It started out better than that rating indicates, I think, but the final third really didn't work for me. I'm a big horror fan, but for me the most frightening horror comes from suggestion, not the hack-hack-gore model where shock after bloody shock are piled on top of each other. There were points towards the end where it all got so over the top that the scare factor actually decreased. It didn't help that hardly anyone investigating this haunted house was likeable, and the main investigator was the most unlikeable of the lot. When I don't care if the house destroys a single one of the characters, that's something of a problem.

That said, I note that, at the end of the book, the about the author section said that Guest has actually worked at the house, manning the BBQ booth. I didn't realise Reindeer Manor was an actual place! But apparently it's run as an amusement park, in much the same fashion as Spookers here in New Zealand, or so I imagine. And the creepy history of the house that's related in the story is based on truth, or so the Reindeer Manor website tells me. Given this setting, I wish I could find the novel more appealing... but I bought the series all together, so perhaps the rest of the volumes in it will improve.