The Matrix

by Jonathan Aycliffe

Seek and you shall find...After the death of his beloved wife, Andrew Macleod finds solace in his research in Edinburgh.His interest in the ancient practices of magic is purely academic until the soothingly hypnotic rituals and mysterious ceremonies begin to lure him into a consuming quest for knowledge.When his passion escalates into an obsession for power and mastery, Andrew unwittingly becomes the apprentice of Duncan MyIne, who has a strange hold over him.Though Andrew fears MyIne's menacing tutelage, he allows himself to be drawn deeper into an inner circle of evil.When he finally discovers the demented motivation behind MyIne's interest in him, it is too late for redemption, poised as he is on the edge of the horrific abyss between life and death...

Genres: Horror, Fiction, Gothic, Fantasy, Paranormal, Mystery, Supernatural

274 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 7, 1994

About the author

aka Daniel Easterman

Jonathan Aycliffe (Denis M. MacEoin) was born in Belfast in 1949. He studied English, Persian, Arabic and Islamic studies at the universities of Dublin, Edinburgh and Cambridge, and lectured at the universities of Fez in Morocco and Newcastle upon Tyne. The author of several successful full-length ghost stories, he lives in the north of England with his wife, homeopath and health writer, Beth MacEoin. He also writes as Daniel Easterman, under which name he has penned nine bestselling novels.

Reviews

[Jack Tripper · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cover of the 1995 Harper Paperbacks mass-market I'm reading (291 pages). No sign of Keanu Reeves yet, but I'm only a couple chapters in.

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE MATRIX is my personal favorite of Aycliffe's supernatural works. There's a couple of reasons for this; the main one is the setting.

Edinburgh is in my heart. I spent a while working there, and over my lifetime I've spent many happy hours wandering the strets of the Old and New Towns, and sampling beers in the many great bars to be found.

The same streets, and bars, populate this book. But there's something else here too, ghosts from the great city's past, always just at the corner of your eye, always reminding you that there are some dark passageways that are best left alone.

Aycliffe takes his hero, a man from the Wesern Islands, and sends him down one such Edinburgh passageway, one that proves to be a warren full of pale things, ancient sorceries, and some of the creepiest revenants you'll find anywhere in fiction.

The protagonist's journey through the labyrinthine streets, and his mental deterioration as he does so, is expertly handled, and the sense of deep history, claustrophobic and gathering in layers around you, perfectly catches the spirit of Edinburgh.

I read it here in Newfoundland on a warm spring day, but I felt the cold wind coming off the Firth of Forth as strongly as if I was still there.

If you want an Edinburgh ghost story, Aycliffe has the perfect one for you right here.

Highly recommended.

[Phil · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very atmospheric novel by Aycliffe that delves deep into mysticism and the paranormal. The Matrix is narrated in first person in the form of our lead's diary of a sorts; more like memoir recounting for prosperity of the events that took place that tore his life to pieces. Andrew Macleod, our lead, has a doctorate in sociology but recently lost his wife at the tender age of 26 or so and heads back to his parent's house on a lonely island in Scotland to recoup. Through some family connections and such, he lands a professorship in Edinburgh and commences research into paranormal cults and such. Strictly a professional academic, his interests concern the class and social background of those attracted to such cults/religions.

Nonetheless, he has to try to sort out the mumbo jumbo and commences research into the 'classic' texts on various underground cults/beliefs and attends various events around the city hosted by such people. One of the things I liked best about this novel was the setting-- lovely Edinburgh, one of my favorite cities in the world. Andrew even lands a flat on the Royal Mile! In any case, Andrew is frustrated with his research; all the groups he investigates seem so off the wall and trite at the same time. In due course, however, he encounters at one such group a person, Duncan Mylne, who also has an interest in these groups and a seemingly deep knowledge of the paranormal to boot. Eventually, Duncan becomes something like a mentor to Andrew, or is it really an apprenticeship?

Under Duncan's tutelage Andrew becomes enmeshed in the research not of the groups, but the content; Duncan has an immense library of old and ancient tomes on all kinds of esoteric topics that he loans Andrew, provided Andrew only reads them in his flat. Another library Andrew investigates is housed in the house long ago deeded to one of the groups he studied and there one day Andrew finds The Matrix, an old book from 1598 or so that ends up terrifying him, giving him basically a nervous breakdown.

