With his marriage on the rocks and his life in shambles, washed up crime writer Lucas Graham is desperate for a comeback. So when he’s promised exclusive access to notorious cult leader and death row inmate Jeffrey Halcomb, the opportunity is too good to pass up. Lucas leaves New York for the scene of the crime—a split-level farmhouse on the gray-sanded beach of Washington State—a house whose foundation is steeped in the blood of Halcomb’s diviners; runaways who, thirty years prior, were drawn to his message of family, unity, and unconditional love. Lucas wants to tell the real story of Halcomb’s faithful departed, but when Halcomb goes back on his promise of granting Lucas exclusive information on the case, he’s left to put the story together on his own. Except he is not alone. For Jeffrey Halcomb promised his devout eternal life…and within these walls, they’re far from dead.

This is one of those books where…hmm…I wanted to love it, but something was missing for me. This is the first book by Ania Ahlborn I’ve read, and I did enjoy many aspects of it, but was also frustrated by other aspects.

Very early, the plot of Within These Walls struck me as quite similar to the movie Sinister: both are about a true crime author who had an incredibly successful book in the past, but has recently fallen on hard times. In both, the author is convinced that the book they are working on is their next Really Big Hit, and maybe their last chance at another financial success. In both, the author causes upheaval in their family by moving far away, to occupy & work inside the home where The Really Creepy Shit happened. The similarities kind of end there, but it was an odd “I’ve been here before” sensation for me, especially having only recently seen Sinister for the first time.

Lucas Graham is the author in question here, and amidst the wreckage that is his marriage & life crumbling down around him, he receives a letter from Jeffrey Halcomb. Halcomb, in the early 1980’s, was the leader of a cult and responsible for a horrific mass murder/suicide. The house where this crime took place belonged to Audra Snow (well, it belonged to her father). Audra struggles with mental illness, and she is one of many seduced by Jeffrey Halcomb’s charms.

The book takes place across two timelines: the present, as we follow Lucas’s progress writing the book, and back in Audra’s timeline, slowly moving our way towards the murders/suicides. I think Ahlborn does a great job of propelling the book forward this way, because as much as we know what is going to happen, we don’t quite know the how of it all.

Ultimately, it was a lack of connection with the characters that had me feeling a bit underwhelmed. Lucas just wasn’t that compelling as a main character to me. I definitely preferred Audra’s storyline…you could really sense how fragile she was, and how vulnerable she was going to be to a sociopath like Halcomb. Her story is truly heartbreaking.

Also…and this is just a small personal gripe…Lucas’s daughter. She’s a super angsty 12-year-old, dressed all in black, moody af…totally relatable. Her name is Virginia. Her parents call her Jeanie. She thinks of herself as Vee. And while there is a bit of a plot-based reason for this in the end, it honestly just annoyed the shit out of me, this constant bouncing around of three names for the same character. She even earns an additional nickname late in the book. Again, it does get “explained” after a fashion, but it just got under my skin.

There are some genuinely creepy & unsettling moments in Within These Walls. It was well paced & well written, I just didn’t have much in the way of an emotional response to this.