In the Shadow of Spindrift House by Mira Grant

Once Harlowe and crew were in Spindrift House, things just weren’t as creepy as I expected. I really liked most of this story but it does take quite a while to set up the story and get into Sprindrift House. If they can figure who owns the deed to Spindrift House they will be granted a prize of millions of dollars.the only catch is that once they enter the house they aren’t allowed to leave it. As they are all poised to move on to more adult lives and pastimes, Harlowe gets an offer they can’t refuse. There she formed friendships with some neighborhood kids and eventually they formed a detective agency. Story (3/5): Harlowe has a violent and mysterious past but after her parents’ deaths she went to live with her grandparents.

Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone novella that I borrowed from the library. If you like this genre more than I do, maybe this story will work for you. I did get icy chills at that second scene on the widow's walk, which will now live with me forever, but that can't make up for the amount of nope I feel about the whole story. I liked these kids, and that pretty much ruined the whole mood for me. The Scooby gang does Lovecraftian horror sounds like the kind of thing that really ought to be a lot of fun, doesn't it? (I mean, I dislike Lovecraftian horror, but a Scooby Doo take on it should have been great.) Unfortunately, the Lovecraftian horror that this story chooses to take on is mostly, which is a story that honestly only works for me because I don't care about the narrator. Spindrift House has had a great deal of time to decide what it wants to be, and what it wants to be is unforgiving.

Because Spindrift House keeps its secrets for a reason, and it has no intention of letting them go. They have everything they need to solve the mystery. When Harlowe and her friends agree to investigate the mystery behind the manor, they do so on the assumption that they'll be going down in history as the ones who determined who built Spindrift House-and why. The stories and legends surrounding the decrepit property are countless and contradictory, but one thing is clear: there are people willing to pay a great deal to determine the legal ownership of the house. But 'teen' is a limited time offer, and when her friends start looking for adult professions, it's up to Harlowe to find them one last case so that they can go out in a blaze of glory. Shipped off to live with her paternal grandparents after a mysterious cult killed her mother and father, she has grown up chasing the question behind the curve, becoming part of a tight-knit teen detective agency.

For Harlowe Upton-Jones, life has never been a straight line.

In the Shadow of Spindrift House by Mira Grant