The Haunting of Hill House

Description

'As nearly perfect a haunted-house tale as I have ever read' - Stephen King Four seekers have arrived at the rambling old pile known as Hill House- Dr. Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of psychic phenomena; Theodora, his lovely and lighthearted assistant; Luke, the adventurous future inheritor of the estate; and Eleanor, a friendless, fragile young woman with a dark past. As they begin to cope with chilling, even horrifying occurrences beyond their control or understanding, they cannot possibly know what lies ahead. For Hill House is gathering its powers - and soon it will choose one of them to make its own.

Shirley Jackson was born in California in 1916. When her short story, 'The Lottery', was first published in the New Yorker in 1948, readers were so horrified they sent her hate mail; it has since become one of the most iconic American stories of all time. Her first novel, The Road Through the Wall, was published in the same year and was followed by Hangsaman, The Bird's Nest, The Sundial, The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived in the Castle, widely seen as her masterpiece. In addition to her dark, brilliant novels, she wrote lightly fictionalized magazine pieces about family life with her four children and her husband, the critic Stanley Edgar Hyman. Shirley Jackson died in 1965.

Stepping into Hill House is like stepping into the mind of a madman; it isn't long before you weird yourself out * Stephen King * An amazing writer ... If you haven't read We Have Always Lived in the Castle or The Haunting of Hill House or any of her short stories you have missed out on something marvellous -- Neil Gaiman The world of Shirley Jackson is eerie and unforgettable ... She is a true master -- A. M. Homes One of the twentieth century's most luminous and strange American writers -- Jonathan Lethem Her books penetrate keenly to the terrible truths which sometimes hide behind comfortable fictions, to the treachery beneath cheery neighborhood faces and the plain manners of country folk -- Donna Tartt She is the finest master...of the cryptic, haunted tale * The New York Times Book Review * A novel which at one stroke puts her unquestionably among the great masters of the genre . . . as spine-chilling . . . as anything Edgar Allan Poe dreamed up. -- Peter Green * Daily Telegraph *