House of Monstrous Women is a gothic horror novel set in the Philippines in 1986, in which a young woman finds herself in a nightmare of a house, playing a game alongside her brother and childhood best friend. Josephine lives in Carigara alone in the family home, running out of money since her parents were killed and her brother moved to Manila. When her childhood friend Hiraya offers Josephine a chance to come to her family’s old mansion to play a simple game that could give Josephine whatever she desires, it seems like a chance to escape. However, the house seems to not want to help, and the more Josephine learns, the worse her chances seem to be.
The book starts off slowly, building up Josephine’s family history and how tied their tragedies are to the political situation, whilst showing her exploring Hiraya’s house. Once the game begins, the book becomes much more fast paced, with a gripping run to the end. It also features some great horror moments like crawling through impossibly tight tunnels for your life and discovering the truth about the food served in the house. There’s plenty of the gothic side too in terms of social commentary, not just in the political situation but also the position of women in society and how Josephine is looking set to be forced to marry an older man, and the children’s game turned into a deadly fight fits in well with this.
Whilst the book was mostly a quite slow burn gothic novel for the first half, I liked how it then became more tense and also more creepy as it went on, especially with all the insects. If you like gothic horror, this book delivers a tense story that explores the complicated bonds between family and friends and a fight against oppression.
Fiendfully Reading 
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