Puzzleheart: 08/18/24

Puzzleheart by Jenn Reese (2024) is one of those delightful books from the subgenre of "sentient house." In adult horror these houses are often the villain, but in middle grade, they are awkward, goofy, well meaning characters often pushed to extremes by the humans who live with them. That is the case here as the house will end up nearly destroying itself to save the woman he loves and their own hard earned memories.

Perigee and their dad arrive at Puzzleheart at the start of a blizzard. They've come to visit Grayson's mother at a time when the family of two are struggling to stay financially and emotionally afloat.

Like the house from The View from the Very Best House in Town by Meera Trehan (2022), Puzzleheart was built to be extraordinary. This house has puzzles built in and the ability to shift pieces of its architecture around as needed. It also, deep in its heart, has a reset button just in case things get out of hand.

The house was designed to be a B&B escape room experience but that never happened. Before the place could open for business, Grayson's father died. Grayson's mother has grieved every since and retreated more and more into herself, leaving the house in growing desperation to fix her.

The majority of this book is set during the blizzard while Savannah Eklund (the grandmother) is providing shelter to a neighborhood girl whose mother is on the mountain rescue squad. While she's out saving people from the snow, her daughter, her cat and the cat's kittens are all sheltering at Puzzleheart.

Lily, being about Perigee's age become fast friends and to save the house and themselves, set off to solve mysteries of Puzzleheart as the house begins one last ditch effort to get Savannah to regain her love of puzzles.

The journey Perigee and Lily take to solve the mysteries of Puzzleheart puts this novel on the Road Narrative Spectrum. For reasons that are beautifully revealed through the puzzles the travelers are in a Scarecrow / Minotaur dichotomy (99). Both Lily / Perigee and the house believe they are the protectors (scarecrows) and the other is the minotaur (monster/ villain).

Their destination is home (66). Perigee needs a new home. Lily wants keep Perigee safe as a form of sympathetic magic to make sure her mother will come home safe at the end of the blizzard. Puzzlheart itself wants to be Savannah's home — a place she loves living in, rather than a prison that reminds her constantly of her dead husband.

Their route is the maze (CC) in that Puzzleheart does some very dangerous things to protect itself. The puzzles that make the house unique are also the means for resetting the house and potentially erasing all of its memories. To protect itself, Puzzleheart risks bodily harm to Savannah's family as well as structural harm to itself.

Five stars

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