Amanda Stevens: The Restorer

From the back of the book-

Never acknowledge the dead.
Never stray far from the hallowed ground.
Never associate with those who are haunted.
Never tempt fate.
My name is Amelia Gray. I'm a cemetery restorer who sees ghosts. In order to protect myself from the parasitic nature of the dead, I've always held fast to these rules passed down from my father. But now John Devlin, a haunted police detective, has entered my world and everything is changing.
It started with the discovery of a young woman's brutalised body in an old graveyard I've been hired to restore. The clues to the killer-and to his other victims-lie in the headstone symbolism that only I can interpret.
John needs my help, but his ghosts shadow his every move, feeding off his warmth, sustaining their presence with his energy. To warn him would be to invite them into my life. I've vowed to keep my distance, but the pull of his magnetism grows ever stronger even as the symbols lead me closer to the killer and to the gossamer veil that separates this world from the next.
This story offered an interesting spin on the traditional murder mystery and I found myself pulled in from the very start.
The main characters have a depth that I didn't expect to find in pulp fiction and their budding romance is entirely realistic.
The mystery itself is intriging without becoming overly complicated and kept me guessing until the end without introducing unbelievable twists. Which isn't to say that things don't become quite dramatic as the story reaches its climax because they do.
Overall an enjoyable light read that can stand alone, though I am pleased to discover that it is the first in an anticipated quartet. Naturally I will be continuing with this series.-Lynn

Carol Goodman: The Ghost Orchid

From the back of the book-

For more than one hundred years, creative souls have traveled to upstate New York to work under the captivating spell of the Bosco estate. Cradled in silence, inspired by the rough beauty of overgrown gardens and crumbling statuary, these chosen few fashion masterworks-and further Bosco's reputation as a premier artists' colony. This season, five talented artists-in-residence find themselves drawn to the history of Bosco, from the extensive network of fountains that were once its centerpiece but have long since run dry to the story of its enigmatic founder, Aurora Latham, and the series of tragic events that occurred more than a century ago.
Ellis Brooks, a first-time novelist, has come to Bosco to write a book based on Aurora and the infamous summer of 1893, when wealthy, powerful Milo Latham brought the notorious medium Corinth Blackwell to the estate to help his wife contact three of the couple's children, lost the winter before in a diphtheria epidemic. But when a seance turned deadly, Corinth and her alleged accomplice, Tom Quinn, disappeared, taking with them the Lathams' only surviving child.
The more time she spends at Bosco the more Ellis become convinced that there is an even darker, more sinister twist to the story. And she's not alone: biographer Bethesda Graham uncovers stunning revelations about Milo and Corinth; landscape architect David Fox discovers a series of hidden tunnels underneath the gardens; poet Zalman Bronsky hears the long-dry fountains' waters beckoning him; and novelist Nat Loomis feels something lingering just out of reach.
After a bizarre series of accidents befalls them, the group cannot deny the connections between the long ago and now, the living and the dead... as Ellis realized that the tangled truth may ensnare them all in its cool embrace.
I write this review some considerable time after having read the book in question, yet still the story haunts me. A well developed central plot with unexpected twists is peopled by fascinating characters in a beautifully described setting.
This writer has the knack of leading the reader up the garden path (in this instance quite literally) in such a way as to make us follow willingly and be delighted when the expected doesn't eventuate.
Great mystery, with a touch of romance and a sprinkling of chills, this is a good modern gothic.-Lynn

Sarah Waters: Affinity

An upperclass woman recovering from a suicide attempt becomes a volunteer visitor at Millbank women's prison. It is 1874, spiritualism is at its height, and one of the inmates is a genteel medium convicted of fraud. This woman stands out amongst the murderers and thieves who surround her.
The visitor develops a special bond with the medium and after a sceptical start becomes convinced that her abilities are real. Eventually she falls in love with the woman and helps her plan her escape. She is to arrange the mundane aspects of their getaway, while the woman insists that the spirits will help her with the actual prison break.
But will, the desperate plan work?
I have mixed feelings about this work. I have quite enjoyed stories by Waters in the past but I don't feel that this one lived up to its potential.
The pace was very slow and at times I felt I was reading a tract on the conditions and workings of ninteenth century prisons.
Having said that, the story had a feeling of truth to it, the characters were quite believable, if somewhat unsympathetic. The ending is good in that it brings everything to light but somehow it still felt loose to me.
I think there was a lot that might have been done here that wasn't, a shame because the author's voice is strong and capable.-Lynn

Erin Morgenstern: The Night Circus

From the back of the book-

In 1886, a mysterious travelling circus becomes an international sensation. Open only at night, constructed entirely in black and white, Le Cirque des Reves delights all who wander its circular paths and warm themselves at its bonfire.

