Halloween Reads 2017

I love stories about ghosts and witches, and things that go bump in the night. I especially love frightening myself half-to-death reading them in the weeks leading up to Halloween! My favourites are ghostly, historical gothics, such as The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell and This House is Haunted by John Boyne, but this year I did step out of my comfort zone with Dark Matter, a brilliant twist on the haunted house story, set in the Arctic circle.

I've rated all these books five star 'Halloween Reads' but they are not all ghost stories. The Witchfinder's Sister is based on real events. The Yellow Wallpaper is a little gem of a psychological suspense (and currently free on Kindle). The humour of Mystery at Maplemead Castle will have you in stitches.

But whatever you love to read, I'm sure there's something for everyone!

Happy Halloween!

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell

Elsie Bainbridge, newly married, newly widowed, arrives at her husband's crumbling ancestral home to wait for her baby to be born, with only the company of a few resentful servants and her husband's widowed cousin, Sarah. When Elsie and Sarah explore the house they find two wooden props, skillfully painted to look like children, hidden away in a locked garret: a girl and a gypsy boy - and the girl looks just like Elsie.

Historical, dual-timeline, psychological suspense, gothic, paranormal.

Full review here.

A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

Despite the age gap between Merry and her older sister Marjorie, they have a close, loving relationship - until Marjorie starts to behave strangely. Is she having a psychotic breakdown, or has she been possessed by a demon? Or is she just faking the whole thing? When the medical profession are unable to help, her parents call in the local catholic priest. It's then that events spiral out of control and the family find themselves starring in a TV reality show called The Possession.

Contemporary, psychological suspense, paranormal.

Full review here.

This House is Haunted by John Boyne

It's 1867 and Eliza Caine has just taken the post of governess at Gaudlin Hall - the previous governess is so keen to hightail it out of there, she passes Eliza at the train station on her way back to London. The house is huge, gothic, and very creepy. It appears to run without any servants and there is no sign of any other adult - just two very strange young children. What happened to the five governesses before her? And why does she get the impression that someone really, really doesn't want her there?

Historical, gothic, paranormal.

Full review here.

Dark Matter by Michelle Paver

Dark Matter is a ghost story with a difference. Instead of the traditional haunted house, it takes place on the Norwegian island of Spitsbergen in the middle of an Arctic winter - four months of complete darkness. Five men set out on an expedition, one-by-one they all fall by the wayside until only one is left completely alone in the snowy wilderness. Or is he?

Historical, psychological suspense, paranormal.

Full review here.

The Witchfinder's Sister by Beth Underdown

Newly widowed, Alice returns to Essex to live with her brother, Matthew Hopkins. One of the servants tells her he has a great book that has the names of all the witches written down in it. Yet this is the 17th century - who believes in witches?

But in the town there is talk. Young children have died and people are saying it was done with witchcraft. Intimidated by her brother, Alice remains quiet, believing the women will be found innocent. Instead, more women are seized and imprisoned, and now Matthew wants Alice to help him.

Historical, true-life.

Full review here.

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

The narrator has recently moved to a large, decaying house with her husband to recover from 'temporary nervous depression'. Her husband, who is also her doctor, has refused to let her work (write), so she has nothing to occupy her mind other than to lounge about their bedroom and obsess about the wallpaper. She feels that, 

"There is something strange about the house - I can feel it. I even said so to John one moonlight evening, but he said what I felt was a draught, and shut the window."

Historical, psychological suspense.

Full review here.

The Lost Village by Neil Spring

In 1932 famous ghost hunter Harry Price and his assistant, Sarah, travel to an uninhabited village on Salisbury Plain, currently being used as a training ground by the British Army, to investigate exactly what it is that has got the soldiers so spooked.

(Released on 19th October 2017).

Historical, gothic, paranormal.

Full review here.

Mystery at Maplemead Castle by Kitty French

At the grand old age of 27, Melody 'I see dead people' Bittersweet has decided to stop fighting the unique talent which is persistently getting her fired/losing her potential boyfriends, and has set up The Girls' Ghostbusting Agency. Along for the ride are best friend Marina, the terrifyingly efficient Glenda, and naive young Artie, who has just enough sense to dig the girls out of trouble if they need it. In this story, Melody and her friends investigate Maplemead Castle and find it haunted by circus folk - two trapeze artists and their ringmaster - doomed to repeat the events that led to their deaths every single night. 

