William H. Hallahan

Hallahan's second occult novel (1978) which got a passing mention in 'Paperbacks from Hell' almost lost a star on the basis of its first half which is weakly structured and written. Hallahan only proved he could write effectively in the last third in what would otherwise be a potboiler.

A horror novel relates to its time and place. This one is carefully positioned in mid-1970s Philadelphia with the hint of Vietnam coming home to roost and family fears of dislocation from some of the new show more religions of the East. An East Coast fear of the occult is grounded in contemporary cultural change.

There is plenty of evidence that American middle class families, especially in the big depressed cities of the 1970s, were worried about losing their children as runaways to malevolent forces. You see this appear in Hollywood films without occult trappings as much as in popular literature.

A good horror novel - which will always be implausible at its core - must be embedded in a reality that is plausible, one that is more than tracking people through the streets of a city in a way that you can follow on a map. It has to hang together 'sociologically' which Stephen King does so well.

Hallahan's Philadelphia is real enough but the dystopian vision of the city as a place of isolated families without any support goes too far. The occult element becomes murderous too obviously and too quickly - the police would surely have become involved and enquiries made.

Of course, child protection was much less developed then than it is now but the lack of support for parents losing their kids to a malevolent force operating in the full light of day and with easily connected deaths over a short period really does not ring true.

Hallahan also seems to be lazy with human relationships. These are expressed in ways that barely seem credible given what is happening around the characters as if he just wants to get them out of the way in order to get to his more dramatic set pieces.

These set pieces involve possessed scarecrows and puppets, Buddhist tulpa (although the word is never used), astral travel and occult struggle with the hero (Benson) trying to rescue his child by packing decades of 'spiritual' training into a few weeks.

Suspension of disbelief is fully stretched. However, Hallahan's set pieces get better as the story proceeds. They become more coherent. Although nonsense in itself, Benson's astral training shifts the tale from the mundane and from that point on it becomes enjoyable rather than dull.

There is one section later which explores the predatory behaviour of urban cats and rats which is very fine writing indeed. It captures something of the existential horror that is nature red in tooth and claw. To move forward from this with more information would be to be accused of spoilers.

Overall, not a story that I would recommend going out of your way to read. I suspect the average reader might not be impressed and risk abandoning their investment two thirds of the way through but the whole is partially redeemed not so much by the peremptory ending as by that last third. show less

Every year around the fourth of July, I choose books that focus on the American Revolution. This year I chose the two William Hallahan books that focus on the first and last days of the war. This particular book about the day the revolution began was very interesting, presenting events and views I had not previously known. The focus is on the 24 hour period leading up to, during, and immediately after the battles of Lexington and Concord, near Boston. Many figures, well known and some not so show more well known, are discussed, but no one gets as much airtime than Samuel Adams. Hallahan holds no punches when discussing Adam's motivations and influence leading up to the battle. He shows him as the ringleader, inciting riots, and possibly being the catalyst of the bloodshed that day. It was also interesting to see how news of the battle was received in various cities afterwards, including Philadelphia, New York, Williamsburg, and London. All told, I was highly entertained and learned much about a subject I thought I already knew a lot about. I was excited to start Hallahan's book on the last days of the war. show less

Hallahan's first occult novel, 'The Search for Joseph Tully' (1974), has a lot going for it. It is certainly better than the second, 'The Keeper of Children' (1978) which I have reviewed elsewhere but I cannot say that I am enormously motivated to go for the third, 'The Monk' (1983).

The reason is that, while the second was a tolerable but flawed potboiler with some fine moments of writing, the first is interesting and well structured, more conventional novel than horror, but it is ruined at show more the end (no spoilers) with a weak resolution. Things are clearly going downhill.

The bulk of the book deserves better as two narratives converge in ways that are unclear until the very end. Hallahan shows, however, a consistent weakness in his lack of discipline and imagination - his sound realism emerges from within absurd implausibilities much as it does in 'Keeper'.

The first narrative is set amongst a group of middle class inhabitants of an apartment block from which they all have to depart as the locality is developed. New York in the 1970s saw a great deal of older property knocked down. This often appears in the popular culture of the period.

In this case, there is not the usual trope of wicked landlords but just sadness as a loose community of people is dispersed. Richardson, the central figure of this narrative, is last to leave. Hallahan is very good at expressing the man's growing paranoia at a strange noise in his apartment.

This narrative is used to introduce the idea of the occult but mostly as tension between those who believe in it (a defrocked priest, a tarot reader, an artist, a psychic) and those who do not and who even resent the idea (a management consultant and Richardson himself).

As the tenants leave (still on friendly terms), Richardson is left the last and the question becomes whether he is going mad as much as whether those committed to the occult are deluded or insightful. Richardson's paranoia is fuelled by the concern of the psychic types for his future.

The other, apparently unconnected narrative, is a genealogical search for the descendants of Joseph Tully, an eighteenth century English wine merchant, by an English lawyer called Willow for reasons that are not made clear until the end.

Hallahan, much as he would give a detailed itinerary of the characters in 'The Keeper of Children' (in that case, Philadelphia), is very specific about location. You can trace Willow's search around the North East United States and, incidentally, learn a lot about American ancestral record-keeping!

The apartments in the block and the slow but steady destruction of the buildings opposite it are also described meticulously while the two narratives share an insistent, repeated but never dull setting in a description of the coldest winter in 15 years.

In short, Hallahan turns out to be a much better writer of character and of situation than he is of plot. We have said that the plot ultimately ends as a disappointment (more like a short story shocker in 'Weird Tales') but the journey there is not an unpleasant one. show less

As a mystery story, barely there. As the odd novel focused around a literary forgery, well worth a read. A pretty doofy and down-on-his-luck type designer ropes in a friend to create a fake Wise forgery so that a wealthy collector can rub it in a competitor's face. But things are not quite what they seem ...

Some interesting detail on what such a project would entail, though, and on the sorts of things that Carter and Pollard used to debunk the original forgeries. For that, an interesting show more example of the genre. show less