Home Sick by Rhiannon Grist is an emotionally sharp, quietly devastating novel that captures the ache of longing and disconnection with striking clarity. Grist’s writing is intimate and unflinching, pulling the reader deep into the narrator’s inner world where nostalgia, regret, and desire constantly blur together.

What makes Home Sick so compelling is its honesty. The emotions feel raw and lived-in, never overexplained, and the story trusts the reader to sit with discomfort and contradiction. Grist has a remarkable ability to make small moments feel enormous—glances, memories, half-spoken thoughts all carry weight and resonance.

There’s a tenderness running beneath the ache, a sense of searching for belonging even when “home” feels fractured or out of reach. Thoughtful, resonant, and beautifully written, Home Sick is a powerful read for anyone drawn to introspective fiction that lingers in the heart long after it ends.

5/5

First of all, thanks to Rebellion and NetGalley for this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review!

This was genuinely one of the best horror books I've read. It has body horror AND Welsh mythology. The main character is a complex character filled with regret and emotions, it sometimes makes her unlikeable or you don't get why she behaves the way she does. Everything makes sense. Plot-wise, it's absolutely magical. Very well developed and well designed.

If you like mythological horror with a very clear metaphor, this one is fully for you!

Extraordinary! I went into this having only read the blurb here on Netgalley, and was capativated!
What was going on? Why was she running away? And why so fearless? What horrors await? How was it going to resolve?

It's pacy. The writing is first-class. The tension is beautifully and cleverly written. It's present on every page, and yet you're never quite sure which genre this novel sits in. Clever!

As i got through the book, it increasingly reminded me of Steven Spielberg's brilliant early film Duel. The subject matter couldn't be more different, but the handling is strikingly similar: building tension, character development, and everyday moments seamlessly blended with looming danger.

I loved it. And surely this is destined for the screen — whether a feature film or a three-part TV series.

I was not familiar with the author, Rhiannon Grist, but I was drawn to this book based on the cover and description, as well as some ads I encountered. From the start I was impressed with HOME SICK's strong writing and unusual premise, and as the novel continued, I loved how strange it became. Grist approaches a difficult character with tenderness and honesty. I can think of a number of works to compare this to, but the overall effect is like nothing I've read before.

I never had any idea where this one was going! And I want to say nothing because I want everyone else to be as surprised as I was.

Home Sick follows Tamsin as she navigates rural living, having impulsively bought a house in a tiny village in Scotland. Her first surprise is that her cottage is a split. The second is that her new neighbor is a nocturnal nightmare.

Loved the first-person POV as Tamsin deals with social interactions, the past, and her own self-destructive behavior.

Exceptional storytelling. atmospheric Scottish highlands with a creepy freaky neighbor anyone? I cannot wait to get my hands on a physical copy of this. Unique, authentic, so so so very creepy. I had an incredible time with this one, whenever I put it down id just be thinking about when I'd get to read more pages of it. Gimme a strange village with strange traditions, lore and people I AM SAT.

My all time favorite horror vibes are feminine rage, and this one surely delivers. Tamsin turns to a Scottish cottage sight unseen, only to find out her new home is a duplex. (Having lived in several in my life, yikes) and her neighbor is totally creepy. She is vulnerable when she arrives and her paranoia is at an all time high, but mine would be too. This is a short but very spooky cottage core story that's based in Scottish folklore, which brings so much more to the table, since I haven't heard much in that aspect.

Brilliant! I absolutely loved this story. It was the perfect blend of all of my favorite elements — folk horror, unreliable narrator, small rural town, psychological reflection. This was great. I truly have no critiques, I just can’t wait for a few months to pass so I can read it again and get even more out of it. Love!!!

I have whiplash from this book, in the best possible way. I had high hopes for Home Sick and it smashed through every expectation I had. Perfectly blending psychological horror with gore and adding a heart-wrenching tale of loneliness and rage, I think I might have found perfection in these pages.

I specifically loved how raw the writing style was in Home Sick, I felt every emotion alongside the narrator Tamsin, and as she spiralled as the book went on, I was rooting for her at every turn. The further I got into the book, the more I felt like I was taking a deep dive into Tamsin's psychosis, struggling to know what was real and what she was truly experiencing which just added to the thrill of the book. When a horror novel makes me question my own sanity, I know it's done a good job!