Although there are acrobats, fortune-tellers and contortionists, the Circus of Dreams is no conventional spectacle. Some tents contain clouds, some ice. The circus seems almost to cast a spell over its aficionados, who call themselves the reveurs-the dreamers. At the heart of the story is the tangled relationship between two young magicians, Celia, the enchanter's daughter, and Marco, the sorcerer's apprentice. At the behest of their shadowy masters, they find themselves locked in a deadly contest, forced to test the very limits of the imagination, and of their love...

This historical fantasy presents an unusual love story. For the bulk of the novel the protagonists are unaware of each others identity, knowing only that they are in competition with each other to prove their superiority. Their main means of communication is through challenging each other to greater and greater feats of magic within the arena of the circus.

The idea of practitioners of different disciplines within the same field challenging each other for superiority isn't new. Neither is the enemies to friends to lovers concept. This book stands out because both of these aspects have been done so well. The characters are all larger than life but somehow fit easily in the story. Secondary characters are as well developed as primary ones. The plot manages to unfold gently without losing pace.

There is an unmistakable literary inclination here with layers of meaning and subtlties to be seen if the reader is so inclined (the symbolism of a black and white world being the most obvious) but the story can be enjoyed without contemplating those deeper levels.

Quite unlike anything I've read in a long while. Delightful-Lynn

Carol Goodman: The Drowning Tree

From the back of the book-
Juno McKay intended to avoid her fifteenth-year college reunion, but she can't resist the chance to see her longime friend Christine Webb. Though Juno cringes at the inevitable talk of her troubled personal life-and the husband who ended up in a mental hopsital only two years after their wedding-she endures the gossip for her friend's sake.
While lecturing at the Penrose College library, Christine shocks the rapt crowd by reavling little-known details about the lives of two sisters-memebers of the influential family whose name the college bears. Christine's revelations throw shadows of betrayal, lust, and insanity over the family's distinguished facade.
After her speech, Christine seems distant, uneasy, and sad. The next day, she disappears. Juno is alarmed and begins to peel away the layer of secrets and madness that surround the Penrose dynasty. She fears that Christine discovered somethig damning about them, perhaps even something worth killing for. And Juno is derermined to find it-for her friend and for herself.
This tangled combination of historical and modern mystery tales has a strong literary flavour. The pace is slow, the characters complex and the story deceptively straight forward.
My last foray into this author's work didn't leave me partiuclarly impressed but I'm pleased to say this effort was much more enjoyable. There were enough red herrings thrown in to cloud the antagonist's identity without it coming as a complete surprise at the end of the story or worse, being telegraphed loudly throughout the book. A complicated romantic subplot fits in well.
I would class this as a mild modern gothic worth a look for those with an interest in the genre and comfortable with a less sensational approach.-Lynn

Jennifer Crusie: Maybe This Time

From the back of the book-
Andie Miller is ready to move on with her life. She wants to marry her fiance and leave behind everything in her past, especially her ex-husband, North Archer. But when Andie tries to gain closure with him, he asks one final favor of her. A distant cousin has died and left North the guardian of two orphans who have driven away three nannies already, and things are getting worse. He needs someone to take care of the situation, and he knows Andie can handle anything...
When Andie meets the two children, she realizes the situation is much worse than she feared. Carter and Alice aren't your average delinquents, and the creepy old house where they live is being run by the worst housekeeper since Mrs. Danvers. Complicating matters is Andie's fiance's suspicion that this is all a plan by North to get Andie back. He may be right because Andie's dreams have been haunted by North since she arrived at the old house. And that's not the only haunting...
Then her ex-brother-in-law arrives with a duplicitous journalist and a self-doubting parapsychologist, closely followed by an annoyed medium, Andie's tatot card-reading mother, her avenging ex-mother-in-law, and her jealous fiance. Just when Andie's sure things couln't get more complicated, North arrives to make her wonder if maybe this time things could just turn out differently.
This unusual mash up of The Turn of the Screw and Dharma and Greg could have been ridiculous but it works quite well. I think the success is due to the very well developed and believable characters (with perhaps the exception of Alice who felt like a bit of a caricature to me).
The setting was acceptably creepy but I can't understand why the author felt the need to have the haunted mansion imported from England and rebuilt on American soil. It seems completely unnecessary, especially since the ghosts are connected to objects rather than the house itself. This is something I've come across a couple of times (with different authors) and I suppose I'll never understand. If the English mansion is essential then why not set the story in England rather than drag England to the U S.
I really enjoyed this book with the exception of one scene. It was pure Henry James. It didn't add to this story in any way other than possibly as a tribute to the original and for some reason its presence here particularly annoyed me.
In spite of the few quibbles I've mentioned I did find this a fun and easy read. Another hit from Ms Crusie.-Lynn

