Book Review: The Family Plot by Cherie Priest

“Put them all in the ground. Plant the seeds, and harvest the ghosts.”

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Music City Salvage sells old things and strips condemned historic properties. But times are tough, so when venerable Augusta Withrow of the esteemed Withrow clan stops by offering to unload her entire estate “for a check and a handshake,” owner Chuck Dutton can’t afford to resist and assigns his daughter, Dahlia, to supervise the project. What she and her crew find is more than they bargained for: a building in great shape; empty, but far from abandoned and seething with supernatural rage.

The Family Plot is fantastic. From the get-go, the stakes are sky-high: a family business on the brink of insolvency takes a huge gamble on one final expensive but potentially lucrative job, an investment that turns out to be much different than they anticipate. Unease permeates the to-good-to-be-true offer; there’s something the seller isn’t saying. The last of the Withrows, she can’t wait to see the 4,500-square-foot home — built by her great-grandfather in 1882 and filled with luxuries like pine floors, marble fireplaces, rosewood mantels, stained-glass windows, chestnut staircases, and two outbuildings sealed for 80+ years — demolished. Located at the foot of a mountain on the outer edge of Chattanooga, Tennessee, the property is isolated and difficult to reach, but it’s a potential goldmine; too good to pass up despite the risk, lingering doubts, scant staff, and tight, two-week timeline. Hotel rooms are costly, which means they’ll also be camping onsite. What could go wrong?

Though the team arrives toting their own personal baggage, Dahlia immediately connects with the homestead, experiencing oddities (a door that won’t open, mysterious footprints and fingerprints, disturbing vibes, strange and intrusive thoughts, ghostly sightings) and discovering an overgrown graveyard Augusta failed to disclose or include in the paperwork. The gothic elements and atmosphere are nothing short of divine, keeping the reader glued to the pages as the layered storyline gradually unfolds. Remnants of bygone eras and forgotten lives linger in every nook and crevice, rendered filthy and decayed by time and nature but teeming with secrets and untold stories.

It’s a delectable study of death, decay, ephemerality, and things left behind: a liminal, spectral, loaded experience packed with fascinating characters, gruesome remains, grisly mysteries, and utterly terrifying, visceral moments — a delicious haunted house tale where structures live and breathe, ghosts are par for the course, work morphs into a harrowing fight for survival, and history isn’t nearly as dead and buried as it should be. A spellbinding, five-star binge-read sure to top this reader’s yearly and all-time favorites lists.

🖤Amanda