The House of the Wolf

Rating:
Summary: Utterly superb. Old-school gothic tale of the highest order.
Review: Much of my enjoyment of this book comes from my love of the classic, traditional Romantic-gothic, particularly those written or set in the 19th and early 20th centuries. This fantastic book by Basil Copper fits the bill *beautifully.*

A group of folklorists at a meeting in 19th century Hungary (we can assume in the Translyvania area as part of Transylvania is in Hungary) end up trapped inside the Homolky Castle due to weather, which stands menacingly above a village as you might imagine. The castle is appropriately huge and lonely, with many dark and unexplored passages. It's located in a forbidding landscape of forests and mountains. The Homolky clan is a bit strange and mysterious, but the clincher is that they and their castle have a history of being haunted by a werewolf. Indeed, as the folklorists stay on in the castle, it appears they are all being stalked, and gruesome murders turn up evidence pointing to the werewolf. Now one of the men has to get to the bottom of what's going on and unearth the secrets behind the hauntings and attacks.

It may sound like a cliched set-up, but that's the beauty - I love set-ups like these, but since they're seen as so cliched, it turns out there are very few serious books you can name that are structured in this way. It's a story in the vein of the classic gothic tales - late night supernatural encounters in the castle, shadowed castle corridors, a beautiful and haunted young woman in peril, mysterious murder, long-buried family secrets... this story has it all, and Basil Copper executes it in a flawlessly haunting and atmospheric way.

By now I think you should know whether this book is for you or not. It's intelligently written, and perhaps the cynics would call this book "cheesy," but I am a big fan of the classic gothic atmosphere... frankly we need more books written for adults in which a character has to play supernatural detective in a forbidding 19th century castle. If you're a fan of this type of book, then I can't recommend it enough.