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Quiet Houses
THE HOUSES ARE QUIET. IT IS THEIR RESIDENTS WHO ARE SCREAMING...
"No-one could be that unhappy and be alive..." A chambermaid's seemingly innocent request is granted, an act of kindness that has dire consequences for the guest at THE ELMS, MORECAMBE. Human despair has a power of its own after death, and it is contagious...
"I wish I had been right; I wish that it had been a man, or death alone, that had found her..." An unearthly light in an abandoned bungalow resolves the mystery of a missing child, but no human force has taken her. An entity that fishes for children is in THE MERRY HOUSE, SCALE HALL. But will it remain there?
"Go beyond the graves, and they will come to you." An invitation to a clifftop graveyard leads to a harrowing chase by burrowing things that remain unseen, their hunger unknown and never satisfied, BEYOND ST PATRICK'S CHAPEL.
"The great delight in being part of the Save Our Shit crew was that sometimes they could persuade those designers of the present and the future to save or incorporate the past into their designs." There is no need in THE OCEAN GRAND, NW COAST, because the original artists created a living work of art for the hotel. Art that celebrates the triumph of the natural world over the man-made. A life force that transcends - and brings death...
"Something white came out. Something white, screaming and screaming..." Homes fit for heroes, they were promised after the Great War. They were given something else in THE TEMPLE OF RELIEF AND EASE.
There is a hidden agenda to paranormal researcher Richard Nakata's investigations into these houses. A commission that witnesses cattle lowing in the cowsheds of STACK'S FARM long after they've been slaughtered, and a reckoning in the showhouse of 24 GLASSHOUSE, as he and his colleagues pay the price for creating their own ghost...
Simon Kurt Unsworth reinvents the classic English ghost story with a portmanteau collection that takes the haunted house genre and makes it scream...quietly. Because the most terrifying screams are the silent ones.
"A major new talent in the horror genre." - Pete Tennant
"No-one could be that unhappy and be alive..." A chambermaid's seemingly innocent request is granted, an act of kindness that has dire consequences for the guest at THE ELMS, MORECAMBE. Human despair has a power of its own after death, and it is contagious...
"I wish I had been right; I wish that it had been a man, or death alone, that had found her..." An unearthly light in an abandoned bungalow resolves the mystery of a missing child, but no human force has taken her. An entity that fishes for children is in THE MERRY HOUSE, SCALE HALL. But will it remain there?
"Go beyond the graves, and they will come to you." An invitation to a clifftop graveyard leads to a harrowing chase by burrowing things that remain unseen, their hunger unknown and never satisfied, BEYOND ST PATRICK'S CHAPEL.
"The great delight in being part of the Save Our Shit crew was that sometimes they could persuade those designers of the present and the future to save or incorporate the past into their designs." There is no need in THE OCEAN GRAND, NW COAST, because the original artists created a living work of art for the hotel. Art that celebrates the triumph of the natural world over the man-made. A life force that transcends - and brings death...
"Something white came out. Something white, screaming and screaming..." Homes fit for heroes, they were promised after the Great War. They were given something else in THE TEMPLE OF RELIEF AND EASE.
There is a hidden agenda to paranormal researcher Richard Nakata's investigations into these houses. A commission that witnesses cattle lowing in the cowsheds of STACK'S FARM long after they've been slaughtered, and a reckoning in the showhouse of 24 GLASSHOUSE, as he and his colleagues pay the price for creating their own ghost...
Simon Kurt Unsworth reinvents the classic English ghost story with a portmanteau collection that takes the haunted house genre and makes it scream...quietly. Because the most terrifying screams are the silent ones.
