In Dream House, Architect Gina Gilbert is coming apart, alienated by her clients grand house dreams and no longer certain she feels at home in San Francisco. When she travels to Maine to put family affairs in order at her childhood home, Gina and her sister Cassie stir up decades-old suspicions and resentments. Gina struggles to reconcile toxic childhood memories that still permeate the house's rooms with her deep longing for its exquisite waterfront landscape. She uses her architect's eye to unearth smoldering secrets that change family history and release her from the grip of her past.

Catherine Armsden's intrigue with architecture was ignited during her childhood growing up amongst the weather-beaten 18th and 19th century houses in Maine, where she was raised. She was educated in New England and then moved with her husband, Lewis Butler, to San Francisco in 1984 where they co-founded Butler Armsden Architects, a residential architecture firm. This is her debut novel.