Carol Goodman: Arcadia Falls

A young widow battling to make ends meet accepts a dream job at an exclusive arts school, a place where not only can she pursue her doctoral thesis (which addresses the life and work of the school’s co-founders) but ensure the quality of her daughter’s education.
No sooner does she arrive when a tragic accident claims the life of one of the school’s most promising students. Reminded of her own recent loss and troubled by her daughter’s emotional distance, she throws herself into her research and soon discovers the private diary of one of the school’s founders. What she reads within its pages, together with what she picks up from the student body and the attitude of the local sheriff, leads her to suspect that the student’s death was no accident after all. But she has no real proof and the school is riddled with suspects, from the elderly head mistress right down to a competitive classmate of the dead girl.
The more she investigates the past, the more enlightened she becomes about the present, until finally, with the ‘suicide’ of a colleague, everything falls into place. However, her knowledge has put her, and by proxy, her daughter, in grave danger.
It is only with the help of the sheriff that she eventually manages to save herself, her daughter and another student from murderous intent and achieve the life she had hoped to have when she first accepted the teaching position.
I feel this mystery novel, with decidedly gothic overtones, overreaches itself. The plot is unnecessarily convoluted and the characters’ motivation thin at best. I couldn’t relate to the heroine at all. She, like most of the other characters, simply didn’t have enough depth to create any real interest. And the romance subplot was completely unconvincing.
However, to damn with faint praise, the story wasn’t really that bad. Though I feel it was poorly executed there was a lot of potential. With a less contorted plot, more developed characters and a greater sense of place this could have been an outstanding work rather than an average one.
Simply due to that potential I would consider another of Goodman’s works but I’ll not be rushing out for one.-Lynn

Victoria Holt: The Shivering Sands

When her archaeologist sister goes missing, a young widow takes a position as music teacher at her last known whereabouts, in the hope of discovering what became of her. She soon finds herself entangled in the complicated lives of her employer’s family, fascinated by the complex backgrounds of her four pupils, drawn irresistibly to the son recently returned from years of banishment after the accidental killing of his brother, intrigued by the real story behind her master’s wife’s suicide and plagued by the elderly spinster artist apparently obsessed with her long dead nephew.
She suspects that somebody knows more than they are saying about her sister’s disappearance and when one of her pupils also disappears she is sure of it. But it is only when an attempt is made on her life that she begins to believe that her sister met with foul play rather than a tragic accident.
The house is full of suspects and misplacing her trust almost results in her death but at least she’ll go knowing exactly what horror happened to her sister.
This traditional gothic romance from the late sixties has lost nothing with the passage of time. The plot is convoluted yet believable and the characters’ behaviour deliciously ambiguous. The hero is decidedly dark, though typical for the era his character is very much a two-dimensional figure in the background of the main story.
I can easily overlook the weak romance elements though since this is first and foremost a mystery and that aspect of the story is very well done.
Overall a great escapist read that aptly shows how it was Victoria Holt earned herself the title of the queen of gothic romance.-Lynn.

