Rachel HarrisonThe Return

“There are many reasons why bad things happen to young women, and at the same time, no reason at all.”I’ve read a lot of horror in my life. So much so that it’s hard – if not impossible - for me to find a book that really scares me. Let me be clear: this book did not scare me. It did, however, make me feel the beginnings of unease. And that’s probably the closest I can get to scared (by a book) any more.Elise’s friend Julie is missing. Everyone, except Elise, thinks she’s gone for good. Two years later, Julie returns…with no memory of where she’s been. Along with their two close friends, Molly and Mae, Julie and Elise reunite at a remote inn. But something’s different about Julie. She’s dreadfully thin and has unnatural cravings. If this isn’t Julie then who is she? Elise just wants her friend back…but at what cost?Normally, when I read a new author – even if I love them….oh, who am I kidding…yes, when I read a new author I love I definitely go out and buy more books they’ve written. That’s what happened after I read Harrison’s “Such Sharp Teeth.” I loved it so much I immediately got online and ordered “The Return.” I’m so glad I did. This was a terrific read! As mentioned above, this is the first book in a long time that made me feel a bit uneasy. I loved reading about Elise and her friends and this kooky inn they stayed at. I’m adding Harrison to my list of authors to keep an eye on.

THE RETURN is the first novel I have read by Rachel Harrison. To say that I was impressed is an understatement--this novel grabbed me from the start, and I didn't want to put it down until I had ALL the answers. Of course, that meant I was completely invested until the very end.". . . being in this city of millions of people was worse than being alone in my apartment . . ."We have a close group of friends--Elise, Julie, Mae, and Molly--each now in their respective careers/locations, but still connected to each other. When the only married woman, Julie, disappears suddenly, her loss is immediately felt by the others. The only ones who refuse to believe she's dead are her "best friend", Elise, and Julie's husband, Tristan.Then, two years later, she returns with no memory of her lost time."Two years to the day she went missing, Tristan found her sitting on the porch swing . . . "There were so many aspects I really enjoyed about this story. The primary one being the dynamics between the four friends. Despite their differences, their past has bound them closer than any family ties ever could. They know more about each other--and accept themselves, faults and all--better than anyone else in their lives.". . . You can't erase your past when there are pieces of it scattered inside other people."When they reunite at a remote, "quirky themed" inn after Julie's reappearance, the relationships, personalities, and comedic banter really shine through. Through it all, the fact that Julie is . . . "off" . . . in so many ways continues to gnaw away at the other characters and readers, alike."We're all getting used to each other again . . . Not to mention we had a funeral for Julie, and now she's here . . ."While it becomes more and more apparent that something is seriously "wrong" with Julie, other events are happening in the inn that intensify the feeling of apprehension and dread for whatever the inevitable outcome will bring to light.All the while the atmosphere is changing, bringing with it more sinister undercurrents, the emotions and bonds between the friends is becoming more clear to the reader. This, the psychological aspect, is what captivated my attention the most. It was like being given a private window into the thoughts and feelings of others. I can't express enough how well accomplished this was, and how it drew me so much closer to these characters.. . . The more you love someone . . . it's easier for them to hurt you . . . their love will inevitably fall short of your love."Overall, this first novel for me from Rachel Harrison instantly made me a fan. The only slight critique I had is that things seemed to slow down significantly around the half-way point when it focused exclusively on one character's past for a bit too long. Other than this, the writing style was very well paced, and the characters felt "alive" in a way that the readers can easily become attached to.I haven't even touched on the ending and the differences in Julie--this is purposeful. I feel that to allude to anything more would potentially spoil the experience for others. This is a novel you simply need to experience first-hand.". . . hurt turns to hate. To love someone is to hate them, a little bit. We hate everyone we really love . . . "Highly recommended.