Upon recovery and after basically losing his job due to neglect, Andrew loses his job, but Duncan offers to take him with him to Morocco for the summer to meet some old friends and others who are into the occult; that is when things start to get a little crazy...

The Matrix has a great build up and Aycliffe really builds the tension nicely. Lovely depictions of Scotland and various places in Morocco add some great color to the mix. I was less enamored with the way the story went and the ending. First half of the book was a solid 4+, but the rushed and a bit unsatisfactory second half brought this down to a 3. Good stuff, but I liked Naomi's Room much more. I will definitely check out some of his other titles!

[Paulo "paper books only" · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just finish this book today. I started reading then stopped because I think he drag a bit in the middle. Nothing was happening.

The first person perspective was a point in it's favor. I think if this book had been written in the third person the eerie aura that follow the narrator would not be as effective.

Is this a good horror novel? I think it is. It's not gore or scary. It has a bit of a lovecraftian feel. Like the horror is there, he is right inbetween all but he never grasps it all. Mix that with a gothic twist in the end. I think the book was very well written and under 250 pages but you really enter the mind of Macleod (our main protagonist) and the occult euphoria from the seventies/eighties. The antagonist, if you can call it that, controls/seduces in an hipnotic way, our main character making him travel from scotland to north africa as he learns more about the occult.

I think the ending was suitable to the story and leaves a door , well a gate open to our imagination. I think the writer really knows the horror craft, think MR James and again Lovecraft. And for those who enjoy gothic tales will also feel that this novel could have been written in the turn of the century.

In each page, you will feel what the main character is feeling. You will think what horror are out there but never see it. It's an "feeling" horror. It's not describe so you know what to feel. Your imagination will do that to you. It's that good.

In no way this book feels as a King or Koontz in my opinion. This is a different kind of horror.

Why isn't this author more recognize? I really don't understand the publishers. This Sir is a gem. I have another of his book. I will try to find the rest through abebooks and such...

[Rob Twinem · Rating 3 out of 5]

Old fashioned horror story, Andrew Macleod becomes obsessed with the occult and falls under the spell of the mysterious Duncan Mylne, who has a secret agenda and Andrew is an essential part of his future plans. The writing is very descriptive and as with all classic horror relies on the imagination of the reader to bring the story to life in his mind...."And yet, for all the neglect, the building had lost none of it's power. It had been designed to communicate a sense of religious awe, and that remained in the sheer scale with which it towered over the passer-by. But it possessed something else, something I had felt the first time I saw it in my dreams; a sense of brooding evil so overpowering that it took the breath away. There was a force in the very fabric of the building, a strength of purpose, as thought the stones themselves had been imbued with a malign and ancient consciousness. Even without setting foot inside, I could feel that same presence of fear and loathing and brutality..." The story evolves around a book known as "Matrix Aeternitatis" and the evil vision within, taking the reader on a journey from the island of Stornoway to the rain soaked streets of Edinburgh and the oppressive heat of North Africa. As we race towards an exciting conclusion Andrew Macleod must use all his cunning to outwit the evil that accompanies Duncan Mylne.

[Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deliciously dark.

Aycliffe is adept at weaving literate, intelligent tales. The Matrix is thoroughly unnerving as well as replete with expertly researched arcane histories. I always enjoy the blend of academia with the paranormal and The Matrix is a superb exemplar.

Recommended.

[Bettie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Listen here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/...

4 Extra Debut. A student researching the occult comes under the malign influence of an ancient book of spells. Read by Robert Paterson.

#2 Trying to rid himself of an ancient book, student Andrew MacLeod becomes drawn to a sinister group. Read by Robert Paterson.

[Addy · Rating 5 out of 5]

After a very long hiatus of not reading this one jump started my love of reading again. This book flowed really well that it had my attention throughout. Sometimes that is very difficult to accomplish. Most books have a lot of filler and bore me but Aycliffe has a knack for not losing the reader. The Matrix was spooky in all the right places. I love subtle spookiness. It’s better than all out violence and gore to me. I have a few other Aycliffe books and I hope they won’t disappoint!