"A major new talent in the horror genre." - Pete Tennant
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First published September 1, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
January 22, 2012
The portmanteau is a device more commonly associated with the anthologu films of Amicus and television shows such as The Twilight Zone and The Night Gallery but here Simon Kurt Unsworth uses the linking thread of a private investigator's explorations at sites of reported supernatural phenomena. The tone is modern in that the sites are surburban houses, train station lavatories and half-built 'Phase II' houses but the tone is strictly old school as ghosts emerge that echo the dictum of M.R. James that such things should be malevolent and, even when sympathetically cast, they remain so here. As to my favourites from the collection, I would pick 'Beyond St. Patrick's Chapel' as a brilliant short that evokes M.R. James and Aickman in its quietly persistent phantasm that is all the more disturbing for its implicit threat. 'The Elms' also keeps certain causes and reasons for the haunting cautiously hidden which only serves to evoke a great sense of tragedy and sadness as the question 'why?' hangs in the air throughout the narrative. Lastly, I would like to choose 'The Temple of Relief and Ease' as my absolute favourite from the collection as it uses a setting that could have been too prosaic or too comedic - a public toilet - and turns it into a place not of relief and ease but of blackly depressing and suffocating horror. Recommended for those who enjoy seeing the past and the present of the horror genre beautifully conjoined.
October 9, 2024
A novel-in-stories following a paranormal researcher seeking authentic ghost stories. At first, these stories, recounted by those who experienced them, are at the forefront; later, we learn why they have been sought, and the protagonist’s own history of haunting. At its best, Quiet Houses touches on the chill melancholy and unease of Joel Lane’s work, and at other times I was reminded of Nicholas Royle’s lighter and wittier writing in collections like Manchester Uncanny. Unfortunately, I felt the whole concept ran out of steam as it went along, and I struggled to care about the last few chapters; the revelations in them seem to deflate the narrative, making the overarching story less interesting than it’s appeared up to this point. However, I do generally find I prefer connected stories when they remain largely distinct, rather than coalescing into one big blob of plot (see also: The Magnus Archives), so maybe this is just a personal thing.
Also, a very minor issue but a lot of the characters in this have very odd names – are they all references to something? If so, I couldn’t figure out the connecting thread – which I found distracting throughout.
Also, a very minor issue but a lot of the characters in this have very odd names – are they all references to something? If so, I couldn’t figure out the connecting thread – which I found distracting throughout.
April 19, 2013
In the afterword to Quiet Houses, author Simon Kurt Unsworth refers to the book as a two-fold experiment; an attempt to write intertwined stories in order to create a written portmanteau, as well as an attempt to utilize personal and familiar real-life locations as the settings for all the stories. Although some of the places in the stories are fictional, they are heavily based on real places, and the afterword does a great job of breaking down each location, going into their importance to Unsworth and the reasons he chose them. The final product of this experiment, although not perfect, could only be called a success.
Quiet Houses opens with an advertisement: "Do you live in a haunted house? Have you ever been to a place and had an experience that you cannot explain? Do you have a story to tell? Serious researcher wants to hear from you. Must be prepared to go on record. No timewasters. Tel: 01524 500501 ext 23 and leave a message." The book follows paranormal researcher Richard Nakata's investigations into alleged hauntings and is broken up into two different types of chapters: short "in-between" chapters which set the stage for Nakata's imminent investigation, and the larger chapters which detail the incidents themselves. Structurally, this works rather smoothly. The interlude chapters are short enough to set the stage without lingering too long, and work nicely as the cement that holds all the individual stories together.
Which brings us to the stories themselves. Each of these chapters is titled after a place, and although the earlier parts of the book continue with the premise of Nakata gathering stories from others, it isn't long before the chapters are of Nakata himself having experiences instead. Nakata's chapters are, unfortunately, the mixed lot of the bunch. I found that the four larger chapters featuring him were split; the first two (Beyond St. Patrick's Chapel, Heysham Head and The Temple of Relief and Ease) failed to resonate within me like the others in the book, while I found the final two (24 Glasshouse, Glasshouse Estate and Stack's Farm, Trough of Bowland) to be essential and very climactic. The first two chapters follow Nakata as he explores two areas that came to his attention. Although they have their moments, and I would still consider them to be good examples of storytelling, I felt that they were the weaker chapters of the book. The final chapters are the ones that truly tell Nakata's story. 24 Glasshouse explores Nakata's past, detailing a very important part of his life that will shape the Nakata of the present, while Stack's Farm is where all threads of the story culminate in a truly frightening and enlightening manner.