Wilkie Collins: The Woman in White

A woman falls in love with an artist, and although their stations in life preclude a relationship between them, she feels duty bound to admit the attraction to her fiancé and beg him to break off the engagement. He, being desperate for her dowry rather than her affection, refuses and her family insist on the wedding going ahead.
She receives an anonymous letter warning her against the match but feels honour requires her to go ahead with it, even though her sister is beginning to have doubts about her husband to be.
Once married her refusal to sign over a large amount of money without legal advice angers her husband who sets a convoluted plot in motion to gain control of her fortune at any cost.
(here follows spoilers-be warned)
He arranges to pass off a crazy unknown bastard half-sister as his wife (since she will be much easier to control) and have his wife committed as a lunatic. The plan works better than he might hope when the bastard sister dies.
But the woman’s sister is suspicious and with the help of the artist they find the woman and help her escape from the asylum her husband has placed her in. With a lot of effort they manage to prove that she is who she claims to be, though by that stage her fortune is well gone and her husband dead.
Now a penniless widow she marries her artist love and everyone lives happily ever after.
This is a dramatically simplified outline of an incredibly complex tale of love, loss, lies, madness, and international intrigue-with just a hint of the paranormal thrown in.
Considered a classic of gothic literature this 1860’s tale of mystery is told from a variety of view points. Though the reader has no trouble guessing where the story is going, there is a constant question as to how it will get there, keeping suspense high even as foreshadowed plot twists are confirmed.
The chosen presentation style (a series of written narratives) does make for a slow pace at times but that is typical of the era and doesn’t detract from enjoyment of the story. There are several paths not taken throughout the tale which surprised expectations without disappointing them.
I found the main character to be a little too passive, even for a woman of her time but I can see how this gained its classic status though I have no desire to acquaint myself with the author’s other highly acclaimed works at this time.-Lynn

Jane Harris: The Observations

A young woman tries to escape her sullied past by taking a job as a maid in lonely house outside Edinburgh. She is fascinated by her beautiful new mistress, if somewhat confused by the lady’s increasingly strange requests. As her affection for her mistress grows so too does her jealousy toward her predecessor-a young woman who died under mysterious circumstances. Learning that her employer preferred the dead girl to her, she decides to ‘punish’ the woman. But her practical joke takes a turn for the serious and she soon finds herself caught up in a web of sex, lies and insanity.
Through it all she remains faithful to her mistress but can’t help but wonder what really happened to the other young woman and to make matters worse, her past is catching up with her, threatening to destroy the tenuous hold she has on her new life.
As the mysteries are unveiled one by one everything falls into place sending her life off on a tangent she never expected.
I really enjoyed this intriguing tale, particularly the unexpected ending. Though some of the secondary characters were a little clichéd, the main pair was quite well developed. Historical detail is scattered throughout with a light hand and the style imparts a strong sense of place.
It took me a little while to customise myself to the liberal use of dialect in the writing, something that I am not usually fond of but that works here. (And I was surprised at just how many words and phrases are still in use today-at least in my house).
This is an unusual story, and a step apart from others of its genre.-Lynn

Victoria Holt: Mistress of Mellyn

A penniless young gentlewoman takes a job as a governess in a lonely house on the Cornish coast. But, if the servants’ gossip is to be believed, the house has dark secrets and its enigmatic owner is only one of them. The man is insufferable and it is only her concern for her poor motherless charge that stops her from leaving and leads her to seek the truth behind multiple family tragedies.
Little does she realise that uncovering that truth may cost her life.
This book was exactly what one would expect of an old-school gothic romance.
Spooky old house-check.
Dark and mysterious man-check.
Unsolved mystery-check.
Heroine in danger-check.
Secondary characters with ambiguous motives-check.
Possible paranormal element-check.
It was all here. No wonder I loved this book.
I read somewhere that old style gothic romances are love stories between a woman and a house and in this case, at least, nothing could have been truer. A fan of the modern romance is bound to be disappointed. The hero barely rates a mention for the bulk of the story. To say he is two dimensional is to give him more substance than he possessed. He is present only insomuch as he is required to move the plot forward. The supernatural elements hinted at are, in the end, quite mundane, but I think, no less interesting for that.
Victoria Holt is the Grande Dame of gothic romance and this book is a prime example of how she became so. I just wish there was more of the same around today.-Lynn

David Blair (ed): Gothic Short Stories

This is a collection of 20 Gothic stories covering the spectrum from the supernatural through insanity to just plain violent horror. It includes both works by famous authors (Poe, Dickens, Hawthorne) and gems from lesser known writers. It is well annotated with explanations of references unfamiliar to a modern reader and a short biography of each author’s writing life.
These Gothic tales are classics. They illustrate the development of the genre from the eighteenth through to the early twentieth century. Like any anthology there were some stories that appealed to me more than others but I believe each earned its place in this collection.
I enjoyed the stories not only for their own sake but also recognising them as the basis of many modern stories enabled me to see how individual tales could be adopted and grown.
A well selected and presented collection I would recommend to those with an interest in Gothic Literature.-Lynn