Contemporary, cosy mystery, humour, romance, paranormal.

Full review here.

Midnight Crossroad by Charlaine Harris

Psychic Manfred Bernardo has just moved to to the town of Midnight in Texas, which is basically just a few run-down stores around an intersection with one set of traffic lights. His new neighbours seem friendly enough, if a little ... strange ... but he's sure he's going to fit in just fine. He's right about that, because while Manfred has a few secrets in his past, it's nothing compared to those of his new friends.

Contemporary, cosy mystery, paranormal, supernatural.

Full review here. 

Related Posts

Halloween Reads 2016

10 Books Which Chilled Me (on my personal blog)

Review: The Travelling Bag and Other Ghostly Stories by Susan Hill

I've loved Susan Hill's ghost stories ever since I read The Woman in Black as a teenager. This little book contains four novella-length stories of about fifty pages each. The hardback version has a beautiful retro cover and would look lovely on any bookshelf. The stories themselves are set in different time periods, although these are not exactly specified. 

The Travelling Bag

One of those story-within-a-story tales. A paranormal detective sits in his club and recounts his most 'intriguing' case to a friend. This turns out to be the story of scientist Walter Craig, his rivalry with the more successful Sir Silas Webb, and of a mysterious travelling bag. 'It was at this exact point that there crept over me a sense of claustrophobia, and an increasing fear ... as I watched the man open the travelling bag.'

Boy Twenty-One

A sad little tale of a lonely schoolboy who finally makes a friend. Very poignant - although there is humour during the part where he and his schoolmates take a school trip to an ancient manor house - and appear to leave with one extra ...  'In the end, there was nothing for it but for everyone to say that Mrs Mills had had a long tiring day, perhaps wasn't feeling herself, and the bus left with the teacher seated at the front, with a queer, dazed expression.'

Alice Baker

A creepy story about a crumbling office block and the women who work there - including the very odd titular character. 'I could sense Alice Baker's presence but I could not see her. I smelled her though, a smell of mould and rottenness and decay, as if I had stumbled into an ancient cellar.'

The Front Room

One of those 'no good deed goes unpunished' tales, of a young family who kindly offer their spare room to an elderly relative - who then proceeds to make their life hell. 'The shadow stirred again, like a tree in the wind, but did not go. The silence was like the silence of deep snow.'

Out of the four stories my favourite was Alice Baker with Boy Twenty-One as a very close second. 

I'd recommend this book to anyone who loves traditional, creepy ghost stories, but not to those who love their ghost stories to have non-stop shocks and gore. 

Review: The Greatcoat by Helen Dunmore

The Greatcoat is half ghost story, half poignant love story, but if you are expecting to be half scared to death you are going to be disappointed. There are no jump shocks here.

It is 1952 and middle-class women were supposed to give up work when they married. Isabel spends her entire day cooking meals for her GP husband and trying not be be fobbed off with fatty cuts of meat from the butcher - a completely alien lifestyle to me living in the 21st century - I actually snorted out loud when her husband suggested they got a cleaner in to help her out!

The two-roomed flat they are renting (from a very Mrs Danvers-ish landlady) is freezing. In an effort to keep warm, Isabel uses the old RAF greatcoat she has found in a cupboard as a blanket. It doesn't take long for the original owner (Alec) to make an appearance, tapping on the window like a vampire from a horror movie, and it's not just his greatcoat he's after!

There is a lot of historical detail about life in the early 1950s, and that of an RAF pilot during the war, but the most chilling scenes are when time seems to slip. Occasionally Alec realises life has moved on without him before his mind resets, and Isabel glimpses Alec's long-lost world superimposed on her own. It reminded me of Tom's Midnight Garden and The Time Traveller's Wife.

There are a few twists I didn't see coming, mainly because I wasn't expecting them. I'd been lulled into believing this was a nice little paranormal romance, but the final scenes are genuinely chilling, along with the revelations about Alec's death and the reason for his return. 

This is a lovely ghost story, which I thoroughly recommend, although it is more poignant than frightening.