[Rabha Almahdi · Rating 5 out of 5]

the third book I read by Jonathan Aycliffe and it has the most appealing end, I'm not gonna say much but those lines is more than enough to make you read it :
“Who is the third who walks always beside you?
When I count, there are only you and I together
But when I look ahead up the white road
There is always another one walking beside you
Gliding wrapt in a brown mantle, hooded

[Bibliophile · Rating 3 out of 5]

Scottish evil is refreshingly fortright. There's no devious tempting of innocents. It proudly announces itself and proceeds to slither, rattle and crawl all over an atmospheric Edinburgh. A grieving academic studying the occult finds it hard to ignore it and begins socializing with evil's best friend Duncan, reading inappropriate books. A nice read for a rainy night.

[Jo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Andrew is a sociologist undertaking academic research into occultist groups and non-mainstream religious practices. He comes into the orbit of the mysterious Duncan Mylne who unleashes literal Hell. Perfect little spooky book for the arrival of autumn. It's nothing special but still a decent read.

[Stevedutch · Rating 5 out of 5]

When the film of the Exorcist was first released to all of the accompanying now well known ‘who-ha’ I went to see what all the fuss was about and came away unimpressed. Than night I woke about 3 a.m. and gradually it occurred to me what I’d seen the night before and a feeling of dread increasingly overcame me. Reading this book was a similar experience. The prose is quite plain, in keeping with a straightforward narrative account of a man who feels compelled to record certain experiences he’s had for the benefit of others. The opening scenes are set in Edinburgh and centre on an academic sociologist who is given a contract at the university to conduct research into the prevalence of satanic cults in and around the city. He begins by insinuating himself into various groups in order to learn more about their affairs and to use their libraries. Eventually, he gets ‘taken up’ by one of the city’s leading barristers who is a member of one such cult, The Fraternity of the Old Path, who offers to act as a kind of mentor and allow him access to valuable literary resources that would otherwise be ‘forbidden’. From the outset he senses that his mentor might potentially be a dangerous man to know but he cannot turn down the opportunities he presents. After a fairly prosaic beginning, there is a progressive feeling of dread emanating from the narrative as though the protagonist is being drawn, in spite of his knowledge of the consequences, into a dark shadowy world that is palpably evil and from which there is no turning back.

Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos has been mentioned elsewhere in relation to this novel and I can almost understand why. I’m a fan of Lovecraft and find his stories, for the most part, entertaining. However, when you read him you know it’s simply gloriously hyperbolic entertainment; similarly, with Le Fanu, M. R. James, Stephen King etc. Aycliffe’s sublime skill, as far as this novel goes, is that when reading it, you forget it’s fiction and really come to believe that there do exist those who are in possession of certain arcane knowledge and evil enough to use it with fatal consequences. The closest that anything comes to capturing the same feeling of palpable menace I can think of are Susan Hill’s, The Woman in Black (the book not the film!), the BBC’s M. R. James productions of a few decades back: A Warning to the Curious and Oh Whistle and I’ll Come to Thee. In film I suppose the closest would be the films of Jacques Tourneur; for example, Night of the Demon, itself based upon the James story, Casting of the Runes.

The book remains a masterpiece of its kind and the author has never quite reached the same heights again although The Lost comes close.

[Jack · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once again my favourite ghost story writer strikes again. Similar to Naomi's Room we have a very educated Englishman who lives in the world of academic scepticism, only to have this predisposition crumble down as a result of forbidden pursuits. Andrew Macleod the main protagonist is a sociologist interested in the study of Occultism, he at first doesn't believe any it until he comes across a book from 1598 called Matrix Aeterniatis then all hell breaks loose.

To quote page 3 "[facts] are our best defence against our innate proneness to exaggerate and fantasise", it is in this essence that I believe that Ayecliffe himself wants to sever the division between the paranormal and palpable so the reader's own views on the subject of ghosts can be challenged and thus perhaps changed. The novel is addressed to the reader as a memoir written by Macleod after everything took place, which is why it makes it interesting to read the book through someone's eyes that have already had their ideas confronted.

