A family moves into their dream home—only to discover that it hides an insatiable hunger—in this dread-laced and darkly outrageous domestic horror novel.
Intrigued? Read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from The House That Eats the Dead by Max Doty, which releases on August 18th 2026.
The new house is a fresh start for Claire and her family. It’s a move away from the cityscape of a declining San Francisco and towards the quiet suburban life she has craved since her turbulent childhood; a step up the corporate ladder for her husband, Tom; and a safe haven for their two children.
Yet as they unpack their boxes, she senses something is wrong. Fresh flowers dry up, store-bought eggs are inexplicably hollow, and her daughter’s favorite toy disappears. Claire soon confronts a series of impossible truths: The house is hungry. It’s devouring anything that was once alive. And only Claire and Tom, the owners of the house, will remember that this “food” ever existed.
When Claire exploits the house’s power in a moment of weakness, she and the house forge a fragile bond. But as its hunger intensifies and Claire loses control, she fears who else might be drawn to her home—and what sinister appetites they’ll bring.
EXCERPT
That night around ten, Tom came home late from work to find me weeping over an empty plastic bag.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“There was a pillow in here,” I said. “A brand-new feather pillow. And now it’s gone. And the bag is still sealed. How does that happen?”
“Are you sure you didn’t just put it somewhere else?”
“Things disappear in this house!” I was almost shouting. I made myself keep it together. I didn’t want to wake Grace. “Things disappear in this house,” I said, now whispering too softly, overcorrecting. “I need you to know that. I need you to believe me.”
“I do.”
“I had a whole list. There was tea on it. And a book. The house ate the list.”
“I believe you.”
“You don’t. I know you. You want to reassure me, but you’re a lawyer. Without a reasonable doubt, right? That’s what it takes with you. But I’m telling you, I was the one who supervised the move. I’ve got ten thousand items in my head, dishes to thumbtacks. I know every one. I know everything that goes missing. Everything.”
“You did a lot,” he said. “Too much.”
I thought for a second. Then I went to the fridge and picked out a steak I’d bought earlier that evening. Actually, I’d bought five. Now only two and a half were left. I flopped one onto a plate, where it landed with a bloody squelch. I brought it over to the counter on the kitchen island.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“We’re going to watch this steak,” I said.
“Watch it do what?”
“Disappear.”
I knew how it sounded, but I was exhausted and tired of being dismissed, even if it was with kindness. Mostly, I felt tired of being alone.
“I need you in this with me,” I said. “None of this ‘separate spheres’ bullshit. I need you to see it and believe it.”
“Do you really think it’s going to disappear if we watch it?” he asked.
It was a good question. And he had a point. Whatever was consuming things seemed to like its privacy, working off-camera, allowing for plausible deniability.
On the other hand, it hadn’t been able to resist that deli meat. I’d never had meat last more than a few hours in the house. Whatever the presence was, it had favorites, just like the rest of us. Apples never disappeared. Oranges were hit or miss. Cheese never lasted. But meat? Meat was its favorite.
“We’re going to watch that fucking steak and find out,” I said.
Tom looked at the bloody meat and nodded. If he thought I’d lost it, he hid it well.
“Can we at least open some wine?” he asked.
“Well, yeah,” I said. “I’m not a monster.”
And so, for the next hour, we watched steak TV. Sitting on stools at the counter, we kept a lookout over the bloody meat, waiting for a bite to go missing.
It was actually a lot more fun than either of us could have expected. The wine flowed freely (Tom had opened a fifty-dollar pinot noir, because why not?).
Without the chatter of children or television to distract us, we found ourselves really talking for the first time since the move.
“Do you like it here?” he asked. “Other than the stuff disappearing, I mean?”
“I don’t know yet,” I said honestly. “I think the whole move is a shock to the system, like I’m waking up from a seventeen-year coma in this older body.”
“Alexa,” he called out. “Play ‘Once in a Lifetime’ by Talking Heads.”
“Don’t play it,” I said. “Just talk to me.
“Alexa, stop.” He put his hand over mine and looked into my eyes. I could sense he was about to kiss me, that he wanted to carry me up to bed again, and I wasn’t going to stop him. Then suddenly, he stopped. “Hey. Did the steak just move?”
We looked over at the plate. Had a bit gone missing? Had the pink pool of blood surrounding it receded?
“We should take a picture,” Tom said. “One every thirty minutes. Then we can get a good comparison.”
“Or a time-lapse video,” I added.
We propped Tom’s phone up against the toaster and set it to record.
“Thanks for doing this with me,” I said. “I know this seems crazy. You have to admit, the thing with Sunny Bear—”
“It was definitely weird,” he said. “I’ll give you that. And you’re here more often than I am.”
“I just want you to be on my team,” I said, suddenly feeling deeply lonely.
“I am,” he insisted, and I could tell he really meant it. But it wasn’t enough.
“I want you to see the things I see.”
Then he leaned forward and kissed me. The wine on his breath was delicious, and his stubble tickled at my face. I drew him closer, nearly falling off my stool.
“I’m going to open another bottle,” he whispered.
And then, suddenly, we both stopped. The steak was gone. In the five seconds we’d closed our eyes to kiss, it had disappeared, the plate licked clean.
For a moment, Tom was speechless, which was certainly rare for him. Then, suddenly, he reached for the camera. He stopped the recording and played the footage.
“What do you see?” I asked, but he just looked confused.
“It’s just a video of an empty plate,” he said. “The steak was never there.”
“But it was there,” I said. “I remember it. Don’t you?”
“I do.”
“So what do we do now?” I asked, but Tom just shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
We headed upstairs to bed. Soon, we were lying in the dark. I listened for sounds but heard nothing.
“Will you be able to sleep?” asked Tom.
“I think so,” I said. “Thank you. For watching the steak with me. It meant a lot.”
“I believed you all along, you know,” he said. “I really did.”
I reached out and held his hand beneath the blankets, and soon I was asleep.
