Chet Williamson

A story with a haunted theater as the premise! How could a horror lover go wrong?

I received this book as part of a Humble Bundle that I won from Brian Hodge. (Thanks, Brian!) A fellow horror reader in one of my horror groups chose it for a group read and I was excited, because the premise sounded so great. I was not disappointed.

There are some cliched themes here, but I loved the way Mr. Williamson made them his own. Not only were there the expected spirits, but there was an entirely new show more entity and a dangerous one he proved to be. A new type of doppelganger, once realized, nearly unstoppable. And no one was safe. Of course the denouement, would have to take place at the theater-what will happen during the performance? Will the main character win the role-the role of his life, so to speak? You will have to read this to find out.

This book was well written and the story well told. I think it could have been trimmed a bit as sometimes the main character's inner monologue was redundant. Even though a couple of the characters were cliches, I thought most of them came through as real people, capable of all the feelings and changes that go along with that.

This book definitely made me a fan of Chet Williamson and I'm looking forward to seeing if he has more work for me to discover. For now, I will say goodbye to the Venetian Theatre and all of its scary, wonderful history.

Highly recommended for fans of haunting stories! show less

A tale of vengeance told in a hyper-sexualiized style reminiscent of Lafcadio Hearn. Fascinating, if not always interesting; Lags a bit in the middle. Includes a terrific faux-academic essay on the possibility of it being a lost tale of Hearn's.

Dreamthorp is a pleasant little village in Pennsylvania that is the paradigm of tranquility and peacefulness. However, when a retired couple go treasure hunting with metal detectors, they stumble upon an ancient Native American quartz carving, things start to go south. People begin to die in mysterious ways, and the circumstances keep getting weirder with each passing member in the tight-knit community.

The plot may seem a bit campy, but I was surprisingly enthralled with this book. I was show more expecting the worst, maybe because I'm being prejudice by linking bad horror movies from the 80's with the horror in literature, so I wasn't expecting such a well-written book, with so many likable characters. People dying in a horror novel rarely will rarely a strong emotional response in me, it's kind of expected, but Chet Williamson definitely emphasized the tragic nature of death, while still maintaining a dark and creepy atmosphere. Something other horror writers should take note of.

The book does feel a little dated at times, such as when a character struggles to come to grips with their sexuality, however the author's take on equality hit all the right buttons for me. The book offers a wide variety of characters and viewpoints and it was nice to see the full spectrum represented. What a nice change from the typical one-sided chauvinistic slants you find in most stories. show less

When my son was young, we read The night before Christmas every year. We decided to revive the tradition this Christmas Eve, but we chose to read Pennsylvania Dutch night before Christmas instead of the original version. (OK - I admit that my 2 copies of the original were somewhere in the basement and I didn’t want to hunt!)

So we put on the Dutchy accent and read aloud. Instead of Santa and his sleigh pulled by reindeer, we have the Belsnickel in his plow pulled by 8 cows and steers. He show more lands on the roof, not realizing that the plow with the steers are too heavy! Havoc ensues. But in the end, all is put right; the children get their gifts and the roof will soon be repaired, or as the Belsnickel says, “I’ll send over Stolzfus your broke roof to fix.”

The text is written to approximate the sounds and usage of Pennsylvania Dutch; real “Dutchies” might quibble over some of the pronunciations and definitions. And the purists will say that Belsnickel always comes through the front door! But this doesn’t affect the enjoyment of the story.

Chet Williamson has done a wonderful job of adapting the story and the illustrations by James Rice are a delight. There is a section on the history of the Belsnickel, Pennsylvania Dutch pronunciation (which differs from German) and a recipe for shoo-fly pie, “chust” like Mama made.

So “set yourself dawn and schnuggle” with Papa as he recounts the Christmas Eve story show less