WOW - Rated 
I thought this book was incredible, I couldnt put it down and at the same time, didnt want it to end. Easily the best book Ive read in a long time....
Competently written, but a highly misleading cover. Not the genre I was expecting! - Rated 
Just look at that cover---what does it suggest to you? A haunted house? A dark Gothic treat? There's even a reference to 'Gothic' on the back of the dustjacket. I know you can't judge a book by the cover, as the old adage goes, but if a publisher sends out confusing signals on the dust jacket, the reader is bound to feel a sense of thudding disappointment if nothing spooky happens. After a promising start, with the evocation of the big house and a ghost story told by one of the (frankly rather tiresome) characters, the book turns out to be about brie eating and bonking amongst a group of (frankly very tiresome by now) young people.
This is a first novel by a very competent writer, but it lacks suspense and a gripping plot. There are also times when it fails to convince---would a modern, twenty-something girl, for example, spend so long talking about her relationships with men with her parents? Abd how does that advance the plot anyway? There's a lot of the protagonist's 'navel gazing' in this book and it's rather alienating, when the reader is waiting for plot developments.
My main concern is that misleading cover and title. They feel like a cheat, somehow, and it's a pity that the publisher chose to market this young writer's book in this way.
Disappointed rather than haunted! - Rated
I was really looking forward to reading this as it seemed to have echoes of "The Secret History" sharing similar themes of loss and mystery. However, I could not care about any of the characters and waited in vain for anything of significance or meaning to actually happen. I guess I was seduced by the evocative title and thought this would be an enthralling and haunting read.Sadly it wasn't
High Brow Scoobydoo - Rated 
I agree with the Scoobydoo reference - perfectly sums up this book. I enjoyed the book on the whole, mainly for the perceptive middle-class Putney-dweller descriptions and the twists and turns, but I found the fact that Whitehouse mixes classical and artistic references (not everyone would understand - I, for one, did not study classics) with pop-literature a la Dan Brown amusing - a bit like she is trying too hard to write an intelligent classic piece of literature by including these references but with a plot that, although enjoyable, doesnt quite cut it.
Still, I'd recommend it as an amusing, enjoyable and "cant wait to turn the page" read, just like I would recommend "The da Vinci Code".
Very Disappointing - Rated 
The only tension for me which built in reading this book was wondering when something significant was going to happen; sadly, it never really did. The characters ring hollow, so as one other commentator said, you don't really give a toss what happens to them. Although sometimes reflecting on lost youth, the behaviour of most of the characters seemed as if they had never left university or was it play school? The incessant drinking binges were sad, but the lighting up a cigarette by virtually every character in the book was almost as frequent as the number of paragraphs. The feel of these characters is all too stereotyped and whilst recognisable is not very convincing.
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