So, how are you all doing? I did finish Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House and i absolutely loved it!
And here is my review on Goodreads :)
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Much like We Have Always Lived In a Castle, Shirley Jackson explores the human frailties and its effect on people and the environment. This time, the setting is an old Victorian and quite haunted Hill House.
Doctor Montague has assembled a team of paranormal experts/assistants (who at one point experienced paranormalcy in their life before) which would help him in his endeavour, to write a book about a haunted house. We have the drama queen with a dull life, Theodora, the reclusive Nellie and the doctor himself to be chaperoned by the heir of Hill House, Luke who is quite the annoying milksop.
Theodora, something of a socialite back where she came from, is quite the stirrer, often times making a scandal out of simple events relayed to compensate for her dull life outside Hill House.
And my personal fave Eleanor, otherwise known as Nellie, the introverted one of the lot. Having taken care of her ailing mother for so long before coming to Hill House, she has perhaps started losing herself in that period House Hill hastened that experience furthermore. Showing extreme paranoia , forgetfulness, experiencing persecution delusion (she interprets her colleagues' statements as if they are out to mock her, humiliate her, or spite her which isn't the case, really), mild hallucinations and major depression. All of these are common early signs of Schizophrenia.
Each of the characters have their own weaknesses which have been aggravated by continuously inhabiting the haunted rooms. Even Mrs Dudley is an enigma with her sharp, obdurate manners toward the clienteles of the house, constantly reminding them of the meal curfew, the rules of the house and even mildly scaring them by stating that no one can leave the house after dark. All of these, of course, were initially laughed off by the company.
All in all, this is just a short read but i love how the reader can easily dissect the psychology of each characters imbedded in the book.
This book is definitely a quality over quantity sort of read.
What a delight to read! I am still abnormally jumpy even after reading it.
View all my reviews
The very last book to be counted towards the booktubeathon challenge is Howl's Moving Castle which i will be able to finish in 3 hours, i believe. :)
Total pages read so far: 1, 959 pages (excluding The Howl's Moving Castle) And if i had enough time left, i would really like to start on The Night Film as well! i have a physical copy (because of the creepy pictures on it) I am keen on reading what it's about. I hope it's not too much of a House of Leaves though. Excited!!!!
I shall conquer you Pessl!
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