Model Home
The Maxwell siblings grew up as the only Black family in a gated community outside Dallas, in a house that always felt wrong, marked by strange noises, hostile neighbors, and a creeping dread none of them could name. As adults they have scattered and tried to forget. When their parents are found dead in that same house, the three return and are forced to reckon with whether the haunting was supernatural, the racism of the world around them, or something tangled out of both. Rivers Solomon uses the haunted house to look hard at race, family, and the homes that shape and damage us. It was a TeaTime Book Club pick by Dakota Johnson.
Themes & atmosphere
What you might want to know about Model Home
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
Three Black siblings return to their childhood home, a house in a gated white Texas suburb, after their parents are found dead, and confront the terror that has haunted the place for years.
Yes. It is a literary haunted-house story that uses horror to examine race, family, and the trauma of being the only Black family in a white gated community.
Yes. Dakota Johnson selected Model Home for her TeaTime Book Club in October 2024.
Model Home was written by Rivers Solomon, published in 2024 by MCD.
Model Home is 304 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Model Home takes most readers 5 to 7 hours to finish.
Model Home is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.