What do readers think of The House on Biscayne Bay by Chanel Cleeton? Write your own review.

The House on Biscayne Bay is a mixture of mystery, murder and historic fiction. Marbrisa, an extremely large and elegant estate is the house on Biscayne Bay in South Florida. Built after WWI on a remote site facing the water with the dual intentions of developing luxury living for the newly rich and elevating the status of builder Robert Barnes and his wife Anna in Florida society. Fast forward to 1941 as nineteen year old Carmen Hayes comes to Marbrisa to join her sister, Carolina and grieve their parents who perished in an accident. She immediately becomes enmeshed in the web of intrigue around unsolved murder that has plagued Marbrisa since the estate opened its doors.
Screaming peacocks, large iguanas and alligators stopping cars provide a chilling yet somewhat comical back drop to the fairly predictable plot. Allusions to the gangster element in southern Florida and the negative feelings of locals as outside money begins to change their lives offer some historical background but the main story concerns how Anna Barnes deals with her husbands secrets and how Carmen navigates between her grief for her parents and the contradictions she finds in her sister's household. A fast read yet not captivating.

Marbrisa, the house on Biscayne Bay, was the central character with all its secrets, accidents, and deaths after WWI and before WWII. I found the characters were not developed enough to understand their situations and how they responded to events happening at Marbrisa. As a historical fiction there was no depth about the two time periods. The novel was more about power, glamour, affairs, loss of fortunes, trust, and betrayal. I like suspense, but I was disappointed, and I found the story not engaging. I even guessed who was causing troubles in 1941.

The book was well written but the story was predictable and not all that engaging. I thought having Carmen and Carolina come from Cuba was odd. It didn't feel like that aspect of the story was well researched. If some of the main characters are from a different culture, it would be good to highlight aspects of that culture that are relevant to how the characters handled the events in the story. Overall, the book was okay but I prefer more history in my historical fiction.

This book was a quick, easy read. with just a bit of a twist at the end. Tells the story of 3 women who have lived in the same Florida mansion... As I read I kept thinking "another house book"... Another book with chapters alternating characters and story lines. Felt like I had read this book before..

Many of the characters in this novel were not particularly sympathetic, with this reader finding Carmen Acosta the one exception. The motivation for each character's actions were eventually explained but were not accompanied by full character development.

The stories of two murders, occurring in two time periods, were told in alternating chapters. This construction impeded the build up of dramatic tension, and made what would unfold in the next chapter less intriguing.

Though both the title and the Gothic genre suggest the house should be a more imposing feature in these stories, it was treated as a background character. A major feature in the house's construction was introduced late in the novel and seemed to exist only to foster the final resolution.

It was easy to breeze through the book to the conclusion, but it wasn't a compelling read.