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some years ago I read Aycliffe's novel A Shadow on the Wall and felt it was a bit overlong and I had to task myself a bit to finish it. However if your appetite is whetted for something in the mode of M. R. James it's a good read. The same can be said for this earlier novel, but I would argue this has better pacing even though it's a bit longer.

As a horror novel this feels pretty safe and predictable -- almost a "cozy" horror tale. The horrific is present, but is mostly kept "offscreen" or is implied. But Aycliffe does have a talent for description and he's always referencing nature; winter is coming on, the sun setting, the streets are empty. The atmosphere is palpable and the setting of Edinburg comes alive as any story set in Prague and written in the style of European Fantastique. Aycliffe also writes in a very effectively antiquarian way -- when there were references to the modern world in the text I often forgot I wasn't reading a novel set in the Victorian era.

[John Wiltshire · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think horror is one of the most difficult genres to write successfully in. I'm long past pure slasher novels (although I do dip my toe back in occasionally if a really gory one comes into my reading radar) but I do enjoy slow-creeping horror, unease, a sense of things not being right in the world. This author has captured that sense wonderfully. Really well written and unnerving, this novel is a warning about delving into the occult.
As ever, I'll update when done.
Finished this one a while ago but forgot to update...
Well, yes, warnings about delving into the occult...I have a few basic life rules which have served me well over the (too many) years, one of them being just that: don't mess with the occult. I don't believe in any of it, but I'm hedging my bets too. I would not allow a ouija board into my house. Same with Tarot.
This book bears out my caution.
Highly recommend for lovers of more literary horror.

[George · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very solid horror novel. Was subtle in its scares. Reminded me somewhat of Lovecraft, given the 1st person style, the supposedly erudite narrator who is taught the real ways of the world, and the author's refusal to fully reveal the monsters themselves.

The idea that there are scary things that are so big, so scary, and that will drive you insane on the spot, and as such the narrator can only hint at their awfulness, certainly makes for a scary book if done right.

I would recommend this to people who have already read the cannon (King, Barker, Simmons, McCammon).

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

(No, not thatone. The "Matrix" in this novel is an ancient-- and evil-- book of magic.)

You'll recognize most of the bits and pieces of this novel-- particularly if you've a penchant for good old-fashioned atmospheric horror and Lovecraftian "weird fiction". However, recognizing the signs, knowing full well what's coming, and (mentally) shouting at the characters, "Stop, for goodness' sake!"-- that's all part of the fun of this type of book.

If you don't mind predictability, there's plenty to enjoy here.

One thing, though, that I can never understand in books of this type (and it does seem to happen fairly often) is this: How can a character who has witnessed all sorts of magical, mystical, paranormal phenomena be so certain that none of the "good stuff" could possibly also be true? No God, or in this case, no heaven. I guess it's supposed to contribute to the overall feeling of gloom and dread-- no light at the end of the tunnel-- but I find it illogical and strange.

I'd give this 3.5 stars if half stars were possible.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

From BBC Radio 4 Extra:
Evil Awaits
Jonathan Aycliffe - The Matrix

Episode 1 of 10
"I understood nothing then. I was still a child ..."

A postgraduate student's research into the occult brings him under the malign influence of an ancient book of spells - the Matrix Aeternitatis.

Episode 2 of 10
Trying to rid himself of an ancient book, Andrew MacLeod becomes drawn to a sinister group

Episode 3 of 10
Andrew MacLeod is taken to Africa, where he is horrified to hear a voice from his past.

Episode 4 of 10
Now back in Scotland, MacLeod becomes increasingly dependent on Mylne's support.

Episode 5 of 10
MacLeod witnesses a mysterious ceremony in a former church and meets with a friend's widow

Set in contemporary Edinburgh. Jonathan Aycliffe's chilling novel abridged in ten parts by Rosemary Goring.

Read by Robert Paterson

Producer: David Jackson Young

First broadcast on BBC Radio Scotland in 1997.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01n...

