The Haunted Book

I have read many supernatural stories of both the fact and fiction variety since I was a child, but The Haunted Book easily ranks as the worst. Instead of chilling, gothic style stories woven into a tense plot, you get a ridiculous collection of insipid, pointless amateur rubbish.

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The stories are in no way scary, and I do believe I have read children's books that were more frightening and made much more sense! The flow was very stilted and jarring, without any definate aim or direction. When it I have read many supernatural stories of both the fact and fiction variety since I was a child, but The Haunted Book easily ranks as the worst. When it comes to the point where it's a book within a book within a book, you're entering into ridiculous and pretentious territory.

As the book goes on I felt like the author was trying to show how complex and creative he could be, but instead of marvelling at his "cleverness" I really felt like setting fire to the book and clapping my hands with glee as it turned to ashes! The last few pages just nosed dived into obscurity and I have to admit that I struggled to follow what was happening by this time. None of the plot threads added up to a satisfying and cohesive ending, and it just seemed illogical to me.

I have never had book try to "talk" directly to me before, or try to convince me that I am stuck in the book and my life is not real, but just a construct. I think the author has been watching the Matrix films one to many times Oct 28, Ellie rated it really liked it Shelves: As he sets off around the country he learns how the mundane can turn terrifying in an instant. The success of many of these stories is the complete normality running up to the ghost encounter. The fear that a noise or a touch can bring is somehow much more real than monsters that lurk in the dark.

Hardened horror fans may find the pace a little slow but I found several of the stories really gave me the creeps. The Haunted Book is rather ambiguously marketed, presented as a collection of ghost stories from around Britain sourced by Dyson. It is left up to the reader to decide the truth but inevitably it becomes clear it if fiction masquerading as non-fiction. Like many short story collections, there are hits and misses and I found myself skipping over a few. Yet there was always the feeling that you could turn the page to be confronted with something terrifying and the lack of it just adds a little to the tension.

What really lifted the book for me was the end; hidden away in those black pages. If you are a book geek you will love it. Maybe every book should end that way! The physical hardback is certainly one of those books that begs to be picked up. The designer has managed to replicate the old journal look perfectly.

Dec 16, Joanne Sheppard rated it really liked it. And, as I would have expected, a lot of it did certainly resonate with me. Each story-within-the-story and there are many is a gem. Some of them are ghost stories in the conventional sense. A man is haunted by a ghostly voice from a disconnected phone, for instance, and an evil spirit stalks an old library. Some of them, however, are something different, and ultimately more unsettling: Those who went to see Ghost Stories may remember what happens to Dr Goodman, the rationalist sceptic and professor of parapsychology played by Andy Nyman in the production I saw who tells the stories themselves, and also the degree to which the audience were drawn into the production.

Perhaps elements of The Haunted Book will come as less of a surprise to them. Perhaps the fault lies with me, and I was too busy looking out for it, too keen to analyse. It's an ending that will stay with me for some time, and I suspect it will stand up to repeated re-readings. If you have even the slightest interest in ghost stories, I'd recommend The Haunted Book.

View all 4 comments. Nov 10, Patrick rated it it was amazing. I enjoy a good ghost story. An introduction by the author frames the book as a collaboration with a journalist named Aiden Fox, who writes columns on supernatural occurrences for a local paper in the south-west of England. He even goes so far as to give road directions as to how to get to most of the locations yourself, should you be interested. The stories themselves are genuinely inspired. Dyson has clearly read widely in the traditions of British horror fiction, and he really does know his stuff.

Or sometimes it does. And then something else unexpected happens. About three-fifths of the way through the book, the author does something unusual with the form of the text which colours what follows. And that might turn out to be the most interesting thing about this book. Certain themes, things the stories have in common are underlined, but it frustrates any attempt to link them all together in any kind of grand conspiracy.

The question of where all these stories came from — which in a way is the main question of the book -- is left unanswered. Upgraded this to five stars because I'm still thinking about most of these stories over three months later. Jan 12, Phil rated it really liked it. I loved this book.

The tale about the mental institution, forget the title, was particularly chilling, like being stuck inside a nightmarish public information film from the s. My only gripe is that the back story, about the author's collaboration with a reporter, seemed to fragment and eventually disintegrate entirely - what happened?

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I expected there to be some kind of resolution but none was forthcoming. Having said that, it's still a fantastic read. The Aickman influence, well documented by Dyson, is very evident, as are the other formative influences, many of which are mentioned in the introduction. I read it on Kindle, which was fine, but I suspect the print version is probably more immersive, with the illustrations and design no doubt adding to the experience.

Feb 24, Phillip rated it did not like it Shelves: There I was expecting this book to be full of chills yet the stories are about as scary as an episode of Scooby Doo. This is one book that does not seem to know what it is, and you are left with the feeling that the author is trying to be too clever for his own good. These are supposed to be fiction stories based Preposterous tosh. These are supposed to be fiction stories based on true locations and experiences, yet the endings left me feeling disappointed and not the least bit frightened, which is a shame as some of the locations seemed to be the perfect location for a good ghost story.

If you want to read ghost stories written by someone who knows how to scare the reader, then read the works of M. Jun 21, Judy Abbott rated it liked it. Dec 04, Janette Fleming rated it really liked it. What unspeakable horror glimpsed in the basement of a private library in West Yorkshire drove a man to madness and an early grave?

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What led to an underground echo chamber in a Manchester recording studio being sealed up for good? What creature walks the endless sands of Lancashire's Fleetwood Bay, and what connects it to an unmanned craft washed ashore in Port Elizabeth, nearly six thousand miles away? In Jeremy Dyson was contacted by a journalist wanting help bringing together accounts of tru What unspeakable horror glimpsed in the basement of a private library in West Yorkshire drove a man to madness and an early grave?

