Ewan begins to investigate the house's history despite a promise from his wife that he leave the past alone and is assisted by the housekeeper's (Elsa) teenage daughter Petra. His five-year-old daughter Maggie has expressed fear of a being she calls 'Mister Shadow' and has an imaginary playmate called 'Miss Pennyface', so named because she has pennies on her eyes. Ewan and his family experience several strange events that appear to reference both the Carver murder-suicide as well as the house's original owner, William Garson, and his daughter Indigo. She deliberately omits that the home also has a history of supernatural activity, which the family comes to discover on their own. The realtor reluctantly informs them that the home was the site of a murder suicide prior owner Curtis Carver murdered his daughter Katie before taking his own life, leaving his wife Marta to discover their bodies. The below synopsis is split into sections, one containing Ewan's narrative and the other containing Maggie's.Įwan and his wife Jess have purchased Baneberry Hall, a Victorian home in need of some repair. Maggie Holt narrates events as they happen during current day, while her father Ewan's narrative occurs via passages of his book House of Horrors, which details the family's time at Baneberry Hall during the 1990s. The book-within-a-book focuses on supernatural events that Ewan claims drove them to flee their home and never return. It focuses on the characters of Maggie Holt, via her first person narrative, and her father Ewan, through excerpts taken from a book. Sager references the 1977 Jay Anson book The Amityville Horror during the novel, which also served as part of Home Before Dark's inspiration. The novel was first published on Jthrough Dutton. Home Before Dark is a 2020 thriller novel by pseudonymous author Riley Sager.

Home before dark book summary