Horror Book Review: Play Nice by Rachel Harrison

Complicated family dynamics and a haunted house? Correction: Possessed house. This novel is exactly what you are searching for if you enjoy reading books about complicated family issues. 

PLAY NICE by Rachel Harrison was published in September 2025 and has since been on the best-sellers list for Horror Occult, and Suspense. It has amassed plenty of praise from other authors and customers who bought the book. 

But should you read it or skip this one? 

Read on to find out. 

PLAY NICE Plot Summary

Clio Louise Barnes is an influencer and stylist. She grew up in a possessed house, not haunted, after her parents had a messy divorce. Alex, her mother, insisted the house was possessed, but Clio and her sisters didn’t believe her, and neither did the court when they took away her custody rights. 

Alex did write a book about her experiences, but Clio and her sisters were discouraged from reading it. After Alex passes away, the house is passed on to Clio and her sisters. While Clio sees this as an opportunity to create content about house flipping, her sisters see it as processing trauma. Eventually, Clio reads her mother’s book after she experiences haunting memories of her past. She soon realizes the ugly truths that shake the very foundation of her beautiful life. 

PLAY NICE Preview with My Take

Clio is at a party when she meets a guy called Ethan with whom she hits it off. They leave the party, and as they are talking, she receives a call which Ethan insists she take. It’s from her sisters, Daphne and Leda. 

Clio chooses to talk to Daphne over Leda and learns that her mother passed away. The sisters have decided to meet up at their father’s house, and Clio agrees. 

As Clio processes her mother’s memories, it is obvious that her mother was an alcoholic and often gave the advice to never open her heart to anyone. 

Clio decides not to go home with Ethan and practically pushes him out of the car. 

The next morning, Clio wakes up and panics about not using her serums and adhering to her nighttime skin routine. She also makes a fuss about having to take the train all the way over to her Dad’s place and guilts him into coming and picking her up. 

Clearly, Clio is a spoiled child, or perhaps her father enjoys his daughter being dependent on her. Her Dad is married to Amy, and Clio may like her pancakes but not the person making them. 

Her father not only comes to give her a ride but also helps her clean her fridge and carry the luggage. He has even gotten her a bottle of water! He’s either father of the year or clearly spoiling his daughter. 

When Clio reaches the house, we meet Daphne and Leda. They have their Dad doing things for them as well, although not as much as he is for Clio. 

At this point, none of the characters are looking good, and it has less to do with their dependency on their father and more to do with them squabbling over everything. 

A few more things are established as the preview draws to a close. Aunt Helen, Alex’s sister, hates the father. She has invited the girls to the funeral, but only Clio declares that she is going to the dinner table. 

The preview ends with us learning that Alex put the possessed house on the market and had long since given up fighting for custodial rights. Also, she had moved on with her demonologist boyfriend, Roy. 

READ OR SKIP?

This is a tricky one. Who doesn’t like a haunted house story? Correction, a possessed one. It is stated multiple times in the first few chapters that the house is possessed. But how, that we do we not learn in these chapters? 

The characters are not likable, but I suppose they are not supposed to be. They are broken, traumatized by the past, of which we still need to read and learn. 

The fact that no one was ever curious about Alex’s book seems debatable. Sure, the sisters were upset with their mother, but she was their mother after all. Did they not want to know her side of the story? 

This part reminded me of the Netflix show The Haunting of Hill House, based on the novel of the same name. In that, too, one of the siblings had written a book that had gotten the others pissed off because they felt it mocked their childhood trauma. 

Play Nice has pace that works in its favor. The writing flows well, too. But can you really read a story when you don’t like any of the characters? 

Nevertheless, I would still READ this novel if only to learn what secrets the mother was hiding about the house. 

You can check out the novel on Amazon