The Haunted Book chronicles the journey Dyson, formerly a hardened sceptic, went on to uncover the truth behind these tales. Love this review from the Independent http: It's traditional to present ghost stories with an authenticating framing device: The shtick here is that a journalist, Aiden Fox, who writes a column about true ghostly encounters, has proposed a collaboration to Jeremy Dyson, the co-creator of The League of Gentlemen; he provides his extensive source material and Dyson will write up the stories as fiction. Dyson, or should that be "Dyson", accepts, and vows to visit all the locations.

But that is just the start of the game. The 10 stories which comprise The Haunted Book explore the conventions and tricks of the form, although some have no ghost at all. We begin with a straightforward haunted house yarn. A young man is taunted by calls from a disconnected telephone; but it seems that the clue lies in his own psychosexual make-up. The sense of a link between a character's sexual life and his supernatural experience intensifies as the book goes on, and is one of the unifying features of the collection.

Another is the way that "Dyson" himself becomes a haunted figure, as he roams around the country following Fox's leads. The recording terminology of the title becomes an elegant metaphor for time passing and opportunity lost. After four tales, the book turns into a replica of a title, This Book is Haunted, within which lies perhaps the most terrifying tale, "Tetherdown Lock".

The spirit of the writer Robert Aickman — much admired by Dyson — presides over all one of Zurau's songs is named after an Aickman story.

Aickman also ties sexuality and coercion in some of his creepiest tales. The last two formal tales, which purport to come from yet another source, "A Book of Hauntings", make this link explicit with a Leeds library haunted by a porn fiend, and a series of sex crimes out on't moors. But there's one more surprise for the reader, in the final, coal-black pages. The Haunted Book sets out not merely to entertain, but to embody a creeping menace in the text itself.

The trompe-l'oeil cover is just the start of the fun.

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Open it if you dare …. Nov 30, D. I've only read one other book by Dyson, but it was good enough for me to want to check this one out when it appeared credit again to my library, who actually ordered it new when I asked for it! Coincidentally, I've been reading a collection of M. James' ghost stories, and this fits in perfectly with that. In fact, many times I forgot what was going on in which book, they're so similar in tone, topic and style. Dyson's writing is perfect. When I read the previous book Cranes This time out, he's adapted his style to reflect not just the subject at hand ghosts and general weirdness , but to change in order to ape different time periods' popular styles.

He does this admirably, and if not for the gimmickry at play here, I'd almost believe these were the excerpts from various sources they claim to be. I absolutely loved this book. It's the first time in a long time I was so creeped out by a story that I gave in to the infantile impulse to look around the dark room to make sure I wasn't being watched though this was aided by the atmospheric video Amazon has to promote the book! This would have been a five-star book for me, except for one thing: Through the course of the tale s , something is clearly being set up.



I had no solid expectations of what that would be, but what it finally was I found vastly disappointing. I won't give it away, as I know there are plenty of readers who found the end clever and interesting. So, the book loses a star for crapping out at the end. But, if you're looking for a modern book of spooky stories with a classic bent, you could do far worse than The Haunted Book.

Do yourself a favour, though, and don't e-book it; I'm sure it'll lose something in the change from this beautifully-produced hardcover into a sheet of electro-text. Jan 14, Nay rated it really liked it. Well, I'm not really sure what to make of this book. It starts off with an introduction by the author, Dyson, explaining his history with ghost stories and how he came to write this book. He then lays out some stories for our perusal, giving an account of his experiences when visiting the setting of each one. The book then takes a different turn by becoming another book of a similar name, again recounting some ghostly stories.

I'm not even sure I fully understand the last few pages, s Well, I'm not really sure what to make of this book. I'm not even sure I fully understand the last few pages, so the less said about that the better. The stories within the book were good, they didn't scare me but I enjoyed them as creepy little stories about the supernatural and the unknown. I have a feeling some of them will stick with me, as one or two did when I read Dyson's 'Never Trust A Rabbit' twelve years ago.

I liked that they didn't provide an answer, letting the reader make their own mind up on what happened, why and how. It seems as if Dyson wants his stories to be just the set-up of the ghost story, and has decided that anything that actually features a person engaging with the ghost is crossing into the different genre of horror. He is certainly adept at posing his tales in different ways, constructing them in different manners, and the ten featured here take that as a very loose count, the number is designed to be debatable have a great variety. But whether it is the noises at night, or a potentially phantom institution, or something connected to a strange collection of manuscripts, too often one gets the build-up, which is of course vital in a ghost story, only to see the ghost fully in all its glory at the climax — then it's on with the next one.

One tale here has some people seeking a ghost of a kind, and we get to feel a little like them at times — ghosts are for relishing, not for building up to and ignoring. At the book's best the separate tales are allowed to freewheel with a Gothic mentality, and it's clear the darker tales — the ones that might be said to cross into horror — are by far the more satisfying.

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The tale of a policeman investigating something horrific in the Burley moors of Yorkshire has a delicious inevitability about it. And as for the over-arching tale, the raison d'etre of the entire piece, that sees 'The Haunted Book' become 'This Book is Haunted' and then 'A Book of Hauntings' — only to be tormented by the one and the same ghostly content?

Well, it has potential, yet again is underused. This, then, despite the intelligent whimsy of its structure and formatting, is saddled with the heinous sin, not just of some quite poor proof-reading, but more importantly of leaving us with too little resolution.

Ghosts are for life, not just for while the pages are open, and if they are allowed to live, yet we see too little of the consequences, then they will be forgotten. November 1, at 2: November 2, at 9: November 2, at Hope you like the book! November 2, at 6: Leave a Reply Cancel reply Enter your comment here Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: Email required Address never made public.

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