The Gatekeeper

by Dana Reed

Erica Walsh and her family move to a new house, unaware it's inhabited by demons waiting to take possession of her soul

Genres: Horror

399 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published June 1, 1991

About the author

Dana Reed, author of eleven published novels—eight horror, two romantic thrillers, and a mystery-suspense—worked as a reporter for several years, and taught Creative Writing and Journalism in Adult Ed classes. Born in Peekskill, New York, she now resides in Vermont with her husband.

Reviews

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Henry Wittaker knows there's something wrong with his latest listing; the house in Monroe exudes bad vibes and Henry feels the presence of evil very strongly, not to mention has frightening experiences of his own there. Despite his conscience, though, he is desperate for money and must make this sale.
So in moves Erica and Kayle Walsh with their four young children - Todd, Didi, Sam and Katie. Before long, every member of the family has some type of encounter in the home, but none will admit it to each other, for fear of sounding crazy. Despite trying to rationalize what's happening to them, it is obvious something is wrong with the house.
"The house is full of minor demons. Your noise makers, they slam doors and move objects. They just try to scare you, but they're harmless. There is one though who's not harmless. I think it may be the Gate Keeper. I believe he's there because the last occupant was involved in Satanism and fooled with things he had no control over. He conjured up the Gate Keeper, then couldn't get rid of him."
At first, the Gate Keeper wanted nothing more than to drive this family from the home... until he realized how badly he wanted Erica for himself, and will stop at nothing to get her.
"The Gate Keeper is a four-headed beast with a reptilian body who has the power to be anything he wants to be... to come to you in any form he desires. The Gate Keeper controls that house."

-----------SPOILERS PAST THIS POINT-----------

So I have a lot of thoughts. Every single person who ever encountered the house got "bad vibes" and just "knew" there was something wrong; they ALL had psychic tendencies. Okay, unrealistic. Not every person in the world has psychic tendencies. Annoying.
When they first moved in, Erica started being nasty and cruel to the kids so you thought she was possessed or something, but then it literally just stopped and she was normal again?
Also every single family member, neighbor, acquaintance, etc who entered the house had some type of experience and NO ONE talked about it to each other. They all just told themselves they were crazy.
Then there was the super annoying love square between Erica, Kayle and his co worker whom Erica was cheating on him with for 8/10 years they were together, and "Paul" aka the Gate Keeper in attractive human form. She ping-ponged back and forth between these three dudes like 47 times in the last 50 pages of the book.
Not to mention Paul lived in her closet and she just like... accepted that. Sometimes it was brought up that she thought it was a bit odd, but for the most part, yeah, she dumped her common law husband for a four-headed demon that lived in her closet.
I could go on and on, but I'm honestly exhausted. 😒

[Tara · Rating 4 out of 5]

An absolutely ludicrous—and hence highly entertaining—tale of a house possessed by a horny closet demon. There was also much hilarity to be found in the good little Christian psychic warrior who was willing to risk it all to do battle with said closet demon, a psychic who got her powers from a car accident which “split her skull in half and released something inside of her.” Aha, so that’s where psychic powers come from! I always wondered about that.

Anyway, I think my favorite part of this adorable little shitshow was the ridiculously over-the-top writing, as in the author, the incomparable Dana Reed, was clearly thinking that we need an assload of italics and exclamation points!, and we need them all the damn time! This made for a fucking hilarious reading experience, because nearly every other paragraph featured one or the other, and quite often—both!

Of course, she also gave us a shit ton of paragraphs that were only one sentence long, often featuring the aforementioned potent one-two combo of having everything in italics and ending in an exclamation point! This single-sentence paragraph approach was needed for added emphasis, because how else can you expect the reader to know when something’s really, really, really scary, as opposed to just really scary? You can’t, and Dana Reed clearly anticipated that. What a gal.

So, this obviously wasn’t a seriously scary horror novel, as you have hopefully picked up on, or even seriously a novel, really, but I sure did enjoy the shit out of it! It started out completely out to lunch and somehow just kept getting more and more insane, and I can honestly say that, although I was never scared, I was also never, ever bored. Dana Reed, you’re my hero.

[Wayne · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars to be perfectly honest. This was not a bad book, per se. Half of it was pretty good. It's just that the other half was pretty bad. While the good parts consisted of some gore and sex, the bad was full of long winded padding. Talk of demons and who loves who go on and on. It got very tiresom. Like a bad soap opera. It's a big disappoinment because I loved the first book I read by this author, "Demon Within". I breezed right through it. Giving it five stars. Loved it. This though, it was a struggle to keep reading.

The basic polt centers on a woman and her four kids. The father. The woman's boyfriend and the thing that lives in her closet, in thier new house who wants to be her demon lover. Walls sweat. Dogs bite. Undead talk. A few people die. Put this one up for sale.

[Julie Jarvis Barker · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once you open this book it sinks it's proverbial claws into your mind and demands that you finish it, even at the cost of losing sleep. It takes over your imagination, which is the scariest place to be.

[Gabriela · Rating 4 out of 5]

i read this book in my "horror" phase which lasted for most of high school. this was the summer after senior year, i believe. it was the first time i was so scared that i actually thought, "you know, i just won't finish it -- i just can't do it." but then reason set in and i thought, "well, most of these books have a somewhat decent ending: bad guy gets it, good guy is okay." so i decided to finish it, even though, every night when i was done reading it, i took it downstairs and put it face-down under some heavy object. well, guess what -- *spoiler alert* i don't remember it ending happily. it's quite possibly one of the scariest books i've ever read. after this phase, i went sci-fi/fantasy. nowadays, i'm more YA fiction. who knows, in a few years, i may wind up reading dr. seuss, again.

[Jared · Rating 3 out of 5]

Needed to cut about 100 pages. I read the whole thing, but it really dragged for a rather unsatisfying ending.

[Jill Van · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book starts at about an 11 and never goes back! I’ve read some other reviews on here about it. People said it was very scary-and I can see that, but I was not affected. I loved how the author put you inside everyone’s mind so you knew what was going.

The characters’ actions/reactions and relationships were sometimes confusing. There is a lot of abuse and mistrust. I suppose that’s what made this book a little difficult for me to bring it closer to reality. The characters were so unloving and abusive, it was hard for me to associate with them on a personal level. I’m glad I don’t know any people that act the way these people do even prior to the haunting/possessions whatever it is.

That said, I did enjoy it a lot! If you want a great horror read with a lot of crazy stuff going on, this is your book! I really enjoyed it and I’m looking forward to finding more by this author

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was another revisit of a book I read when I was younger. And having reread it, I probably shouldn't have read it at 12 or 13, but whatevs... I did. The book was pretty creepy overall, but it was a bit dated. It was colored in many shades of the Satanic Panic when it talked about some of the demonology/satanisim portions, which was a bit annoying, but it still had legit creepy parts that I appreciated.

[Damien Casey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wild. W I L D. WHAT A BOOK.

[Zachary Conyers · Rating 3 out of 5]

Just OK for me. Full video review here: https://youtu.be/Y2cJxfGeF0s

[Werefox by moonlight: Half man, half beast, but all horror · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a very funny book. I don't think the author intended that.