I've been looking forward to this book since I read the author's previous work, World's Collider: A Shared-World Anthology. Richard Salter was the editor of that work, the various short stories in which gave me nightmares for quite some time after I was finished. "The Patchwork House", a proper novel rather than an anthology, delivers the same long-lasting jolts.
In the story, four characters spend the night in a haunted house in England. This is potentially tired territory, but the author spends quite a bit of time justifying the scenario. The narrator needs to visit the house for business, and he needs to spend the night in the house because he's trying to reconnect with a long-lost childhood friend who's come to visit. He also knows there are ghosts on the premises, but he's been assured that they're friendly ghosts. With every such haunted-house story, the premise is potentially spoiled because the reader can never stop asking "Why don't they just leave?!" Salter answers that question several times here, so there's absolutely no room to challenge the story's logic; that's a rare feat.
The set-up is given quite economically; the four characters arrive in the afternoon and night quickly falls. After that brief set-up, the ghosts start making themselves heard, seen, and felt. It's safe to say that there's very little respite for any of the characters from that point onward. The characters soon learn that there are five ghosts in the house, but one of them is in control, and has the ability to manipulate time. There are conscious nods to the Doctor Who episode "Blink", only this book is much more scary and unsentimental than that TV story. It's the search to find out just who is the fifth ghost, and how that ghost can be stopped, that propels the second half of the book. There are few wasted words here.
Salter does something else interesting with the premise of a ghost that can manipulate time. The book opens with a prologue in which the narrator lets us know, from the future, exactly which houseguests survived the night, and which ones were never seen again. And yet, even with the outcome of the story set out for the reader literally on page 1, Salter manages to keep the reader guessing, literally right up until the final line of the epilogue.
Read "The Patchwork House" with the lights on. It's much easier that way.
I was provided with an advance review copy of this novel in exchange for an impartial review.
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About the author
Much More Than A Haunted House
James and his girlfriend, Beth, have come back to England to assess a piece of real estate for his dad. The patchwork house is a mix of various architecture...and it's haunted. So, naturally, James invites his friend Derek and his wife Chloe to spend the weekend at the house for some ghost hunting. Unfortunately, there is more to the house than just ghosts. There is an entity that can control time travel, and the couples soon find themselves trapped in nightmare. If they want to survive, they have to sort out the different timelines inside the house, keeping them prisoners. I'm a fan of Salter, and this is his best work to date. I read this novel in one sitting, during the day, and it still scared the crap out of me. I don't scare easy - I really don't, but the combination of horror, sci-fi and drama is absolutely terrifying and hopeless...and the relationship histories between characters adds that extra gut twist. Horror fans have met their match in Salter.
Top reviews from the United States
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- Reviewed in the United States on May 10, 2015
- Reviewed in the United States on January 9, 2016
- Reviewed in the United States on March 7, 2019
James and his girlfriend, Beth, have come back to England to assess a piece of real estate for his dad. The patchwork house is a mix of various architecture...and it's haunted. So, naturally, James invites his friend Derek and his wife Chloe to spend the weekend at the house for some ghost hunting.
Unfortunately, there is more to the house than just ghosts. There is an entity that can control time travel, and the couples soon find themselves trapped in nightmare. If they want to survive, they have to sort out the different timelines inside the house, keeping them prisoners.
I'm a fan of Salter, and this is his best work to date. I read this novel in one sitting, during the day, and it still scared the crap out of me. I don't scare easy - I really don't, but the combination of horror, sci-fi and drama is absolutely terrifying and hopeless...and the relationship histories between characters adds that extra gut twist.
Horror fans have met their match in Salter.
Images in this review
- Reviewed in the United States on July 26, 2015
Top reviews from other countries
- Glynis Margaret ElliottReviewed in the United Kingdom on January 9, 2016
A Haunted House Novel
- Kindle CustomerReviewed in the United Kingdom on January 7, 2016
A story for teenages
