Five Mile House : A Novel [Paperback]

Karen Novak (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Bloomsbury USA (2001)
• ASIN: B0029EAEA6
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A tremendous page-turner, September 24, 2000

By 

Lorraine Berry (Ithaca, NY USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Five Mile House (Hardcover)

How far would you go to protect your children? Would you kill for them? That's the question that I was left with after zipping through this intelligent, well-written, spooky, thrill ride of a book. Karen Novak has sent her main character, Leslie Stone, on a hero's quest involving a search for a sacred manuscript. The biggest part of the quest is Leslie's attempt to come to terms with her who she is and what she has done. You see, Leslie Stone is a detective, and, as the book opens, she has been sent to investigate the murder of yet another child, a four-year old girl who reminds her way too much of her own four-year old daughter. Before the end of the day, the suspect in this awful crime will be dead at Leslie's hands. Her life in shambles after serving her sentence, Leslie and her family move out to the country where her husband has gotten a job restoring an old mansion. This mansion, is, of course, haunted. But this is no ordinary ghost; Five Mile House is inhabited by a spirit who is as troubled as Leslie. This spirit, a woman, supposedly killed all of her children and then killed herself. Ever the detective, Leslie wonders if the legend covers up a grisly crime, and she sets out to investigate. There is a ton of stuff to talk about in this book, but I'm afraid I've come close to revealing too much already. I would highly recommend it.

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A BEAUTIFULLY WRITTEN GHOST STORY AND IMPRESSIVE DEBUT NOVEL, September 16, 2001

By 

Lawyeraau (Balmoral Castle) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Five Mile House (Hardcover)

This is a well crafted and beautifully written debut novel that is impressive. A modern day ghost story with Gothic underpinnings, it is a page turner, full of suspense and mystery. It is an intelligent ghost story that is as ephemeral, as it is gripping.

The story revolves around a married female detective, Leslie Stone, who lives with her husband, Greg, and her two young daughters, Molly and Emma. One morning, Leslie goes to work on a particularly brutal child homicide. A perpetrator is in custody, and when Leslie goes to interview him, she snaps and metes out a form of vigilante justice that is final and irrevocable. Arrested, charged with murder, and tried, she is found not guilty by reason of temporary insanity. Confined for months to a mental hospital, she is finally released.

Her husband, a building contractor, having anticipated the notoriety attendant with is wife's release, gets a job that enables them to move to a new place and get a fresh start, or so he thinks. They move to the small New England town of Wellington, where he is able to obtain his dream job, the restoration of an unusual house named Five Mile House. The catch here is that Five Mile House has had its own share of notoriety. A century ago, a woman, Eleanor Bly, killed her children, then herself in that house. Moreover, it is located in a town riddled with witches, adherents to the ancient Wiccan religion.

Leslie, a detective down to her very soul, soon discovers that she is Eleanor Bly's doppelganger, and that the dream job her husband got was not by chance. Moreover, she senses that there is something about the house that is evil. The past soon begins to collide with the present, as Eleanor reaches out to Leslie to try and set the record straight about what really happened at Five Mile House all those years ago. What she reveals, bit by bit, will keep the reader turning the pages.

It is only at the end that the auther stumbles a bit, as she tries to bring closure to her story. It is still, however, a debut novel to remember.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not bad, but not strong, either, November 30, 2004

By 

gothic cowgirl (NorCal) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Five Mile House: A Novel (Paperback)

I enjoyed reading Karen Novak's debut novel, and I am interested in reading more of her work. That said, "Five Mile House" is a quick engaging read, but leaves much to be desired. The supernatural connection between the main character and the narrator never becomes clear, and the plot has way too many holes and is a bit too outlandish for easy acceptance. I don't want to beat this horse to death as there are already so many reviews, so let me just leave you my suggestion: check the book out at the library before you buy. It's likable, but not one I'd read again.