The Seance - John Harwood

I've been seriously NEEDING to read this book ever since I heard about it from Jackie and Simon. I loved The Ghost Writer, also written by Harwood, and I needed some spooky reads for my RIP reading challenge as well.

The book opens in 1889 with an introduction to Constance Langton, a teenage girl who, probably because of her distant relationship with her parents, has always imagined herself to be adopted. After her parents die, she inherits a crumbling old Gothic mansion from a relative she never knew she had. She is warned by the family's lawyer to stay away from the hall, as it has been associated with deadly accidents, mysterious disappearances, and rumors of ghost sightings. She would be better off to sell it and move on. But Constance is a headstrong girl, and persists in exploring the history of her long-lost ancestors, and eventually receives from the lawyer several diaries with clues to the hall's sordid past. Has she found the key to determining her suspected parentage? Have there really been disappearances associated with lightning and a suit of armor? Are all the ancestors really dead? Are there malevolent spirits at work, and can they be summoned through a seance? In order to solve the riddle of her own ancestry, she must also find the answers to these questions.

I had a tough time getting traction with this book until about halfway through. (I am prepared to accept full responsibility, and blame it on real life distractions.) This isn't a long book, only a little over 300 pages, but it took me about a week to read. With that said, I did enjoy it. Atmospheric down to the last word, this is a book that could have been written in the Victorian era by Wilkie Collins himself. Every nuance screams "sensationalist". So if this is your genre, you must add this one to your list. I can't say that it was all that scary, but it certainly was creepy and spun an intriguing mystery. The mystery, however, was dispelled fairly abruptly, over the last 50 pages or so, which I think took away some of the aura of the book. On the other hand, with these mysteries solved, Constance finally gets the answers for which she has always yearned.

I wanted to share the following video with you, which features Harwood talking about The Seance, his inspirations for the characters in the book, and his love of Victorian mysteries. (Rest assured - no spoilers.) It is a little over 5 minutes long, but it is worth it. Take a look:





4 out of 5 stars