A review of "The Haunting of Orchard Hill" by Sara Crocoll Smith

Sara Crocoll Smith's The Haunting of Orchard Hill is solidly a paranormal novel and solidly a romance in the gothic style. It begins with tension as Nina, our protagonist, and her infant son flee an abusive husband, who also happens to be a cop, upping the stakes. When her car breaks down in a rural town, she is taken in by a widow who owns an apple orchard. There are whispers about her too. Did she kill her husband? Then Nina meets the mysterious farmhand, Colin, and is instantly smitten. Colin, however, has his own secrets.

The text of this story was well-written and well-edited. Its highlight is definitely the folksy, mysterious widow who offers to take in Nina and her son. Like Nina, in the beginning I could not tell whether this woman was truly kind or had nefarious motivations. I was really cheering for her to be good because Nina already had enough crap going on in her life.

The tension is high throughout, and as a reader, I was very interested in finding out what was going to happen next. The baby, Holden, creates a lot of this tension as Nina loses him often, though only for short periods. I think the pacing would have benefitted from a few more quiet times and a few cameos of life without the threat of the estranged husband or the mysterious widow. This would have particularly helped build the romance subplot, which I questioned. I could have revelled in more of the paranormal aspects and given the romance more time to develop. I wanted Nina to turn away from a relationship immediately after leaving her abusive husband. It seemed too soon. A great deal of her motivation comes from her son. She needs to protect him, after all, and should know she's in no state to get involved again so soon.

The ending offered a twist I definitely did not seem coming. For the romance readers (mild spoiler), this gives you your HEA. I, for one, expected a different sort of ending.

I did really enjoy this book and would love to continue following this author, to see what else she comes up with in this genre.

I received this book as an ARC from the author.

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