The problem with diving into Rachel Harrison's "The Return" and expecting a good ol' bloodfest of a horror novel...is that you won't get one. And then you might be disappointed.But "The Return" isn't "'Salem's Lot", and it isn't meant to be. Horror nowadays can be a state of mind, and it can encompass a slow build-up to an uncomfortable realization that something isn't quite RIGHT, and with "The Return", steep us in a terrific amount of dramatic irony, waiting for the hopeful (hapless?) heroines to look into the terrible abyss they skirt around on a minute by minute basis.Julie, Elise, Mae, and Molly are best friends from college. Two years ago, Julie abruptly vanished during a walk in the woods, disappearing off the face of the earth. Just as abruptly, she reappears on her front porch, nearly two years to the day she left, with no memory of her two vanished years.Elise, Julie's best friend, never gave up hope that Julie would return. Despite the odds, despite the hopeless searches, Elise just KNEW that Julie would come back someday. When she does, the four best friends decide to celebrate with a few days in a remote inn located in the mountains of New York State. The inn itself is odd, fantastic, and not just a bit macabre. But when they all see Julie, they are shocked. Something is wrong. She looks desperately ill. Her appearance is strange, despite her assurances. Elise notices an almost pathological revulsion that Molly and Mae have toward Julie. Neither one wants to be alone with Julie, despite having no reason to feel that way.Julie is...odd. Clearly something happened. The reader may grasp the answer quickly, but the true meaning of Julie's change and the friends' feelings has more to do with the nature of friendship, the quality of hope, and kernel of longing that Elise kept alive inside her. The other two moved on...perhaps. What does the refusal to grow and change mean within a friendship? How do we place ourselves within a group of friends? How do we define ourselves and the nature of friendship? All of these questions have more to do with the innate questions in the novel than any horror elements, which sometimes seem secondary to the fundamental ember of the narrative. What is a friend, and what passes for friendship in a give-and-take?This seems like heady stuff for what should be a fun thriller. But this is a well-structured narrative, with decent characters, and decently competent writing. What Julie is might not be as important as how the other three react. The women are thoughtfully written; the setting is unique. "The Return" isn't a difficult read. The dialogue is quick and smooth. Just don't expect jump scares and gore.

