Let me save you the 11 hours. It doesn't. The characters are underdeveloped. There's a surface explanation of why the students stay. But the faculty? The staff? Why are they keeping this big secret? What bonds all these folks to together? The paranormal element just gets dropped in there, but there is no explanation of how it works, why it works, even what it is or what they are actually trying to do. It's just there. It's a secret. Don't ask too many questions. That extends to the reader and the antagonists as well. There's no plot development and certainly no resolution. I still am befuddled how this bizarre college experience supposedly turns out the king makers of the world. Throughout their time at Catherine House, characters actively avoid talking about what they are experiencing at Catherine House. They barely know each others names outside of their 3 friends. That suddenly turns into a vast connected alumni network at graduation? Do alumni still get treatments after graduation? Or the college treatments had a lasting impact? None of this is answered. It's just one of many glaring plot holes.

And then the book ends. Just ends. Not a single thing explained or resolved, but not in some grand allegorical kind of way. Just in a way that makes you go, none of this made sense, not a single bit.

It was fine. I listened to it all. I wish I checked it out from the library. It definitely wasn't worth a credit and I would never suggest anyone else read it.

Major plot gaps

This book could have easily had 100 more pages. There’s so much missing in character development, leaving me to build them in my mind as if preparing for film acting. The film, if it gets there, may actually be better. It alludes to, although stated verbatim, that slums of Catherine House are some of powerful world leaders. There’s no evidence, storyline outside of the house to exhibit that magnitude. Really great marketing by publishers these days. I presume she’ll have several “airport” books like those of James Patterson for years to come—trite, predictable.

Disappointing

I was really looking forward to this. The story is set up in a such a perfect environment but ultimately every mystery or major conclusion ends with a thud. Pretty much the novel is about a really hot, slutty girl who doesn’t have that much of a personality. She’s curious about the right stuff but so indecisive and unemotional at certain points I had to rewind to make sure I was understanding what was going on. In fact I’m not even sure if the “villain” in this novel was really that bad?

“Ines finally got the door open. Was it ever locked?”

There are a lot of pointless & creepy innuendo that lead to nothing, and tons of food descriptions just for fun.

This novel didn’t scare me, it made me hungry. For food. And a better story.

Long drawn out

The book was a long read…started to get interesting towards the end which sucks since that was the best part
Overall it’s ok

It was alright

I wouldn’t recommend it to a friend, but I didn’t hate it. The lack of emotion from all characters, but especially the main character made it the most unlikeable for me.

Mixed bag

Catherine House tries to be a lot of things, and because of this, ultimately is less impressive than it could have been. I don't mind mixing and blending genres when it's done in a way that creates something new and interesting or serves the story, but here, genres are mixed without reason and resulting in a muddy story that takes the slow-burn to tortoise speeds. The biggest problem with Catherine House is that it is not engaging. You don't feel for any of the characters, nor is the mystery that eyebrow-raising. Had it all come together in a mind-blowing conclusion, it would have been worth it. However, that's not the case here. By the time it ended, I felt like *I* had spent three-years at Catherine House, and not in the totally absorbed in the story kind of way, and I wanted those eleven hours back. Characters spend more time naked, eating, and talking about food than engaged in the mystery or doing anything remotely interesting-or worth reading/writing about.

Reads more like a first draft of something that could be interesting, but as a final, published work is less than memorable.

Terrible story

I finished this book only because I had wasted so much time listening already. The story dragged on and on...just to end on a cliffhanger.