[Chris Browning · Rating 3 out of 5]

What a strange book - essentially it’s a Dennis Wheatley style potboiler written by someone who clearly thinks he’s more of a literary writer. As such the full blooded stuff is basically Hammer/ Amicus levels of faintly sinister and nothing ever quite gets weird enough or well written enough to be literary. Instead it feels like a well meaning middle class solicitor deciding to make a horror novel that’s not really satisfying for anyone. It has some great moments but as a whole it sort of flaps, unconvincingly between two worlds

[Sean Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this a convincing and claustrophobic novel, despite a beginning that's almost too matter-of-fact. (This does make more sense in view of the ending...) Despite unavoidably picturing Mylne as Russell from True Blood, I liked the slow development of The Matrix, its almost Kafkaesque portrayal of Edinburgh as a city of dark magic, and some pleasingly well crafted plot twists. In parts, it's also beautiful - such as the scene set in the snow in the Lammermuir Hills. The chapters in Morocco are as threatening as anything in Paul Bowles. All in all, a near faultless performance. (Perhaps my only quibble is how the narrator gets to Glasgow in half an hour from Tollcross, clearly an act of magic beyond my imagining...)

[Larry Crawford · Rating 5 out of 5]

"What are you looking for?"

"Knowledge," I said, hoping it might not sound too banal. It was, at least, an approximation of the truth. "I'm in search of knowledge."

"Every Tom, Dick, and Harry is after knowledge," he replied. "You are not ordinary. I want to know what it is you seek that the ordinary man does not even guess at."

. . . "Mastery," I said. "Real knowledge and final mastery."

He smiled.

—p. 61(1)





Just to get it straight, this is not the original source material for the escapades of Neo, Morpheus, and Trinity. Author Aycliffe writes what is referred to as the British Ghost Story, as assigned by early purveyors such as M.R. James, Algernon Blackwood, Henry James. He's not gonna break out of that formula much; he's got a lot on his mind, being educated through Trinity, Edinburgh, Cambridge. A Senior Fellow and an Irishman to boot—his real name is Denis MacEoin, but he pennames Daniel Easterman to write Espionage—he brings his PhD in focus on Islamic studies with a Middle Eastern centrality. The Matrix is his fourth novel in this venue of demonic tomes, despoiled graves, slumbering hauntings, creaky old houses, ancient talismans and spells.

It is a story about a guy who manages to get through a major life crisis only to be embroiled in another that makes the last one look like a walk in the park. It is a considerable grieving when the love of your life dies young and suddenly. Andrew Macleod faces this when Catriona, his heart-mate of four years, passes on with cancer at 26 years of age. Now, he can only "treasure every moment in my memory"(p.17).

He never imagines he will see her again.

Andrew is a self-titled "scientist", a "late-twentieth-century man of reason"(p.11), educated in the good schools of Scotland, and finding his calling in Sociology, specifically the study of Religion as manifested through current New Age "wooliness"(p.21) and devil-deviated cults. While researching through a private library of the Fraternity of the Old Path, a dusty, leather-bound tome finds him. Called the Matrix Aeternitatis, its date is 1598(2) and has numerous talismanic devices placed throughout its discourse of "diabolic incantations" concerning age-old ritual magic. The author, a Avimetus Africanus, was a Moroccan scholar of some note in medieval Europe. Andrew is fascinated early on by the book's "oracular quality of the spells"(p.34); however, he soon reviles the work due to its grotesque and abominable purpose. He takes it back, but the librarian won't have it. Determined, Andrew tosses the book—priceless as it might be—into his firestove.

It is about this time Andrew begins hearing strange, scratching noises in the walls of his lodging and discovers what looks like contusions on his hands and face. He starts in on a recurring dream where he attends a black mass in "a great black church. . . grim and vast and silent"(p.57) that becomes so terrifying, he tries to avoid sleep altogether. It's also about this time that he meets Duncan Mylne, an upper-class advocate who is likewise enraptured with the occult.

