The Artist of Blackberry Grange
The Artist of Blackberry Grange
By: Paulette Kennedy
[Fulfilled ‘A book set in Arkansas’ (the 25th ratified state) Shelf Reflection’s 2025 Reading Challenge]
“‘Sometimes I think I sold my soul for a handful of penny candy— as if some unseen devil heard Florence’s wish and granted it, using my talents as a vehicle for evil.’”
This is not my typical genre— gothic horror—and there were definitely parts that were not my favorite, but it had some redeeming qualities. I liked the second half a lot better than the first half.
I’ve probably only read a few ‘horror’ books so I don’t know what is normal for that type of read. For this book there were supernatural things happening and hauntings, but it wasn’t a super dark or gory story. Because it was set in 1925 the haunting part felt more like an atmospheric element than anything that was supposed to make me feel scared.
I would say it’s more gothic than horror.
The premise: Sadie, on the wrong end of a terminated affair with a married man leaves Kansas City, seizing on the opportunity to care for her great aunt in Arkansas, Marguerite, who is deteriorating with dementia.
“Marguerite was spirited. A chimera. An artist who broke rules and paved her own path in life.”
Family secrets come to light when Sadie experiences the supernatural through her aunt’s haunting portraits she’s painted of people now deceased. Sadie can see them walking in the house and can even be sucked into the paintings— portals to the past.
“‘This old house holds many ghosts, my dear. Some of them are mine.’”
The lure of the paintings centers on Weston Chase, the subject of one of the portraits who is also a womanizer. He seduces Sadie to carry on an intimate relationship through the painting portal.
“Weston Chase. Like something out of a tawdry romance. He’s a hunter, my dear. He chases. You fell right into his snare. But there’s a price to his pleasures. A price you’ll never be able to pay.”
But Sadie soon realizes something happened in Marguerite’s past that reveals these hauntings are part of a curse that must somehow be reversed before the rage of Weston kills them all.
“‘There’s a reason for her anger. Her pain. She just has trouble remembering what caused all of it.’”
“For the past few weeks, so much of what I thought I knew about my family has changed, as if I’ve been looking at them through distorted glass for all these years. Now I see them more clearly. How their well-bred ways were a facade for a well-hidden darkness.”
Okay, so the first half of the book felt largely unpleasant to read. Sadie was not my kind of girl. Carrying on an affair with a married man and then entering into another lustful endeavor with a ghost knowing the dangers surrounding it felt just very immature and selfish. I thought the whole book was just going to be about these supernatural escapades and how it deteriorates Sadie’s perception of reality. And if that’s all it was— and it did feel like it wasn’t really going anywhere— it was going to be a waste of my time.
Once I pushed through that part, we see some character development in Sadie as she recognizes that what she is doing is wrong.
“I’ve realized I’m not really in love with Weston. I’m addicted to him.”
She starts to have feelings for Beckett, the man on grounds who helps care for Marguerite— who is single by the way and not a ghost— and realizes what real love looks like.
So the main conflict becomes Weston’s rage when Sadie stops the relationship. He haunts the house and causes chaos and destruction. Even when they destroy the painting, it shows back up in the house. How can they stop him?
Then we have the portraits of the other people in the past that start showing Sadie Marguerite’s memories. Something terrible happened on a bluff in California and may be the key to reversing the curse if she can figure out what it was.
“‘But there are some things I’ll never tell you, child. I may be losing my mind. But I’ll take some of my secrets to the grave.’”
“The only way you’ll ever be free of him is by discovering the root of the curse. You must confront the wrongs of the past and make atonement— or the one who wronged him must, if they’re still alive.’”
I was glad when what I thought was just going to be a story about lust turned into more of a mystery about what happened in the past and that it was more centered around Marguerite than Sadie. Did she really have dementia? What memories could we trust? How do you kill a ghost?
The tension and conflict in the book built up a lot more and I really liked the ending. I thought it had a good balance of justice and redemption and allowing the grief of loss to linger. It’s not a completely happy ending, but it did resolve in a way that was satisfying.
Sadie’s selfishness turns to authentic love and care for her aunt and Beckett. She bears the burden of a lot of loss in her life, including her brother dying at a young age from illness and finding her father after he committed suicide on the day of her coming out party. Having been unable to save either of them, she feels compelled to do all she can for her aunt.
There is a discussion to be had here in terms of abusive relationships.