James Herbert: The Magic Cottage

When a young couple out to escape life in the fast lane find a cottage in the country it seems it was meant for them. Not only does the money required for the purchase seem to fall into their laps but the place turns out not to need the extensive, and expensive, renovations they originally thought. The garden seems to be in constant bloom and even the local wild life is tame. The change in lifestyle does them no end of good. His music and her art develop a depth that has hitherto escaped them; even their relationship reaches new, unexpected heights. They truly believe they have found a slice of paradise.
But such happiness can not last indefinitely and trouble arrives in the form of seemingly friendly neighbours. Actually a magical cult, the neighbours want their house. They were willing to kill the house’s pervious owner-reputedly a witch whose power was linked to the land the cottage is built on-in order to get it and are not happy at having their plans thwarted.
They attempt plan B and almost succeed in indoctrinating the young woman but her partner sees the signs of her defection in the slow disintegration of their cottage and extricates her at the last minute leading the cult to stage a full magical onslaught.
This they fight off but at a high cost to all involved.
I’ve long enjoyed James Herbert’s particular brand of horror but I don’t feel that this book is one of his best.
The main problem I had was one of pacing. For a good two-thirds of the book very little happens. The stage is well set, the characters established and the foreshadowing heavy but very little of interest takes place.
When the action does pick up, it picks up quickly and comes across as rushed. There is no gradual increase in tension, no time to savour the scare. There are a couple of surprise twists near the end but they are all but lost in the frenzy of the story’s culmination and so don’t have the impact that they might have.
This one is strictly for the fans-Lynn

Shirley Jackson: The Haunting of Hill House

A researcher and three volunteers form a house party at a known ‘haunted’ house in the hope of documenting paranormal occurrences there. It isn’t long before the house obliges and strange things start to manifest, particularly around the most vulnerable member of the group-a young woman of questionable mental and emotional stability.
As time goes by and the paranormal activity becomes dangerously focussed on the woman the other occupants of the house insist that she depart for her own safety. But she has embraced her connection to the house and refuses to leave. When her companions try to force her to go, the house itself steps in to ensure she stays with it forever.
Acclaimed as a classic of the genre I had high hopes for this novel, perhaps too high, for the work dismally failed to impress.
I found none of the characters to be sympathetic in the least. They behave in an entirely unbelievable manner right from the start and the dialogue often straddles the boarder between just plain silly and outright ridiculous.
There is a decided lack of atmosphere-eerie or otherwise. On the few occasions when things looked to be taking a turn for the spooky the author backs off leaving the reader wondering why the characters are so scared.
Supposedly groundbreaking at the time of its publication not only has it failed to age well but I found it compares poorly to earlier works of horror. For creepy atmosphere the reader would be better off with almost anything by Henry James. Or if psychological decay is where terror is to be found then Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s tale The Yellow Wallpaper is infinitely superior.
The best I can say for this story is that it was a great concept poorly executed.-Lynn

Sarah Water: The Little Stranger

When a doctor is called to attend one of the servants at the local manor house he is surprised to find not the glamorous Georgian mansion of his childhood memories but a dilapidated post war residence inhabited by a family not quite coping with changing society.
As his acquaintance with the family grows he becomes privy to their dark secrets. The war-wounded son, reluctant lord of the manor, claims to be plagued by a ‘presence’ in the night. The elderly mother is tormented, mentally and physically, by the memory of her first-born’s tragic childhood death. The servants complain about ghostly goings on. Even the solid and dependable daughter thinks there might be more to the house than meets the eye.
But the doctor is a man of science and logic. He simply can’t believe all that the family are telling him. And yet, he can’t completely dismiss it either.
And here I can not be more explicit without spoilers.
Set in early post world war II Britain, on the surface this is a story of a once proud and powerful family now in decline. The story unfolds at a leisurely pace, almost a little too slowly at times. The individual ‘spooky’ elements are not particularly scary but cumulatively they give a not-quite-right feeling that is far more effective in creating creepiness in this context than more overt horror would have been. I would have liked to see more made of this aspect of the story. In many ways the decision not to expand upon the haunting elements was an opportunity missed.
The characters felt true to the time. So much so that I found myself actively disliking them on some occasions, while pitying them on others but I never really connected to any of them. I think the back story of the main characters would have added an interesting dimension to the book and made it easier to identify with them.
The twist ending was at once both disappointing and intriguing.
This book has the feel of a traditional Victorian gothic while maintaining a distinct literary flavour. While it is far from the best I have read, it is the first book in many years that has me thinking about the central themes and wanting to dissect the story in order to find out what really went on. Speculation abounds-Lynn

