Happy Halloween! I love Halloween - it's in my top-3 list of favourite holidays! If you want to see some of my recommendations for some spooky reads, click here.
Halloween is on a Thursday this year! I think that calls for a book review, don't you?
And probably an extra-special, themed book review at that!
One book missing from that list of recommended reads from a couple year's ago is the subject of today's book review.
I finished reading Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House recently. It was one of those ones I always meant to read, but never got around to. So, this October, it was a priority.
I'm way behind on my reading for the year. No hope of catching up. But I wanted to make sure I got in one spooky story for the month. And this was it.
At the beginning of October, though, we watched the Netflix TV show. Have you seen it?
Spooky, right? It was scary, but beautifully done. I appreciate well-done stories, regardless of the genre, and the cinematography and directorial choices of this were just plain really good.
And so, the book became a priority.
I really loved this book. I've heard some people say they can't get into it, that it isn't scary enough. It's a subtle scare, but it is scary.
It differs a lot from the TV show, so don't expect the same story. But the house is there, in all its imposing, eerie horribleness.
The house hosts four characters: Dr. Montague, who is investigating the house for paranormal research for an upcoming study and book; Theodora, a lighthearted, fun-loving young woman acting as an assistant; Eleanor, a vulnerable, meek, self-deprecating young woman; Luke, the heir to Hill House. There are also the Dudleys, who care for the house, but insist they won't stay there after the sun sets.
The reader follows Eleanor (Nell). She is friendless. Alone, and the very definition of vulnerable. She spent most of her life caring for her elderly mother, and when she died, she moved in with her sister and sister's husband, both of whom treat her like a child. So, when she answers the ad for Dr. Montague, looking for an assistant, and he hires her, she takes the family car, packs her things, and goes, despite her sister forbidding it.
It's the first time she feels free.
And then she gets to Hill House, and immediately wants to turn around. Still, as she stays, as she gains a sense of companionship with the other guests, she begins to both hate the house, and feel at home there.
Strange things happen. There are noises. Slamming doors. Pounding against the wall. Messages in blood - featuring her name - appear. And through it all, Nell wavers between fear and acceptance.
“I am like a small creature swallowed whole by a monster, she thought, and the monster feels my tiny little movements inside.”
Nell is mousy. She is portrayed as weak, but also connected to the world of the supernatural. Through the book, through her perspective, she gains some strength, even in her confusion about the house and her identity and how the two intertwine.
“Am I walking toward something I should be running away from?”
This is the quintessential haunted house book. It is spooky, it is inexplicable, and the mood is fantastic.
But there is a reason it is the cornerstone of all other haunted house books. A reason it is a classic. Not just a classic horror, but a classic book, period.
And that's the writing. Poetic and understated. Detailed and subtle. That's why it's such a fantastic book, why, even in its horror, it's beautiful.
“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.”
How are you spending Halloween? Do you have any great "Halloween reads" to recommend?
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Happy Halloween!