Book Summary and Reviews of The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home by Joseph Fink

The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home by Joseph Fink

The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home

A Welcome to Night Vale Novel

by Joseph Fink

  • Critics' Consensus (2):
  • Published:
  • Mar 2020, 384 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

From the New York Times bestselling authors of Welcome to Night Vale and It Devours! and the creators of the hit podcast, comes a new novel set in the world of Night Vale and beyond.

In the town of Night Vale, there's a faceless old woman who secretly lives in everyone's home, but no one knows how she got there or where she came from...until now. Told in a series of eerie flashbacks, the story of The Faceless Old Woman goes back centuries to reveal an initially blissful and then tragic childhood on a Mediterranean Estate in the early nineteenth century, her rise in the criminal underworld of Europe, a nautical adventure with a mysterious organization of smugglers, her plot for revenge on the ones who betrayed her, and ultimately her death and its aftermath, as her spirit travels the world for decades until settling in modern-day Night Vale.

Interspersed throughout is a present-day story in Night Vale, as The Faceless Old Woman guides, haunts, and sabotages a man named Craig. In the end, her current day dealings with Craig and her swashbuckling history in nineteenth century Europe will come together in the most unexpected and horrifying way.

Part The Haunting of Hill House, part The Count of Monte Cristo, and 100% about a faceless old woman who secretly lives in your home.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"A chilling ghost story...A decades long, globe-spanning saga of adventure, betrayal, love, and fate [about] one of Welcome to Night Vale's most enigmatic and terrifying characters... A funny, terrifying, and unpredictable slice of Night Vale's macabre history." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"Eerie, enchanting ... offers up a Shakespearian revenge drama that doubles as the origin story of one of Night Vale's most mysterious residents...Newcomers need not be familiar with the Night Vale podcast to enjoy this standout tale." - Publishers Weekly

"The distinctly spare and precise weirdness of Fink and Cranor's writing (It Devours!, 2017) will please even readers completely unfamiliar with the sinister town." - Booklist

"Fink and Cranor are masters of the long narrative game. They have a clear vision in mind, and every element of the book builds toward it, with emotionally devastating, sometimes brutally funny, results. The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home is an excellent, absorbing book." - New York Journal of Books

"A cinematic tale full of endless twists, The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home is a unique horror story with a rare swashbuckling and complex female protagonist I couldn't get enough of. The writing throws you into a colorful, intelligent world of ups and downs, scares and laughs, and nuanced heroes and villains that keeps you gripped with anticipation for an ending you know will horrify you." - Gaby Dunn, New York Times bestselling author of I Hate Everyone but You

This information about The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

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Author Information

Joseph Fink

Joseph Fink created the Welcome to Night Vale and Alice Isn't Dead podcasts. He lives in the Hudson Valley and Los Angeles.

Jeffrey Cranor cowrites the Welcome to Night Vale and Within the Wires podcasts. He also cocreates theater and dance pieces with choreographer/wife Jillian Sweeney. They live in New York.

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