Never mind that Vera has never considered herself a good daughter, nor a good person.Ĭrowder House is not the home that Vera left when she was a teenager: In the intervening twelve years, Daphne has cashed in on their unfortunate infamy by opening up the doors to all manner of strangers who feel entitled to witness Francis’ crimes, and to the writers and artists who would scavenge upon whatever creative morsels are left. Death brings Vera back in adulthood, but it’s Daphne who is wasting away before her eyes her final request is that Vera pack up the house and take care of things once she’s gone like a good daughter.

Killings send Vera Crowder away from Crowder House when she’s barely out of adolescence-specifically, her father Francis Crowder’s salacious murders that took place beneath the floorboards where she and her suburban-with-a-sharp-edge mother Daphne slept.

Examining a serial killer’s legacy through his widowed wife, estranged daughter, and abandoned house, Just Like Home interrogates the bloodlust of the true crime genre alongside a good old-fashioned haunting. Over the past several years, it’s been fascinating to watch Gailey refine the blueprint for a domestic thriller with a supernatural twist, culminating in their latest horror novel that gets beneath your skin before you even realize how deep it’s gone. And even before the blood, there is the equally impactful trauma of adolescence shaped by an unyielding and unforgiving parent so determined to remake the child in their image that they don’t care if doing so breaks them ( The Echo Wife). A house often figures prominently, either a childhood home or one that never got the chance to house a family but has instead been filled with blood and trauma (“Haunted”). There will be familial relationships fractured along fault lines, often involving one member shut out of another’s world ( Magic for Liars). At this point, you know when you’re being told a Sarah Gailey story.

Sarah gailey just like home