Duncan is rich, educated, and anxious to share his preternatural knowledge and experiences. They become fast friends, with Duncan supplying the principle texts of ritual magic and alchemical lore in "recondite volumes . . . as daunting to lift as to read"(p.64). Duncan presses Andrew to learn Arabic as the fountainhead language of necromancy, then insists he join him for the summer in Morocco. Andrew soon feels that "Duncan had not brought me in order to open my mind, but to destroy my soul"(p.79). In Fez, Andrew's early impression is that "it was the city of my nightmares"(p.94). And, in its ancient and twisted corridors, Andrew is introduced to a marabout with ultimate power and indescribable presence. At first, Andrew sees just "a mummy wrapped in the robes of an eighteenth-century sheikh. . . long desiccated fingers like claws." The cheeks "were hollow, the mouth devoid of teeth. But the eyes were as full of life as any I had ever seen."(p.96) Sheikh Ahmad ibn 'Abd Allah. Andrew studies with him for a week or so, learning the obscure rituals for immortality and about da'ira, making the dead undead. In a creepy-crawl of the Sheikh's bedroom, Andrew notices no breath or heartbeat present in Ahmad's sleeping form. He surmises the estimate of Ahmad's age of 200 years to be low. When they are about to leave Morocco, he finds his priest friend Iain's missing scarf in Duncan's bag at about the same time he learns of Iain's enigmatic death back home. Yet an acolyte, but he knows that a sorcerer needs only an article of his victim's possessions to be his representative.

Back in Edinburgh, things on the cabalistic level accelerate. Or, to put it more accurately, Andrew becomes aware of the integration between traditional reality and the uber-reality of transmutation with the hereafter. Things seen and heard and learned are still disconcerting and scary, there is just less dubiety about its certainty. Materialization is somewhat regarded like cheesecloth: it appears solid until liquid pours through it. For instance, when Andrew stays at Duncan's somber country estate, one night he sees Duncan consort with some loathsome thing—possibly Duncan's post-dead wife, Constance—out on the snowy grounds. "I had a horror of it now," Andrew notes. But, beyond not sleeping, his reaction seems rather prosaic: "I could hear my own breath rasping"(p.122-3).

On that toe, Andrew jumps into a far more unnerving terror ride when Duncan takes him to the actual black church of his nightmares to witness a satanic ritual complete with important men in pointy-hat robes, chanting. Duncan calls this place "a focus, a beacon, a brightness."



"It acts as a prism for our emotions, it amplifies them, alters them. Some dream of what they most hope for, others of what they most fear. Don't be alarmed by that. . . The dreams will change. . . Come on, Andrew. Nothing awful will happen. You're perfectly safe with me."

—p.128.



When something white and slithering is summoned, Andrew bolts, "frightened beyond measure"(p.130). He is finally ready to face the calamitous facts and their appalling focus on his settlement. It is not going away. He can't put it off, like closing a book. He is truly terrified that this is the rest of his life, or the end of it.

But—far worse—he should be even more concerned about what happens to him after his earthly demise.

Andrew begins avoiding Duncan, even moving out of his boarding room. He takes up with his dead friend Iain's wife, Harriet. They establish a battle ground to repel Duncan's influence. Andrew re-connects with his parents, trying to find his ordinary life again. Alas, roadblocks appear, upping the stakes. Catriona's grave is robbed and the body taken. Andrew gets another dream-state summoning from a jellaba-wearing apparition. Waking, he catches Catriona's perfume in the room. Now, he sees no hope in regaining normality. "I felt shut out from it as though by a thin, impermeable glass"(p.143).

The irreparable fabric of his world tears further. Twisted and unnatural threads appear all around. Harriet shows him her and Iain's wedding photo taken when they were young. Iain looks like a "thin, bent man." In all of her pics of him he's "days away from death"(p.145). Andrew thinks apprehensively of the photo of Catriona he gave to both Duncan and Sheikh Ahmad.

Then, in what seems like an innocuous sidebar, Andrew stumbles into a strange, depressed neighborhood of "forgotten corners"(p.147) and discovers a bookstore where he might sell his occult collection and pick up a gift for Harriet. Back home, he gets a call from the police. There's been more shenanigans at Catriona's grave, this time with bad juju bits and a dead baby left behind. Feeling like "a flock of large black birds passed over like a stain"(p.145), he telephones home to find out his Father is deathly sick, and, just like in Iain's condition, the doctors haven't a clue. By now, his photo album has gone rotten, also. Catriona's in her wedding dress, but with a shroud over her head. And, in the land of the living, Harriet has unwrapped her "present" and found The Book That Cannot Die: Matrix Aeternitatis, and undeniably Andrew's copy. When he tries to give it back to the bookseller, he finds the store an empty shell, abandoned for years. Maddened, he breaks into the back of the shop, intending to leave the book inside. And this is when, "even in the most vivid of my dreams I had never felt so frightened. This was reality." Because, from a inner doorway yet invisible, Catriona appears and he feels her shocking envelopment.