The three other chapters, which are the experiences related to Nakata by others, absolutely shine from a horror perspective, although their delivery varies in style. In the first of these larger chapters, a sad, older man tells Nakata his tale about The Elms Hotel in a cafe. The Elms takes place in the present, as a conversation in the cafe. The reader is able to follow Nakata's growing discomfort as the man's ghost story is told. The chapter is quite chilling, and makes for an excellent opener. The second of these chapters, The Merry House, is presented as a letter, and reads in the first person. This narrative shift, cutting out Nakata completely, makes for a more immersive reading experience. Instead of seeing Nakata's reactions, readers are now reading the letter for themselves, allowed to come to their own conclusions. This is also, without a doubt, the most terrifying story in the book, and goes way beyond being a ghost story. The third of these chapters, The Ocean Grand, is another story about a hotel, although this eschews despair for blood and action. Three men (self-dubbed the "Save Our Shit Crew") spend a few days camped within the long-closed, Art Deco style Ocean Grand Hotel, where they will appraise what art can be saved and restored. The narrative style of this story takes another turn by switching back to third person, however unlike the first chapter Nakata is not present in the telling and the story only focuses on the three men involved. The story itself is great, but this narrative choice is a bit jarring, as it's not clear until the end which character is the narrator introduced in the preceding interlude chapter, where he is not named. I believe this was intentional on Unsworth's part, as readers know going into the story that two of the men don't make it, and by withholding the name of the narrator Unsworth makes sure that the uncertainty and tension continue until the end.
Overall, Unsworth has succeeded in his quest to make a horror portmanteau. The majority of the stories in Quiet Houses stand strong, and the interludes threading them together work exceptionally well. I think I would have liked to see more stories related to Nakata by others, as I thought those were the best. As a whole though, I can't really complain because it came together so beautifully in the end. In the afterword Mr. Unsworth states, "I like Nakata; he'll be back." I can only look towards that day with eager anticipation.
Originally appeared on my blog, The Arkham Digest.
Quiet Houses opens with an advertisement: "Do you live in a haunted house? Have you ever been to a place and had an experience that you cannot explain? Do you have a story to tell? Serious researcher wants to hear from you. Must be prepared to go on record. No timewasters. Tel: 01524 500501 ext 23 and leave a message." The book follows paranormal researcher Richard Nakata's investigations into alleged hauntings and is broken up into two different types of chapters: short "in-between" chapters which set the stage for Nakata's imminent investigation, and the larger chapters which detail the incidents themselves. Structurally, this works rather smoothly. The interlude chapters are short enough to set the stage without lingering too long, and work nicely as the cement that holds all the individual stories together.
Which brings us to the stories themselves. Each of these chapters is titled after a place, and although the earlier parts of the book continue with the premise of Nakata gathering stories from others, it isn't long before the chapters are of Nakata himself having experiences instead. Nakata's chapters are, unfortunately, the mixed lot of the bunch. I found that the four larger chapters featuring him were split; the first two (Beyond St. Patrick's Chapel, Heysham Head and The Temple of Relief and Ease) failed to resonate within me like the others in the book, while I found the final two (24 Glasshouse, Glasshouse Estate and Stack's Farm, Trough of Bowland) to be essential and very climactic. The first two chapters follow Nakata as he explores two areas that came to his attention. Although they have their moments, and I would still consider them to be good examples of storytelling, I felt that they were the weaker chapters of the book. The final chapters are the ones that truly tell Nakata's story. 24 Glasshouse explores Nakata's past, detailing a very important part of his life that will shape the Nakata of the present, while Stack's Farm is where all threads of the story culminate in a truly frightening and enlightening manner.
