Started: 8th October 2023
Finished: 12th October 2023
Rating: 2.5/5
Spooky Season has arrived. Despite what the early Advent calendars in shops around the UK would make you believe, October is the time for carved pumpkins and fancy dress. It is also the time of horror films and stories, which, you guessed it, will be the focus of this month’s post. So out of the contenders whispering to me from my shelf the one that drew my attention in the end was Jo Nesbo’s The Night House (2023). Yep. You heard me right. The bestselling thriller writer who introduced us to grisly detective, Harry Hole has written a horror novel.
A familiar horror story with unimaginative tropes and an unreliable character that by its conclusion fails to make you feel sympathetic to its theme of trauma and mental health. Have I mentioned in the past that horror literature can be a bit of a hit and miss for me? Pretty sure I have. And unfortunately I felt this one just proved my point.
Set in the remote town of Ballantyne, the story follows orphaned fourteen-year old Richard Elauved, who witnesses the horrifically unnatural death of a classmate beside a telephone box in the woods. When another classmate falls victim to a supernatural threat he is encouraged by fellow outcast, Karen to investigate and this investigation will lead him to the night house.
In fairness, I could understand the angle Nesbo was going for, the choice to have an unreliable narrator suitable for this horror mystery. He starts off strong in the first part of The Night House, introducing a world that will remind readers of both good and bad Stephen King horror classics. Richard himself is a character in whom readers will become invested. Picture a member of The Losers from King’s It (1986). However, imagine that ‘Loser’ to be, pardon my French, a little shit, an antihero who at times bullies his ‘friends’ into doing things that ultimately leads to their demise. It was a refreshing take on the outcast stereotype and made readers forget how bizarre man-eating phones and trees can be. Of the entire book, The Night House, part one was the best, after that, the story becomes quite messy. If part one is a Stephen King playground, part two is an LSD drug trip of craziness leading to a mellowed revelation to an all too real concept by its final act. The madness and broken reality readers experience through Richard may be purposeful in demonstrating his shattered mind but ultimately it makes the story too jumbled to stay focused and even before reaching the story’s predictable conclusion, readers could identity the whole ‘it was a dream’ trope starting to develop. As a result, the tension became lost and Richard no longer felt as interesting as he had been at the start, which is unusual considering the kind of stories Nesbo has provided readers in the past.
While I’m willing to take into account that this is Nesbo’s first attempt at a different genre, The Night House is a cheap thrills mystery whose horror does little to keep readers up all night, squandering a character that could have provided a refreshing perspective.
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