I would like to thank the author for an advance copy of this novella in exchange for a fair and honest review

Publisher – TTA Press

Published – 16th April

Price - £7 paperback

A troubled girl, a haunted book, a house of illusions and enchanted mirrors. Anna Carrow wants to make things right between her and her mum, to please her stepdad, and keep out of the way of school bullies. But her efforts only seem to lead her further and further from reality, deeper and deeper into paranoia and delusion, until she finds herself tangled inside a twisted fairy-tale, face to face with the sinister cully king. Now Anna has to decide which version of reality to believe in. But how can you know who to trust, when your mind is playing tricks on you?

One of the best things about reading is being plunged into other worlds. I can see alien skies; watch the past and future come to life and be swept away from it all. With horror though my actual view of what reality is gets challenged and disrupted – is the world I perceive just how I want to see it and are other forces at play? In Georgina Bruce’s powerful novella Honeybones I was swept on a nightmarish journey into a young teenager’s life where various dangers lie in wait some with a familiar face while others hide within a house that ever changes.

We first meet Anna, her mother and stepfather coming back from a family funeral they stand in a hallway of infinite mirrors and see endless reflections of themselves. Anna feels haunted by memories of the past in school, the strange corridors of the house where voices of other residents in the past dwell. Anna starts to relive the day again and again; each time finding new rooms and different encounters with strange objects and other forces. She is being ignored by her mother; being constantly approached by her over friendly stepdad and haunted by the spirit of her stepdad’s last wife. Reality changes from minute to minute and someone is not telling the truth about what is going on…or perhaps everyone.

This was a great reading experience where we are plunged immediately in the deep end – an ever changing house; a weird family arrangement and as Anna explores the endless rooms we wonder exactly where this story is set, Is it an abandoned sanatorium or a real one? Dolls and animals here can talk and add warnings while an undead spirit whose head is in a cage lurks in Anna’s eyeline. What I loved about this novella is the writing really creates that sense of dislocation – time and space are being played with using language. We appear to relive the same day again and again or is this a sequence of events just now jumbled in Anna’s mind? Are these events really happening or part of a wider delusion? The choice of language here is powerful and rhythmic creating a sense of irregular jagged flow from scene to scene as Anna gets swept through the story.

Slowly pieces of information are shared to help us try and work out what is going on and this is where the story looks firmly and delicately at some strong themes worth warning the read about. This story does explore abuse and there are disturbing scenes as we start to see the relationships with the parents be explored. In the background we also hear of the mysterious cully king and is this a magical entity pulling the strings or someone closer to home? It’s a story not afraid to not explain everything but the pictures Bruce paints of this world underneath our own does mean Anna is battling not just her freedom but that her soul may be on the line too. The real success of the novel is Anna deciding to move away from being thrown from event to event but starting to take control of her own destiny and power.

It was a hypnotic haunting read and once started I couldn’t stop going along Anna’s journey trying to piece the mystery of the house together while worried over her safety. In turns beautifully dark, terrifying and worrying this was an intelligent and powerful work of storytelling. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for further work from Bruce in the future.