A House with Good Bones
T Kingfisher
Ursula Vernon writes and illustrates laugh-out-loud funny books for kids. Under the 'vaguely absurd' (quoting Vernon herself) pen name T. Kingfisher she also writes books for adults. These, too, are quite funny, though in a more Austenesque way -- if Jane Austen grew up in the 21st century and was not shy about dropping F-bombs, she might write like this. (If there's a a nicer thing I could say about an author, I don't know what would be.)
A House with Good Bones is definitely a Kingfisher rather than a Vernon book, in the sense that it's intended for grown-ups. Aside from the aforementioned F-bombs, there's a lot of very adult humor. (I'm not sure I myself am old enough to read this book.) Also, since the blurb describes it as "A contemporary Southern Gothic from award-winning master of modern horror", I think I can mention without spoiling that it is a ghost story (or ghost story adjacent), and that the creepy parts are genuinely creepy. It is the kind of horror fiction I like -- not the boring gross-out stuff, but genuinely scary psychological horror.
One last remark -- if you are a genuine animal lover, this book is for you. So often one reads books that are targeted at animal lovers and finds that the authors are unable to conceive of affection for any animal other than dogs and cats, the occasional hamster or parrot, and barnyard animals. Samantha Montgomery, the heroine of A House with Good Bones is an entomologist -- she loves insects. Also, you will have noticed the vulture pictured on the cover. You would naturally suppose that vultures are part of the horror plot, and they are, but not in the way you might expect. In her Acknowledgements, Vernon has this to say
Black vultures are, in fact, wonderful birds. They’re found all over the American Southeast, and they are highly social animals, with complex family bonds. This makes them different from many other raptors, who tend to be—charitably—extremely single-minded. (The joke is that people who go into raptor rehabilitation start out excited to work with eagles and end up being passionate about vultures.) I own a little piece of land that contains a black vulture roost, and I feel honored to be allowed to host them.
If you're up for a horror story with heroic vultures that will make you laugh when it's not creeping you out (or even when it is), you probably will not do better than this.