It was Catriona, not a simulacrum, not a doppelganger. I could not mistake the very special physicality of that embrace, the movements of her hands, the teasing and surrender of her lips. I might almost have succumbed, might have given in to the embrace and put my own arms round her: dear God, I came so very close to that. Reason screamed at me to run, my eyes told me there was nothing there, that, whatever it was, it was not Catriona; but my body, so unexpectedly caressed, had its own responses.

—p.173



He escapes by asking the succubus its name, a trick from an old Barbara Steele movie, obviously. Since he can't rid himself of the book, he reads it. He then realizes he should flagellate himself for not perusing it sooner, because it lays out the whole cabala enchilada in Arabian hot sauce.



The purpose of the Matrix Aeternitatis, then, was to teach men a method for attaining everlasting life, not through religion or mysticism or alchemy, but by magic. The book itself was to be the matrix for survival. But by the time I had finished reading, I was certain that there was something more to it than that, and I was reasonably certain what it was: the power to return to life those already dead.

—p.177



But having the knowledge isn't necessarily mastering it. He grabs Harriet and they bivouac in his hovel flat for the night. Catriona comes. He holds her outside with defensive conjurations, "while my dead wife howled and scrabbled at the door. Until that night, I had feared death only as a great darkness and an oblivion. Now, it is not oblivion I fear: it is oblivion I pray for every night"(p.186).

They are out of options until Andrew reads the unopened letter Iain wrote to him before he died. Iain was a priest pretty understanding of what Andrew was involved in. He suggests getting a hold of Father Silvestri at the church.

They do, and find a black-robed Jesuit, with "something grim and old-fashioned about him, an air of suffering and knowledge. . . the heart and the mind burned for the sake of faith"(p.200). "My church has never abandoned the miraculous," says Father Silvestri, meaning the purpose of the challis and wafer ritual is considered real, supernatural communication. It is the magic inherent in faith. He shows them evidence that Duncan Mylne has been alive since 1846. He gives them the history of the Mylne family and that Duncan spent a year locked in the crypt with his dead wife attempting to bring her back to life not through reincarnation but more of a rejuvenation through magic. When Silvestri produces a photo of Duncan and Constance, it becomes clear what he wants with Catriona. They look like identical twin sisters.

After leaving Father Silvestri, Andrew gets hamstrung by his family's doctor, Ramsey McLean, into taking medication and getting some rest. Dr. McLean betrays him to Duncan and Andrew ends up captured and held in the black church. In these final scenes, all is revealed, including a basement room filled with coffins and pale white, squirmy and squiggly thingies, some of which are once-human abominations and Duncan's past mistakes in trying to bring back his wife(3).

Andrew is instructed that there will be two rituals. One for Catriona's revival, and the other for him, as it is time for Duncan's transformation. But not for Andrew's body, but his lifeforce. "He would suck me dry like someone sucking juice from a pomegranate, and discard the husk"(p.230). There could not be a more convenient time for Father Silvestri and Harriet to crash the party.

Breaking up the ceremony allows Andrew and Harriet to escape. Andrew even saves the baby put in Catriona's coffin for the transformation, and gets a genuine and caring farewell kiss from his soon-to-be-really-dead wife. The final chapter has Andrew and Harriet living incognito on some beach, married, but still watchful. Father Silvestri didn't make it out of the black church, but apparently Duncan did.

Evil is not diminished in the world, just merely sidestepped.

