Description:
Veteran horror writer James Herbert brings back the protagonist of Haunted to investigate psychic disturbances in a picturesque village in the Lake District of England. It's an interesting mishmash of a novel--not entirely successful, but enjoyable all the same. Herbert's penchant for gorgeously visceral carnage unfortunately clashes with his equally skilled ability to create a subtle mood of supernatural terror. And he throws way too many ingredients into the stew: family secrets, rape, infanticide, necrophilia, the "Black Arts," a moldering mansion, a sinister yellow fog, drowning children, poltergeist pranks, a haunted painting, a tormented vicar, a neglectful doctor, even an evil knight. Yet, as Necrofile: The Review of Horror Fiction reports, "None of these flaws are fatal. These days, making a classic ghost story work at all--let alone on the scale of The Ghosts of Sleath--requires a daunting level of craft, control, and consistency.... Many of the novel's supernatural elements ... evoke the requisite chills."
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