Review - Bedbugs by Ben H. Winters

 

Paperback, 256 pages

Published September 6th 2011 by Quirk Publishing

ISBN 1594745234 (ISBN13: 9781594745232)

From Goodreads:

FOR RENT: Top two floors of beautifully renovated brownstone, 1300 sq. ft., 2BR 2BA, eat-in kitchen, one block to parks and playgrounds. No broker’s fee.
Susan and Alex Wendt have found their dream apartment.
Sure, the landlady is a little eccentric. And the elderly handyman drops some cryptic remarks about the basement. But the rent is so low, it’s too good to pass up.
Big mistake. Susan soon discovers that her new home is crawling with bedbugs . . . or is it? She awakens every morning with fresh bites, but neither Alex nor their daughter Emma has a single welt. An exterminator searches the property and turns up nothing. The landlady insists her building is clean. Susan fears she’s going mad—until a more sinister explanation presents itself: she may literally be confronting the bedbug problem from Hell.

I thought it was a good story.  Made me feel like I had bugs on me while reading it.  I liked the first 2/3 of it and then I felt like the last 1/3 was rushed.  I liked Alex & Emma but actually did not care for the main character Susan.  I didn’t like her at all and when these things were happening to her I wasn’t too sympathetic to her.  I thought she was a bit selfish and did not care about her daughter or husband. 

I did however like the nanny and thought she wasn’t in it enough.  I also really liked the exterminator and she was not in it enough either. 

Overall I thought the book could have been longer, at 256 pages I felt it could have had 100 more pages to explain more things.  I did not expect the supernatural twist to it.  I thought it had a good ending.