The three other chapters, which are the experiences related to Nakata by others, absolutely shine from a horror perspective, although their delivery varies in style. In the first of these larger chapters, a sad, older man tells Nakata his tale about The Elms Hotel in a cafe. The Elms takes place in the present, as a conversation in the cafe. The reader is able to follow Nakata's growing discomfort as the man's ghost story is told. The chapter is quite chilling, and makes for an excellent opener. The second of these chapters, The Merry House, is presented as a letter, and reads in the first person. This narrative shift, cutting out Nakata completely, makes for a more immersive reading experience. Instead of seeing Nakata's reactions, readers are now reading the letter for themselves, allowed to come to their own conclusions. This is also, without a doubt, the most terrifying story in the book, and goes way beyond being a ghost story. The third of these chapters, The Ocean Grand, is another story about a hotel, although this eschews despair for blood and action. Three men (self-dubbed the "Save Our Shit Crew") spend a few days camped within the long-closed, Art Deco style Ocean Grand Hotel, where they will appraise what art can be saved and restored. The narrative style of this story takes another turn by switching back to third person, however unlike the first chapter Nakata is not present in the telling and the story only focuses on the three men involved. The story itself is great, but this narrative choice is a bit jarring, as it's not clear until the end which character is the narrator introduced in the preceding interlude chapter, where he is not named. I believe this was intentional on Unsworth's part, as readers know going into the story that two of the men don't make it, and by withholding the name of the narrator Unsworth makes sure that the uncertainty and tension continue until the end.
Overall, Unsworth has succeeded in his quest to make a horror portmanteau. The majority of the stories in Quiet Houses stand strong, and the interludes threading them together work exceptionally well. I think I would have liked to see more stories related to Nakata by others, as I thought those were the best. As a whole though, I can't really complain because it came together so beautifully in the end. In the afterword Mr. Unsworth states, "I like Nakata; he'll be back." I can only look towards that day with eager anticipation.
Originally appeared on my blog, The Arkham Digest.
January 5, 2023
"Haunted House" stories, as a sub-genre of ghost/horror stories had appeared to have died a while ago, with the advent of all-pervasive electronics and the media boom. But it seems that the stories were just sleeping like the great Cthulhu, waiting for the right time and pattern of stars (in other words, for an author who would be skilful enough to resurrect the genre in his own unique way).
Now the time has come to read them again, in this very-very superior book unleashed by Simon Kurt Unsworth.
The stories (I am omitting the creepy & intriguing interludes from my discussion) are concerned with the following places, that are real enough to make you properly uneasy, and fictional enough to enable the author to insert enough scary elements therein:
1. The Elms, Morecambe
2. The Merry House, Scale Hall
3. Beyond St Patrick’s Chapel, Heysham Head
4. The Ocean Grand, North West Coast
5. The Temple of Relief and Ease
6. 24 Glasshouse, Glasshouse Estate
7. Stack’s Farm, Trough of Bowland.
I SHALL not try to provide gist-shaped descriptions of the incidents, or try to describe the protagonist ghost-finder Richard Nakata and his motives. Read this book, refresh your memories about the places that have made you uneasy with their presence and uncomfortable memories even in the drabbest of surroundings.
And be afraid of quiet houses.
Highly recommended.
Now the time has come to read them again, in this very-very superior book unleashed by Simon Kurt Unsworth.
The stories (I am omitting the creepy & intriguing interludes from my discussion) are concerned with the following places, that are real enough to make you properly uneasy, and fictional enough to enable the author to insert enough scary elements therein:
1. The Elms, Morecambe
2. The Merry House, Scale Hall
3. Beyond St Patrick’s Chapel, Heysham Head
4. The Ocean Grand, North West Coast
5. The Temple of Relief and Ease
6. 24 Glasshouse, Glasshouse Estate
7. Stack’s Farm, Trough of Bowland.
I SHALL not try to provide gist-shaped descriptions of the incidents, or try to describe the protagonist ghost-finder Richard Nakata and his motives. Read this book, refresh your memories about the places that have made you uneasy with their presence and uncomfortable memories even in the drabbest of surroundings.
And be afraid of quiet houses.
Highly recommended.
October 25, 2019
Really engrossing and innovative and creepy ghost stories. I also like how the author strings together the various short stories with the larger meta plot
February 1, 2013
(Note to self: have the Kobo edition, not the paperback or Kindle. Need to create a new record for that at some point.)
