The Gray House
By: Mariam Petrosyan, translation by Yuri Machkasov
My Rating: TWO out of TWO stars for wasting my time
Best for: 16 and up

I really did try, but the The Gray House is just weird.

3 weeks and 736 pages. That’s what I invested in forcing myself through this one.

A 4.33 avg score on Goodreads hadn’t led me wrong yet. A boarding school for physically and emotionally challenged children. A kaleidoscope of characters. An immensely complex story. Different timelines. Is the house alive? Are the children crazy?

All signs point to awesome. That’s why I stuck it out…surely the big reveal at the end would explain everything and I would be amazed at how it all came together and I would wonder how I missed it all along.

Nope.

This story was disjointed and unclear and stayed that way to the end. I read SO carefully, looking for clues and waiting for the clarity that always comes but didn’t. I finally finished it, and I have nothing to show for it.

Maybe the nuances were lost in the translation from the original Russian. Maybe I’m just too dumb.

Either way, this book was wasted on me. I can’t recommend it, but I do wish someone else would read it and explain to me.

No sex. PG-13 language. Not so much violent as disturbing.

Happy Reading.