The Last House on Needless Street | Book Review

The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward weaves together themes of loss, grief, depression, systematic abuse, and mental illness. The book shows how these concepts can feed off each other and create a cycle that can be impossible to break out of. There are instances and descriptions of child abuse, both physical and mental, and confinement and torture, but they serve the story and are done extremely well. They don't feel like they were put in the book just for shock value.

The book makes you squirm and breaks your heart a little bit. The characters are unreliable narrators, and the book wants you to realize that right away and uses that against you. You know something is wrong, but you can't fully place what it is, and it keeps you guessing until the very end. The Last House on Needless Street is a book of twists, and just when you think you have figured out what's happening, another twist is revealed.

By the end of the story, you're left with a strange and wonderful feeling of both sorrow and hope. The pacing and narrative are wonderfully written, and the mystery is one of the most compelling that I've read in a while. The Last House on Needless Street is a violent, sad, and beautiful mess, and if that sounds like something you'd be into, then you should definitely check it out.