Normally, such an extensive summary of a work is not attempted, but The Matrix is all plot and atmosphere. The characters are recognizable to anyone with much reading experience. What this heavy synopsis reveals is the diligence to its categorization The genre whistlestops are all made, but with insistence and precision, so that its "classic" underbelly feels substantial, expanded, and creative. Being in a staging area where breakups with agreed-upon reality are demanded, this novel exploits its traditions to bolster its success. It shows that the older queries—sometimes centuries older—can be the most influential to an attentive psyche, and that the horrors substantiated by history can play harder to a delicate balance between the secular and supernatural. The Matrix is a proud and proper standard in a modern time.



1) All quotes from The Matrix, HarperCollins Publishers, London, ISBN 000224161X, c.1994

2) This is actually when it was translated into English. It was written in 1189 AD.

3) Think Tony Scott's 1st film, The Hunger of 1983, where vampiress Miriam keeps her past lovers imprisoned in the attic for all eternity because she can't kill them.

[Fiona Glass · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book could be summed up by the phrase 'another fine mess you've got me into', but unlike Laurel & Hardy there's nothing comedic about it. Instead it's deeply unsettling and at times genuinely scary, as widower Andrew discovers a horrifying old book and then gets in too deep with a group of occult worshippers in his efforts to research it.

'The Matrix' is well written and the second half in particular is gripping, as he comes to realise that things have got out of control, and that the people he's been associating with have their own evil reasons for being interested in him and his recently dead wife. I enjoyed this part of the book, as Andrew battles to extricate himself from their grip with the help of old friend Harriet. However, the earlier sections are less involving, as Andrew digs himself into his own personal hell. I was never entirely clear why he wanted to, since he's obviously so uneasy with the whole thing, and the explanation that research becomes personal didn't quite ring true. I also have a problem with the first person deep past tense point of view ("I had been going to..."), used here as so often in Gothic horror writing, because it's very distancing and tends to make a thirty-something character from the 1990s sound like an old man in Victorian times. Without something a little more modern it became hard to tell the difference between Andrew and some of the other, much older, characters in the book and it's mostly for this reason that I've given it three stars rather than four.

[Helen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jonathan Aycliffe has a real talent for conjuring up an atmosphere of horror, menace, evil and revulsion in his novels. This one is no exception and it gripped me from start to finish. I think it's my new favourite of his even though it disturbed me especially when reading it at night. I should have known better; the images stayed in my head as I tried to sleep. I enjoyed its old-fashioned feel. It's set in the present (was written in 1994) but it feels like it belongs to a much earlier age. It's reminiscent of Victorian ghost stories. It felt incongruous when one character mentioned 'Tesco'! Definitely a 'goodread' for fans of the horror genre.

[Jordi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mr. Aycliffe, you did it again!!
After a disappointment with "The silence of ghosts", again a good book, as I was used to. This story masters in terms of atmosphere, slow burning suspense, mistery, in a nutshell, all that is expected in a true ghost story. I enjoyed this one very much, so I reccommend to read it, specially on these very season. My only complaint is about the end, which feels a little rushed, the denouement wraps up too fast, but the scenarios and sense of place its truly excellent.

[Kimberly van Pinxteren · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another fantastic story by Jonathan Aycliffe. There's a way he writes that captivates me from the start. It is so easy to picture everything that's happening, he is a true master in storytelling. His books are among the best I ever read. When it comes to creepiness and true chills down my spine, his books are the ones I turn to. The Matrix was another fantastic read that sucked me in easily. I love the darkness to his stories and the knowledge he puts into them. Recommended to all.

[Oren Bochman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aycliffe's "The Matrix" is a gothic horror novel of no relation to the movie of the same name. It fits more closely with the works of H.P. Lovecraft. The plot however moves a bit faster and utilises at times more modern scare tactics. The character development is rather lacking and this leads to a disappointment as the story progresses.

[Cristina | Books, less beer & a baby Gaspar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jonathan aycliffe is amazing! If you like ghost stories with black magic trying to return people from the dead this is the book for you. The ending was so-so hence the 4 ⭐️ Nevertheless, I want to read all his ghost stories!! Bloody amazing!

[Natasha · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's something so darn familiar about this book. I think I've read it before, but as to when... I have no idea!

[Christie B · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty good read. Slow in the middle, but the beginning and end were great.

[Daniel Stainback · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful book!!