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Review in Brief
The book, "The
Haunting of Hill House" is not good.
The Plot Goeth Thusly
In order to
study supernatural phenomenon a psychiatrist gathers a group of people for a
study in a haunted house. The main viewpoint
character of Eleanor slowly goes mad in the house as supernatural shit keeps
happening.
My First Complaint: Boring
The book is boring. I cannot fault the prose of the work, as the
words have a descriptive power and flow that is nice, the performer allows the
words to trip off their tongue quite eloquently. But the plot drags and there is just not
enough meat to the story. By
"meat" I mean revelations, there are few if any twists or surprises,
these people are in a haunted house with some architectural quirks (that I am
sure are metaphors) and they get spooked by ghosts.
I guess I
was expecting more of a “And Then There Were None” type situation, where the
characters clash with one another, all have secrets and ultimately they unravel
as the situation spirals out of control.
But aside from several instances of ghosts causing noise and everyone
being afraid the vast majority of the book is the main character, Eleanor’s internal
monologue which vacillates between demure and bitchy.
My Next Complaint: The Main Character
Eleanor is such a hard protagonist
to root for. The implication in the
novel is that she starts out as a good-natured shrinking violet who has had
little love in her life and the house sort of twists her insecurities into
general bitchiness and ultimately self-destruction. But, her dialogue is boring, and she is a
boring person. At some point you need the viewpoint character of your book to
have more of a personality than feckless human chew toy. I don’t know, I got no vibes of internal
struggle, just a steady descent from pathetic to miserable, and ultimately back
to pathetic. Not so much a character arc
as a character boomerang.
How would I
have fixed this? Simple, I would have
had more characters.
For a book where
the premise is, “Psychiatrist conducts a study,” the Doctor has a comically
small pool of participants. Seriously,
there are two people involved in the study, demure Eleanor and the free-spirited
Theodora. There is another guy there,
Luke who is a member of the family that owns the house, but he’s not part of
the study. Beyond that there are some
extremely tertiary characters, the Doctor’s wife (who is a sort of proto Gwyneth Paltrow for her use of bullshit in the study) and her… bodyguard(?) Arthur who
mostly serves as a gruff salt of the earth contrast to the rest of the cast. And I guess the rude house help… But fuck’em,
their whole personalities begin and end with them being curt to the guests.
 |
| Just to sidetrack a moment, I am not going to watch this show. Calling this nonsense a "lab" is such horse shit that I feel insulted on behalf of science. Netflix should be ashamed. |
None of the other characters work. The Doctor
comes off to me as a doddering old fool with no real method to the study that
forms the impetus for the story. Theodora has traits but mostly exists as a
foil for Eleanor, and her establishing section of the novel paints her as so
flighty and detached that she effectively has no motivation. Luke is just a swaggering dick and offers no
conflict to the story (we are told he is a liar and a cad... But it never
amounts to anything in the narrative. How
about having him act that way?), mostly he just spends all of his time pouring
drinks and playing chess with the Doctor (seriously, that is how a large chunk
of his time on page is spent). Then the Doctor’s
hen-pecking idiot wife shows up with her servant(?) Arthur, a dull-witted
thug. Give me someone to care about, and
then have that person clash with characters who I also care about.
Overall
there is just a lack of inter character drama and a lack of layers for the
cast. Eleanor is the focus, sure it is
good to have a core character, but there is no mystery element, no one is
more/less/something other than they appear to be, at least not in a way that
comes up in the story or impacts the plot.
It is odd to have characters that all have dimension and contrast with
one another just fine… But nothing really comes of it.
Why I Got This Book
I got this on sale for Halloween
and because the "Inspired by" limited
series on Netflix was so good. How
such a great Netflix series was inspired by it is like the evolutionary steps
that moved from especially smart monkeys up to Humans, you can see how it happened,
but is such a significant change that you have to marvel at it.
"Hey, what if the Ghosts were
metaphors for something and we could couple the aftermath of living in the
house with the events as they happened to create a mystery that the audience
will feel engaged unraveling?"
"That sounds like a great idea!"
Ultimate Conclusion
I wouldn’t recommend
this even for people interested in the horror canon. There are just better books out there. If you want supernatural horror, listen to “Dracula”,
and if you are looking for an ensemble piece set in a spooky house then go with
the previously mentioned, “And
Then There Were None” (which is not perfect, but it is better than this).
“The Haunting
of Hill House” fails with the supreme kiss of death for any work of fiction,
the 8
deadly words, “I don’t care what happens to these people.”
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