Genre: : Horror fiction, Novel, Gothic fiction, Psychological horror, Psychological Fiction
Key Stage: Year 9/10+ contains some unsettling and mature reader content. Definitely, a tense and eerie read.
Rating: ★★★★
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson (1959)
Plot: Dr Montague conducts an experiment at Hill House along with two of his ‘assistants’ who were the only people to agree to stay at this house, as well as the nephew of the current house owner. These four people settle in and over a few days, the house begins to affect them all, strangely.
Positives: I found this book scary since some of the scenes in here were very tense but were also left unexplained which left me wanting to understand more. I liked how our perspective of the supernatural events in the house is from an unreliable narrator; it made the whole story much more interesting.
Negatives: I was, at times, confused and wasn’t sure what just happened. However the language was understandable, I just needed to slow down to completely digest it.
Reviewer: Rose, Year 9