This is a book which has lingered for far too long on my TBR, until a relatively recent discovery, the Talk Scared Podcast became a lifeline out of  a huge reading slump, rocketed 'The Return' to the top of the pile with talk of comparisons between it and The Shining.Host Neil McRoberts unabashed and genuine enthusiasm for this modern gothic which uses the setting of the fictional Red Honey Inn for a reunion amongst 4 college friends was what got me stumbling through my bookstacks to find it. It sounds dick-ish calling them that, but basically we navigate our way around the house very carefully as there are piles of books in every room. We have an ongoing shelf space to book issue which I am not at all sad about and a long suffering and tolerating husband and children.Once located, I could not put this book down. I am not saying there is a link between me reading it on my break on the night shift at work the other night and my constant sense of wariness towards lights, shadows and sounds that had me on pins...but I am not usually one for jumping at noises that no one else can hear either...It came with me to the museum today, I read page after frantic page as the miles went by between Bridgend and Cardiff because I was nearing the end and my nerves were in pieces wanting to know just what happens next. How can you not when Rachel nails people again and again with lines like this-''Molly signals the bartender,a guy with a beard that acts as his only defining characteristic''Tell me you haven't met someone like this?Or how about-''You can't erase the past when there are pieces of it scattered inside other people.''Tell me that doesn't hit you right in the soft parts?You take 4 women-Mae,Molly,Julie and narrator Elise- who all have a shared history but have been trauma bonded by both Julie's disappearance and return, 2 years later, with no memory of how she went missing, or what happened to her. Drop them into a boutique hotel, with themed rooms, suggested by Molly from one of her fashion shoot locations, mix them up and let them loose with years of misunderstandings, fermenting worries and the kind of intense inner life that only comes from going through a shared trauma, then add in a menace from an uncertain source and you too will be peering more closely into the shadows.The setting is so vividly described that as a reader I had a visceral, very physical reaction to the jarring colours and schemes which from the get-go are wrong-Elise, meant to have the Gothic room is erroneously placed in the prophetic Cassandra room. The food they are served, the jarring dissonance between opulence of the decorations and lack of style or taste are diametrically opposed to Elise's relative poverty -she is the only one of the 4 with limited finances-and the reason for this getaway. As a setting for a retreat, this is not a great one, showing the roles each woman takes in the group straight away-Molly is the one who controls the narrative, Mae is a loner whose life has been defnied by childhood tragedy, Julie, the one Elise wants most to be like and who she is closest to, and then Elise, our narrator herself.The first person narration brings the reader in like you are one of the group, as she shares her anxiety, the inner secrets of their bonds, their nicknames, partners and shared stories. And this creates an intimacy that as soon as they are flung into danger then your fear for these women becomes a very palpable, breathing, lurking thing behind your ribs.Elise tells you she has anxiety, She tells you she has issues with security both within and without the friendship group. Her perception of things is your guide but she is not a traditional unreliable narrator, she is the beating, wounded heart of the tale. And whether the setting has activated some kind of supernatural something, whether the women bought it with them, or accelerated the monstrous is irrelevant, what is happening is happening and once it does, you cannot imagine a more prescient setting than the Red Honey Inn.Corridors don't quite seem the same the second time you go down them. There are very few other guests. The staff appear to be unravelling. People are missing. The thermostat has a mind of its own. The colours jar and disconnect from the theme of each woman's room. The keys , kitsch and unique, don't do what they are supposed to-they do not keep these women safe.In the midst of this, these four women want to give a platform to Julie, their friend, who now belongs to the world who want to deep dive into the how's, the wherefore's and why's of her 2 year abscence.Why was their friendship not enough to keep her happy? How can they reconcile the woman who has returned with the friend who left. Is she the same person, and if not, can they get her back or is she forever changed?I am absolutely not here to give spoilers, just to massively recommended this incredible book which places these four very real women, in the spiritual hotel sibling of The Overlook, and does something quite extraordinary.It takes a lot to scare me, but this book hit each and every nerve and set them to jangling over and over again.Unexpectedly tender, brutally real about the way women are with each other and pulsing with horror, this is a book which belongs on the shelf of anyone who considers themselves a horror fan.

Okay, there were parts in this book which genuinely made me laugh out loud. The women in it, especially Lise were really funny and sarcastic,which I loved. What I didn't love was the monster,the monster which never really got explained,and boy,should this monster have been explained. Was out a shadowy ghost following the girls? Was out one of the girls and how could she look great one day and terrible the next?..why was it made of the wilderness? There's so many questions I wanna ask the author it's insane. I hated the horror aspect of this book because to be honest there wasn't really one. This is more comedy than horror,it's like the horror got added in there after and still wasn't scary. The writing of the characters was good though.

A lot could have been done with this story, but it missed the mark. We needed to know much more about the think Julie was - this lacked a lot of depth and was rushed at the end. Setting it over three days in a hotel is fine if you give more time to the plot but the author seemed to whizz through it to the end. The main character wasn't great. The whole mystery around Julie and what she was going through was interesting but nowhere near enough. The story was okay but needed much more doing with it. Having read two body horrors this year I think Mexican Gothic did it far better than The Return. I found myself skim reading much of this one towards the end.

Could've been written in 30 pages. I hated all of the characters, I don't know if we were meant to like them but I certainly didn't. The discriptive chunks of paragraphs went on and on. A slight bit of excitement happens but is overshadowed by in-depth, unnecessary discription or throw backs, and awfully written conversation between the boring characters. I hoped for an explanation but was thoroughly let down. Sad I preserved.

I gave this an extra star because the quality and condition of the book itself was perfect. The cover is gorgeous, the colour and the picture is 😍I couldn't seem to get into this one. I found it boring, uneventful, and the chapters were sooooo long I really struggled to carry on with the narrative.I didn't like most of the characters either, the only one I could side with is Molly really. She was the only one who made sense, the rest infuriated me. And the ending was so unsatisfying. I just didn't enjoy this story at all and I'm surprised because I thought this was going to be a good one.