Steve-Calvert.co.uk
Steve-Calvert.co.uk
A Passion For Horror
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The House Next Door is a haunted house story. There are lots of those, I know, but this one is a little different. Usually in books the haunted house is an old house, a house where people have lived and died, or perhaps been murdered. It is, in short, a house with a bad history. The house in this story is not an old house at all; in fact at the beginning of the book it has not even been built. The other unusual thing about the story is that there are no ghosts in it. The house in question has an intelligence in it, an evil and very greedy intelligence, but there are no ghosts and no old, Indian burial grounds; the evil in this story comes from the house itself. The story is told in the first person and from the point of view of a lady called Colquitt Kennedy who is refreshingly down to earth and unpretentious. Colquitt and her husband, Walter, live in what she describes as a good house, but not a grand one and it is in a better neighbourhood than they can really afford because the down payment on the house was a wedding gift from her parents. The Kennedys have two cats, but no children and right from the very beginning of the book you can tell that they are a happy couple, content in their lives and with each other. They even enjoy their jobs. The only problem in their lives is the house that has been built next door. And the things that it does to the people who live there. At the beginning of the book there is an empty lot between the Kennedys and the Swansons. It is a peculiar shape and there is a ridge on it and a creek running through it. Because of this no architect has ever been able to build there and the Kennedys and the Swansons have both enjoyed it as an area of natural beauty between the two houses. Then one day Claire Swanson tells Colquitt that someone is going to build a house on the lot. Buddy and Pie Harralson are a young couple. Buddy has a good career in the making and Pie has daddy's money behind her and the makings of a baby inside her. They are young and happy and they have found a brilliant young architect, Kim Dougherty, to build their dream house for them. Kim is somewhat of a genius and this will be his first house, but what a house it will be! The plans alone are enough to impress Colquitt. They show a house that seems to grow from the ground and blend with the landscape to become part of it rather than to intrude on it. It is a house so magnificent that she cannot imagine the human hands and machinery that will be able to form it. Colquitt's honest awe at the plans before her is enough to start a friendship between the young architect and the Kennedy's and Kim's true brilliance is enough for the Kennedy's to reciprocate that friendship. Even while the house is being built though, there are strange occurrences. Many dead animals are found on the site and then something rather nasty happens to Pie's puppy, but that is nothing when compared to what happens to Pie herself, who takes a fall on the site and miscarries her child. She and Buddy are still young and healthy though, and there is no reason why they can't try again. The Harralson's stay in their dream home doesn't last past the housewarming party, where a lot of unpleasant things happen. None of these things seem at all sinister or connected to the house at the time; it is only later on that Colquitt begins to realize that evil forces are at work. The next family to move into the house are the Sheehans and, once again, their problems seem to be totally separate from the house. The same might be said for the Greene's but, it is what happens to them that finally decides Colquitt and Walter to act. The
House Next Door is 346 pages
long and is one of the most enjoyable reads that I have had in a long
time. It is a scary story, but it is also in many ways a very sad story
because the house destroys so many lives, including Colquitt and
Walter's, who had been so content with their lot before the house was
built. |