“Ted and Weston share many similarities. Passionate. Possessive. Dominant. And perhaps… duplicitous… What Weston offers me is familiar. But familiarity isn’t always good. Familiar can be dangerous.”
I was glad to see this growth in Sadie— not only that she recognized she didn’t want to be a mistress but that she realized she turned around and pursued a similar man, out of comfort of the familiar, which is not always good. Well, also he was a ghost, but you get it.
In the author’s note, Paulette says she was actually setting out to write a book about caregiving since she had some personal experience with it and wanted to highlight the challenges caregivers face and how our loved ones “teach us about living well and dying well in the process.”
But as she was writing, it kind of morphed into something more:
“While this is still a story about caregiving, it’s also one about generational trauma, and how the echoes of our actions filter down to our descendants.”
I thought this was interesting because I’ve recently been listening to Alisa Childer’s podcast series talking about demonic oppression and generational curses so for a generational curse to pop up in a fiction book I was reading was timely.
One of the ways Sadie attempts to combat Weston was to see a fortune teller where she got something to sprinkle in doorways, a charm to wear, and a prayer to recite. These are similar things to what is discussed in the podcast— what is demonic oppression and how do you deal with it?
I don’t usually choose to read books that have supernatural elements because some things depict reality and others dramatize or exaggerate for the story. I don’t want to romanticize, trivialize, or catastrophize the spiritual world.
If you are a Christian reader and you’re not sure what to think of things like this, I would recommend Childers’ podcast as a launching point to thinking more about these kinds of things.
Supernatural world aside, I do think that there is something practical to be said of family legacies and the things we pass down to future generations. Paulette chose to depict this using a curse. I don’t believe in curses, but I do think that how we parent our children is relative to how we were parented and will be relevant to how our children will parent their children. Abuse has been seen to be passed down. How we treat people. Our beliefs. Our way of seeing the world. Our values and priorities. The way we use our time and our money. All of these things influence future generations for good or bad.
And it’s not to say we can’t make mistakes, but what do we do with our mistakes? Do we cover them up or lie about them? Or do we confess and repent and teach people from our own mistakes?
It is right to think about the legacy we might leave for others. Are we leaving them a blessing or a burden?
A couple other random comments:
I wish we had gotten more information as to what turned the paintings into portals. Was it something in the way Marguerite painted, was there an event that triggered it? Perhaps it would have been too complicated to integrate well into the book, but it’s something that just has to be accepted and I would have preferred a better explanation.
We never did tie up the comments surrounding the Blaylock family and the death that occurred in the house. Was that just to add to the eerie vibes or was it meant to be some sort of plot point that got forgotten?
I agree with another reviewer that I’m not sure I really felt the chemistry between Beckett and Sadie. I was not wanting the lustful connection Sadie had with Weston, but I do think there was something missing from Beckett’s character to connect the readers to him and Sadie’s relationship.
I will also include this quote from the author’s note for readers more savvy than me: “Savvy readers will notice my nods to The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde, Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte, and The House on the Strand by Daphne du Maurier, all of which helped inspire certain aspects of this story.”
I actually hated Wuthering Heights and am not a big ‘classics’ fan in general so I obviously didn’t pick up on the cues, but maybe you can!
This book does have a touch of time travel and the idea that we have to be careful changing the past because we don’t know what it will affect in the future. That’s the thing about mistakes and regrets. They still shape who we are and our experiences that lead us to people and discoveries that we otherwise wouldn’t have.
Based on the author’s content warning printed at the beginning of the book, she attempted to bring a lot of things to bear in this story. Some more so than others. I suppose it makes for book club discussions, but sometimes I think authors can try to shove too many hot button topics into one book. To be honest, though, most of these were so subtle that I didn’t even notice them or feel overwhelmed by them … other than when I read the whole list before starting. Luckily, I forgot about them pretty quickly.
Recommendation
This one is hard to know how to recommend. I’m not a fan of the lust and sexual content, or the first half of the book in general, but I was glad with the turn the book took and some of the themes that eventually shone through.
I think there are both reasons to read it and reasons not to read it. I think I’ve provided enough information for you to know if this is a good fit for you.
[Content Advisory: 0 f- or s-words; there is sexual content, nothing drawn out but a few sex scenes and lust is a main plot point; supernatural elements and a demon/ghost; LGBTQ+- Marguerite had several female lovers]
**Received an ARC via NetGalley**
This book just released May 1, 2025. You can order a copy of this book using my affiliate link below.
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