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The Haunting Four seekers have come to the ugly, abandoned old mansion: Dr. Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of the psychic phenomenon called haunting; Theodara, his lovely and lighthearted assistant; Eleanor, the lonely, homeless girl well acquainted with poltergeists; and Luke, the adventurous future heir of Hill House. At first, their stay seems destined to be merely a spooky encounter with inexplicable noises and self-closing doors, but Hill House is gathering its powers and will soon choose one of them to make its own.
Jannes: Not sure if it is a coincidence, but the two perhaps best ghost stories ever written are both by women, in a genre otherwise mostly dominated by men.
Both are superb explorations of death, loss, fear, and all those other elementsthat make up the good supernatural tales.… (more)
SomeGuyInVirginia: Dahl's is the best collection of ghost stories available, and Jackson's is the best haunted house story of all time. I think they make a nice pair (as the bishop said to the chorus girl.)
"No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality. No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more."
A creepy psychological thriller. I listened to it on audiobook. Next time I will read it. It is fast moving and at time I had to rewind so as not to miss important story beats! ( )
Creepy, yes. At times even scary. Still, I think this book made me sad more than anything. Poor Nell may haunt me longer than any of the apparitions will, which I think says a lot about the effectiveness of this novel. ( )
The story moves at a fast pace rich in dialog and attention to detail. Interesting eccentric characters, which I found all likable.
A bit of Gothic-psychological-suspense and paranormal undertones, I was hooked from the first page. Overall I really enjoyed The Haunting of Hill house. I highly recommend to all. ( )
I've had this book forever and have heard multiple people brag about how great it is. It's a "classic" as far as I know. I'm not really into horror, but my wife is and we were looking for something we could finish before the end of the year (like to start the year with a new book).
I'm not sure what the hell this is supposed to be? I guess it's a comedy? But if so, why have a scary cover with blurbs like "Makes your blood chill and your scalp prickle..." ? There were exactly 2 possibly scary parts that were also interspersed with comedy.
It's a couple comedic characters, and about half of it is witty dialogue (the only thing that kept it from getting a 2nd star), that is often funny, then the other half is surreal ranting of a character who must be insane as far as I can tell, because much of it is indecipherable.
At the end there is no resolution. Started skipping pages to get through it and almost gave up a couple times. ( )
No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more.
Quotations
Journeys end in lovers meeting.
She could not remember ever being truly happy in her adult life; her years with her mother had been built up devotedly around small guilts and small reproaches, constant weariness, and unending despair. Without ever wanting to become reserved and shy, she had spent so long alone, with no one to love, that it was difficult for her to talk, even casually, to another person without self-consciousness and an awkward inability to find words. (chapter 1)
The house was vile. She shivered and thought, the words coming freely into her mind, Hill House is vile, it is diseased; get away from here at once. (chapter 1)
When they were silent for a moment the quiet weight of the house pressed down from all around them.
We have grown to trust blindly in our senses of balance and reason and I can see where the mind might fight wildly to preserve its own familiar stable patterns against all evidence that it was leaning sideways. (Dr. Montague, chapter 4)
Within, its walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.
The Haunting Four seekers have come to the ugly, abandoned old mansion: Dr. Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of the psychic phenomenon called haunting; Theodara, his lovely and lighthearted assistant; Eleanor, the lonely, homeless girl well acquainted with poltergeists; and Luke, the adventurous future heir of Hill House. At first, their stay seems destined to be merely a spooky encounter with inexplicable noises and self-closing doors, but Hill House is gathering its powers and will soon choose one of them to make its own.
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Book description
Hill House is an eighty year-old mansion built by a man named Hugh Crain. The story concerns four main characters: Dr. John Montague, an investigator of the supernatural; two young women, Eleanor and Theodora; and a young man, Luke, the heir to Hill House, who is host to the others. Doctor Montague hopes to find scientific evidence of the existence of the supernatural. He rents Hill House for a summer and invites several people to stay there as his guests. Of these invitees, whom he has chosen because at one time or another they have all experienced paranormal events, only Eleanor and Theodora accept.
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Halloween Read: The Haunting of Hill House
Wikipedia in English (2)
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A creepy psychological thriller. I listened to it on audiobook. Next time I will read it. It is fast moving and at time I had to rewind so as not to miss important story beats! (