I would really recommend going into this one blind and letting it shock you, avoiding spoilers is a must! For every woman who has felt left behind, overlooked, or forgotten, this one is for you.

Normally I don't really much like the "supernatural or madness" sub-genre of horror, but Home Sick absolutely nails the premise, somehow being a triple-threat of scary, sensitive, and sympathetic all at once. Holy hell, some of the scenes of this book were the scariest I've read, yet I still got behind the character driving development because the story didn't rely on (literary) jump scares or survival horror.

Its hard really to add much more to my review other than to simply say this book was good good good, READ IT!

Although October is my official spooky season at Kindig Blog, I love a horror story all year round. The blurb of Home Sick was really intriguing, and I was excited to get started!

Tamsin is ready for a fresh start – she buys a cottage in the middle of the countryside without viewing it and is ready to start a new life away from the world. However, when she arrives and discovers the house is a semi-detached with an erratic neighbour, she realises her new house might not be the peaceful haven she had imagined…

From the moment I started Home Sick, I was hooked. Rhiannon Grist has created a real, lived in character of Tamsin who I empathised with throughout. Don’t get me wrong – she has a lot of flaws; she’s angry at the world, paranoid about what people think of her and makes some silly decisions. However, none of these flaws felt out of character for her at any point – this was just who she was. Without any spoilers, her character has quite a journey and a personality arc to travel on which led to a satisfying conclusion.

There’s an undercurrent of tension and unease which runs throughout the story. As a reader, we are constantly kept on the back foot – unsure of what is real and what is happening in Tamsin’s imagination or thoughts. There is a lot of her backstory which we are also are kept in the dark about until the very end – with vague references to something that has happened at work in her past in Edinburgh which drove me forward – wanting to find out more. The supernatural and horror aspects of the book were great, although the main twist is signposted very early on which I think ruined the reveal somewhat.

Overall, Home Sick is a twisty psychological thriller which puts you right in the mind of its somewhat twisted main character and had me hooked from the outset. Thank you to NetGalley & Rebellion – Solaris for the chance to read the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

After a violent incident at work, Tamsin retreats to a remote cottage in the Scottish countryside, hoping to rebuild her life from the ground up. A fresh start, new friendships, a version of herself she can finally feel at peace with. But the isolation she seeks isn’t quite what she gets, the cottage is semi-detached, separated by only a thin wall from a deeply unsettling neighbor whose shifting demeanor and ever-present smile quickly put Tamsin on edge.
As strange disturbances begin to plague her home and the townspeople share unsettling stories about the house, Tamsin’s already fragile sense of reality starts to fracture. What follows is a slow spiral into paranoia, where the line between external threat and internal unraveling becomes increasingly blurred.
I really enjoyed this psychological horror debut. I’m always drawn to stories where the setting, especially a house, feels alive and unpredictable, and the story delivers on that front. The unease builds not just through the environment, but through Tamsin herself. As both narrator and focal point, she’s deeply self-deprecating, socially anxious, and prone to overanalyzing everything around her. At times, she’s incredibly relatable; at others, her perspective feels exaggerated, but intentionally so, reinforcing the story’s tension and ambiguity.
Grist leans into the unreliable narrator effectively, particularly in Tamsin’s interactions with her neighbor and the townspeople. Because of Tamsin’s own insecurities and tendency to overthink, we only ever see others at a distance, filtered through her perceptions, which often feel incomplete or skewed. This creates a sense of disconnection that works well thematically, though it did leave me wishing for a bit more depth and development from the supporting cast.
The novel starts on slightly uneven footing, as it establishes Tamsin’s voice and instability, but once the central mystery takes hold, the pacing sharpens considerably. The climax is especially well-executed: tense, satisfying, and, in a way, liberating for both Tamsin and the reader. The resolution ties together the psychological and horror elements in a way that feels earned and ultimately redeeming.
Overall, while the pacing may feel off at times, it seems intentional, mirroring Tamsin’s own mental state and gradual unraveling. Despite a few minor shortcomings, this book is a compelling and atmospheric read that effectively blends psychological tension with gothic horror.