Review: 'Catherine House' by Elisabeth Thomas

 I was so excited to read Catherine House that I saved it for when I had plenty of time to enjoy it in all its Gothic goodness. And I did enjoy it. But after it was finished I was also left... wondering. Below I will attempt to outline my thoughts on a book that left me conflicted but nevertheless keeps playing on my mind.

Pub. Date: 5/12/2020
Publisher: Custom House

You are in the house and the house is in the woods.
You are in the house and the house is in you . . .

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 its graduates a future of sublime power and prestige, and that they can become anything or anyone they desire.

Among this year’s incoming class is Ines, who expects to trade blurry nights of parties, pills, cruel friends, and dangerous men for rigorous intellectual discipline—only to discover an environment of sanctioned revelry. The school’s enigmatic director, Viktória, encourages the students to explore, to expand their minds, to find themselves and their place within the formidable black iron gates of Catherine.

For Ines, Catherine is the closest thing to a home she’s ever had, and her serious, timid roommate, Baby, soon becomes an unlikely friend. Yet the House’s strange protocols make this refuge, with its worn velvet and weathered leather, feel increasingly like a gilded prison. And when Baby’s obsessive desire for acceptance ends in tragedy, 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 that is connected to a secretive, tightly knit group of students selected to study its most promising and mysterious curriculum.

I was so intrigued by Catherine House from the beginning. Was it going to be like The Secret History, but more diverse? Would it be all Dark Academia or would we get Thriller, if not even Horror, elements? Is there something supernatural to it all, or will we be confronted with the banality of evil? With all these questions I began and I was riveted for the first 100 pages. The setting up of the house, the characters, Ines' past, the weirdness that pervades the air, it was all stellar. Catherine House then runs into something of a rut, a rut that I'm still not quite sure is intentional or incidental. As Ines is sucked further into the House and its mystery, so things begin to repeat themselves, begin to take on a soft glow, begin to become unfocused. They do so for the reader as well as for Ines and the effect can be to either lull a reader into complacency, or it will completely disconnect them from the story. In a few reviews I've read I can see that this "calm before the storm" doesn't work for many readers. For me, once I started thinking of it as having been done on purpose by Thomas, it added a new level to the novel, even if I had to fight at times to stay on board.

Ines is running from something, and what better place to run to than a place you can't leave and others won't enter. Meet the Catherine House, an elite college that's not quite a college. After a highly competitive selection process, you enter the house and don't leave until three years later, wiser, better, and on a path of certain success. But Ines is haunted by her past and she is not sure whether Catherine House truly is the place for her. But as she begins to form friendships, she also begins to give in to the House's weird charms, and days seem to be a medley of meals, complicated lectures, wine, and sex. But tragedy and suspicion finds a way into Ines and now nothing is certain and nothing is sure. Ines is a difficult character, in the sense that she is so disengaged from the world around her and so prone to disassociating, that readers can't connect to her in the way expect to. This doesn't mean one can't connect to her, the reader just has to access the same level of unease and suspicion as Ines. If that's not the reading experience you're looking for, perhaps save Catherine House for a different day.

Elisabeth Thomas absolutely nails the Gothic atmosphere of a suspicious House. The halls seem to stretch or narrow, depending on the time of day; the house is both glorious and beautiful and also decrepit and falling apart. Beautiful light illuminates dusty corners. Tiny rooms become claustrophobic at the blink of an eye. The description of the House, especially in the first half of the novel, are stunning and really draw the reader in. You can't help but slightly fall for the House. But Thomas never neglects the sense of the uncanny, mightily helped by her consistently suspicious main character. I must admit that Thomas lost me a little bit when it came to some of the more "academic" aspects of the book, the mystery behind the curriculum of the House. I occasionally found myself drifting towards the end, even though the tension had ramped up. Catherine House holds many charms and is full of potential. At times it feels more like a mood than a plot, but as I mentioned above, this may very well be Thomas' intention. Whether the plot entirely works for me, whether enough happens, is a difficult question to answer. I know I was engrossed by Catherine House, but I also know I wasn't entirely satisfied at the end. A third thing I know, however, is that I do definitely want to read more by Elisabeth Thomas.

I give this novel...

3 Universes!

Catherine House is an intriguing but also puzzling read! If you persevere through the at times slow pace or drowsy atmosphere, then a lot can be gained and appreciated.