John Harwood: The Seance

A young woman with few prospects is surprised when a distant relative dies and leaves her the beneficiary of a large estate. She is even more surprised by the reaction of the lawyer who delivers news of her windfall: he warns her that the house is cursed, the grounds are haunted and suggest that she might not the be natural daughter of her parents but that of a scandalous cousin accused of murdering her husband then running away with an unnamed lover never to be seen again.
Fascinated, she begins to research the history of both the house and the family. She soon comes to believe that the murder never happened, that the accused were set up and the supposed victim still alive and well.
At this point she is approached by the Society for Psycical Research, who wish to hold a séance at the house. She agrees and during the society’s examination of the premises certain evidence is found that prove her suspicions are correct.
This knowledge puts her life in danger but she finds she cannot rest until she clears the name of the supposed murderess, which might just be her natural mother, and exposes the fraud of the supposed victim, who may be her natural father.
This book, while a little slow to start, turned out to be an interesting historical novel full of intrigue.
Refusing to plod the predictable path, the story twists and turns, seemingly setting up one situation only to deliver another.
Though it wasn’t quite what I had expected, from the title and blurb I had anticipated more of a ghost story rather than a crime mystery, it did not disappoint. It kept me guessing even beyond the point when I had worked out what had actually taken place but didn’t spring a completely unanticipated culprit on the unsuspecting reader in the way of historical crime writing.
Authentic to its era and entertaining too-Lynn.

The Atrocity Archives - Charles Stross

Bob Howard is a desk jockey keen to move into field work. He works for Britain's ultra-secret intelligence agency known as the Laundry, and the fact that the Laundry's brief is paranormal phenomena, albeit interpreted through science and cutting edge information theory, in no way diminishes the amount of petty bureaucracy Bob has to wade through.
When what should be a standard a training course goes horribly awry, Bob keeps his head and his calm, and his first mission follows soon after - a break in at an industrial building where a young mathematician's discovery risks him summoning demons from an alternate universe, just the sort of thing the Laundry is designed to prevent.
Something of a success, Bob is sent to the US, to pry a beautiful redhead away, but when Islamic terrorists interfere the mission becomes a bloody disaster. In between a psychotic on-again, off-again girlfriend, two truly odd roommates, and a slew of office polices akin to a collection of Dilbert strips, Bob finds himself getting deeper and deeper into parallel universes, Third Reich escapees plotting a come back, demons and shades of Lovecraft.
Ostensibly a horror novel, and certainly chilling, the tone of The Atrocity Archives (a serialised novella and a short story about gorgon-esque monsters who turn a bunch of cows in the heart of Milton Keyes into concrete) is light and sarky. The details of office hoops and paperwork ring true for anyone who's ever worked within a government system, and the world Stross creates is both compelling and true, while still being fantastic and strange.
The final component of the book is an essay by Stross comparing the genres of horror and thriller, with some unlikely but interesting comparisons and areas of overlap. All in all this is an original voice with a unique perspective. Though superficially light, some of the ideas he introduces are profound, and I suspect I whisked through The Atrocity Archives a little too quickly to glean everything from it that I could have. I look forward to trying another of his works when I have the time and mentally energy to make the most of it. - Alex

