I am not really a big comment leaver but this doesn't mean I don't enjoy your reviews! :) xx
I am not really a big comment leaver but this doesn't mean I don't enjoy your reviews! :) xx
Member since:19.12.2005
Reviews:102
Members who trust:75
Gabe and Eve Caleigh, along with their two daughters, Loren and Cally, rent the old and eerie Crickley Hall for a while so Gabe can work on a project in nearby Ilfracombe, Devon. The timing of the move coincides with the pending anniversary of their five-year-old son's disappearance from the park a year ago. Gabe feels it will help Eve to get through this difficult period by being away from their normal living environment in London.
However, Crickley Hall, a large old house once used by Augustus Cribben and his sister Magda, to look after and educate eleven orphaned evacuees from London, welcomes them in an entirely different manner than had been expected. Chester, the family dog, is scared rigid from the second they arrive and none of the other's feels too much at home either.
With it's huge cavernous rooms and gloomy interior, it allows the mind to play tricks on you and make you hear footsteps where there are none, or hear banging inside cupboard doors, or find locked cellar doors open and puddles in the grand hallway…….or does the mind have nothing to do with it.
This is James Herbert's latest offering and what
an offering it is. The goose bumps rose on my skin while I wrote the details above and this is the effect this book had had on me all the way through. It is a genuine chiller of a story and in my honest opinion is the book that has scared me the most since I began reading in this genre years ago. Other books have given me temporary chills, like The Lake by Richard Laymon, but this continuously had me shivering and the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck rose and fell with scary regularity.
The way Herbert managed to reveal the historical story was brilliant. You found out bits and pieces through various different characters, like Percy, the old gardener who had been taking care of the lawns since before the World War in 1943. He witnessed a lot of history in this old house and loved and lost his one true love as well. He remained dedicated to the work though and proved to be a helpful and trustworthy friend to Gabe and Eve. Another conduit was Lili Peel, a psychic who Eve contacts to try and help her find her lost son. Lili finds out a lot more than she had bargained for when she agrees to help Eve and you are let in to some very raw and difficult insights to the house's past.
This is something that perhaps made this book stand out for me from other books in the same genre, and that is the inclusion of children as part of the main story line. Ghosts and children are always a combination that scares me when it comes to film and I have found out that it is no exception with the written word. Of course it could be Herbert's fantastic story telling abilities that captured the fear for me and held it there for the duration but although it did genuinely give me the creeps, I had to keep on reading. Some of the chapters are hard to read about even though you know they are fiction, especially the descriptions of one of the orphans evacuated to Crickley Hall who was persecuted simply for being a Jew. It was compelling and totally engrosses you in the plot.
Augustus Cribben, one of the major characters here was actually terrifying. With plunges into sadomasochism and self-harming he opened a new channel of fear for me that I had not read about before. I would hate to think that anything like this happened in real life in World War 2, although I am sure it was entirely possible, but the events just seemed so horrendous that it was almost beyond comprehension, although this does not mean it was unbelievable.
One thing I did find annoying was the way Herbert quite often tried to write someone's response in the way they would have said it in Devon. Coming from the South East I quite often had to re-read these sentences out loud so I could understand what he was trying to have them convey. Sometimes he would describe the sentence in correct language and then repeat it as it was said. This was even more frustrating, although I realise he was trying to add character and realism to the conversation. I did also find he repeated particular feelings continuously as well, for example the dark shadows of Crickley Hall seemed to press against the lights rather than the lights pressing against the darkness. This is a great way of relating the creepy feeling of the shadowy house and is exceptionally descriptive but when you have read it half a dozen times, just worded slightly differently it loses some of its appeal.
However for the niggly bits there is a whole book full of fantastic fiction and a story that will really grip you and not let go till the crescendo at the end. Most chiller/horror books end with a high note but this really did explode into an extraordinary finale, which was just perfect. It kept with the theme of the book and didn't let me down as I have found before. It left me satisfied and crying out for more at the same time.
I honestly think this is the best book I have read so far this year and Herbert is now high on my list of favourite authors.
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A good review but not one of Herberts best books, and i have read them all. I found this one a little short of pace at the beginning although it picked up pace later and i couldnt put it down near the end. Tony xx
sifair 11.05.2007 22:52
Nice review :-}
mightymuffin 22.04.2007 13:11
I love James Herbert - loved this book - nice review x
Apr 13th, 2007
very helpful by (100%):