About the Author

Helen Dunmore was born in Yorkshire in 1952. She won the first Orange Prize for Fiction (now the Baileys Prize) for her novel A Spell of Winter. She wrote about the Siege of Leningrad in her 2001 novel The Siege, which was described by the historian Antony Beevor as 'a world-class novel'. It been translated into more than twenty languages. Her 2014 novel The Lie focuses on the trauma of the First World War and its aftermath through a group of three characters who come of age during that war. The Lie was a Sunday Times bestseller. She is also a poet, short story and children's writer. Her 'Ingo' series of novels for children has been published around the world.

Review: We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

I originally downloaded this book because the title caught my eye (I love castles!) along with the cover - and the fact that it was written by Shirley Jackson. I love her style of writing - she is one of the few authors I'm prepared to forgive for not always settling for a traditional happy/satisfying ending. 

The story is told by Mary Katherine Blackwood (also known as Merricat, sometimes affectionately, but often as an insult by the people who live in the village). The Blackwoods are a wealthy family who have lived for generations in a large house surrounded by a large estate. "As soon as a new Blackwood wife moved in, a place was found for her belongings, and so our house was built up with layers of Blackwood property weighting it, and keeping it steady against the world."

Six years ago Merricat's father, mother, aunt and brother all died when arsenic was put into a sugar bowl. Merricat's elder sister Constance was arrested for the murders, but acquitted due to lack of evidence. Their Uncle Julian was the only other survivor. Everyone in the village hates the Blackwoods, although it is unclear whether this is due to their wealth, because they are 'different' or because one of them is believed to be a murderer. Merricat refuses to be intimidated and visits the village every Tuesday to buy groceries. Constance is agoraphobic and does not like to leave the house; Uncle Julian's mind is going and he is confined to a wheelchair.

At the start the story reads like a mystery. Why do the villagers hate the family so much? What did happen six years ago? Who was the murderer? The answers are dripped in very, very slowly. The writing style is deceptively simple and yet the tension curls tighter and tighter. It is closer to psychological suspense than horror. Is Merricat an 'unreliable' narrator? Every word she speaks is the truth - but it's the truth as she sees it. She casts spells, buries objects or nails them to the trees in the wood. Is she a witch or just completely bonkers? 

When their estranged cousin turns up, hoping to divide and conquer, and make off with the family fortune, you just know it won't end well. But don't under-estimate the Blackwoods. They have always lived in the castle - and they always will.

Recommended if you love claustrophobic psychological suspense in the style of The Turn of the Screw. Avoid if you're a fan of fast-paced jump shocks and gore.

About the Author

Shirley Jackson was born in California in 1916. When her short story The Lottery was first published in The New Yorker in 1948, readers were so horrified they sent her hate mail; it has since become one of the most iconic American stories of all time. Her first novel, The Road Through the Wall, was published in the same year and was followed by five more: Hangsaman, The Bird's Nest, The Sundial,The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle, widely seen as her masterpiece. In addition to her dark, brilliant novels, she wrote lightly fictionalised magazine pieces about family life with her four children and her husband, the critic Stanley Edgar Hyman. Shirley Jackson died in her sleep in 1965 at the age of 48.

Halloween Reads 2016

I am one of those boringly predictable people who love to read holiday books in the summer, Christmas books in the winter and spooky books leading up to Halloween. There was one time when I made a habit of re-reading Bram Stoker's Dracula in the last few days of October, but I'm hoping I'm past that now. When you get to the point where you can quote large chunks of text from a book, its probably time to move on!

But I've had a rummage through my Kindle and found lots of long-forgotten gems - old favourites as well as books I'd downloaded and then forgotten about - and I'm planning on working my way through they over the coming weeks. They will not necessarily be straight-forward tales of horror; some might only have the slightest hint that not all is as it appears, some won't be frightening at all! But gather around the fireside my friends, for something wicked this way comes ...

Book Reviews

The Greatcoat by Helen Dunmore
Melody Bittersweet and the Girls' Ghostbusting Agency by Kitty French
The Travelling Bag and Other Ghostly Stories by Susan Hill

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

Related Posts:

10 Books Which Chilled Me (on my personal blog)