Sandra Schwab: Castle of the Wolf

Rather than accept the status of poor relation in her brother’s house and tolerate the whims of his shrewish wife, a young woman decides to accept the terms of her father’s will that enable her to escape this dreaded fate. He has left her a castle in the Black Forest but in order to become its mistress she must marry the son of its former owner.
The man in question, wounded physically by war and spiritually by love, has no idea the castle no longer belongs to his family and doesn’t accept the news that his future is dependant on a woman very well.
Naturally, two such spirited individuals clash constantly but for the sake of both their futures they do the logical thing and marry. It is not until they face an attempt on their lives that they realise just how much they have come to mean to each other.
True love triumphs and they, in the best of traditions, live happily ever after.
Being a huge fan of the, sadly rare, old style Gothic Romance I really enjoyed this spin on the old beauty and the beast story with its strong gothic leanings.
The characterization was great; this pair danced right off the page. The heroine was strong and determined and the hero brooding enough to be enigmatic but not so much as to be off-putting.
At times the plot became a little transparent (I found it quite obvious who was behind the ‘accidents’) but in all fairness to the author, I think that may have been done deliberately.
I am delighted to discover somebody reinvigorating the dark romance, and am please that this work is more polished than her debut novel. I begin to expect big things from Ms Schwab and won’t leave it so long before I read her again.-Lynn

Kim Wilkins: Grimoire

In Victorian London a magician’s quest for eternal life culminates in his summoning of the Devil himself. Angered by the summoning, Satan kills the man and threatens to destroy the world if anyone should try such a thing again.
In modern day Melbourne a group of academics devoted to the Victorian era have found the magician’s grimoire and are secretly trying to recreate his paranormal experiments, unaware of the consequences.
But they are not the only secret society meeting at the College. A group of students devoted to illegally exploring a labyrinth beneath the college uncover both the secret of the grimoire and the potential result of performing the magic it describes.
They steal the grimoire in an attempt to put an end to the experiments and soon find themselves the targets of a ruthless killer.
They escape, barely, but are unable to destroy the grimoire. The experience irreparably alters them and their relationships with each other and the question remains will they be able to protect the secret they have discovered or will the grimoire’s esoteric knowledge prove too much to resist.
A horror story in the gothic tradition, Grimoire, is dark and eerie. The atmosphere is decidedly creepy everywhere it should be and the author gives a sense of place without intruding upon the story.
Explanations as to how such disparate times and places have become linked are solid and believable, something many authors don’t manage to achieve convincingly.
The characters are complex and though a lot of time goes into their development I would like to have seen more of this towards the end of the story when situations change rapidly. I had a slight problem believing some of their behaviour in respect of their supposed ages-they behaved much younger than I would expect but that is a minor quibble.
As expected of a character driven piece the plot is relatively straightforward. Though there were still a few surprise turns there was nothing coming out of left field leaving me bewildered. I must admit that the ending left me a little flat. It felt a bit like the sequal bating endings of bad horror movies and I felt the characters deserved better. I would be disappointed if the grimoire were to feature prominently in a future work.
Overall slow in places but genuinely chilling at other times, this early effort by an author for whom I have high hopes, was a great find and I look forward to reading their more recent works.-Lynn

Barbara Michaels: Someone in the House

An academic is invited to spend the summer at a friend and colleague’s house where the two of them hope to finish a text they have been collaborating on.
But the atmosphere at the isolated gothic manor is not conductive to work. Days of tennis, swimming and house parties are followed by evenings of needlepoint, crosswords and novels. At first the academic believes her change in interests is a factor of the summer holidays and her growing romantic interest in her host a product of their relaxed time together. But she soon begins to suspect that there is a more sinister force at work behind the changes in her personality.
Convinced that the house is haunted she teams up with the other house guests-her host’s aunt and her friend-and the local vicar to set the spirits to rest. This is achieved with ease but the academic still finds herself unsettled. It is only when her host proposes to her that she comes to understand what is happening.
The house itself is sentient and is ensuring its own survival by forcing contentment upon all its inhabitants.
She escapes back to her old life, regains her personality and counts herself lucky to have escaped.
I’ve been undecided about Barbara Michaels’s work. Of the two other works of hers I’ve read one was terrible, the other, quite good, so this book was a bit of a decider for me.
Sadly it contained many of the elements that I didn’t like in work I’d previously read. Particularly an absentee boyfriend that is introduced only to be more or less ignored for the rest of the book, and more detail about character’s pets than strictly necessary. The female characters were the type of humourless Feminists that were already going the way of the dinosaurs when this book was written but they were an even match for the male characters who were patronizing at best, if not completely misogynistic.
Having said that when in form, this author can deliver a great sense of place and a good story. But for me the inconsistent, uneven writing was too great a cost for the rare payoff of a good passage.
For me this book falls somewhere between the previous two Michaels I have read. Not awful but not great either. From my experience Michaels writing is mediocre at best. I’m glad I gave it a chance but I see no reason to try this author again.-Lynn