A collection of related stories about a parapsychologist collecting ghost stories and looking into various haunted houses, and I really need to write a better summary because that doesn't even begin to cover this book's quality.
In much the same way that Sarah Monette's stories of Kyle Murchison Booth makes me think of M R James, I found this collection made me think of Ambrose Bierce. There's a weariness to Nakata and a sense of a rather casually cruel world in the stories (and on top of that the Heysham Head story (which I think is my favourite) reminded me of "The Damned Thing" on what I guess is a fairly superficial level).
The protagonist seems to pretty clearly go with "The Stone Tape" theory of ghosts (and it's even referred to that way at one point), but the stories definitely aren't constrained by it; the haunts are ghosts, or art, or the monstrous, or the rather horrifying unknown.
It's not a perfect collection; the Glasshouse Estate story left me a little cold. But it's well-written, restrained, spooky, paints lovely and evocative pictures of events, and is so very much worth the time to read.
A collection of related stories about a parapsychologist collecting ghost stories and looking into various haunted houses, and I really need to write a better summary because that doesn't even begin to cover this book's quality.
In much the same way that Sarah Monette's stories of Kyle Murchison Booth makes me think of M R James, I found this collection made me think of Ambrose Bierce. There's a weariness to Nakata and a sense of a rather casually cruel world in the stories (and on top of that the Heysham Head story (which I think is my favourite) reminded me of "The Damned Thing" on what I guess is a fairly superficial level).
The protagonist seems to pretty clearly go with "The Stone Tape" theory of ghosts (and it's even referred to that way at one point), but the stories definitely aren't constrained by it; the haunts are ghosts, or art, or the monstrous, or the rather horrifying unknown.
It's not a perfect collection; the Glasshouse Estate story left me a little cold. But it's well-written, restrained, spooky, paints lovely and evocative pictures of events, and is so very much worth the time to read.
March 24, 2013
Quiet Houses is proof positive that the small presses are really the place to go for unique and powerful talent. Unsworth, an admitted admirer of the "portmanteau", a collection of stories connected by a frame story, treats the reader to a real smorgasbord of the paranormal. Virtually every kind of story is represented, from the more traditional type of haunted tale, such as the one in which a ghostly chambermaid provides hotel guests with service that extends far beyond their stay, to a more modern, ethically ambiguous treatment,involving the narrator and a group of other graduate students who dare to "create" their own haunting, with devestating results. Each story was different and uniquely frightening, which is a big accomplishment for any anthology, but the real revelation of this collection is that we quibble about what it is to be truly haunted... after reading these wonderfully imaginative tales, I am convinced that anyone who has experienced loss, pain, or grief, has indeed been haunted.
Highly recommended for the fans of this genre and all who hope to become fans.
Highly recommended for the fans of this genre and all who hope to become fans.
November 21, 2021
What a neat horror anthology! Quiet Houses is a collection on short stories, almost small vignettes, of supernatural goings on and hauntings. The spine tying all the stories together is Richard Nakata, a supernatural researcher, who is compiling stories and experiences of the supernatural for initially unclear purposes. What follows is Nakata either having supernatural experiences related to him by others, or experiencing them himself.
Simon Kurt Unsworth says in the book's epilogue that the book was a two-fold experiment; on one hand trying to write a bunch of small, related stories, and on the other, setting these stories in places that are familiar to him. Both experiments succeed wonderfully. The places feel real and grounded, because Unsworth is able to inject small details that give them texture. The horror anthology format was also a very good choice, because none of the stories linger too long. There's no filler, just small moments of unsettling or spooky things happening to people.
One of the best horror books I've read in recent years.
Simon Kurt Unsworth says in the book's epilogue that the book was a two-fold experiment; on one hand trying to write a bunch of small, related stories, and on the other, setting these stories in places that are familiar to him. Both experiments succeed wonderfully. The places feel real and grounded, because Unsworth is able to inject small details that give them texture. The horror anthology format was also a very good choice, because none of the stories linger too long. There's no filler, just small moments of unsettling or spooky things happening to people.
One of the best horror books I've read in recent years.
October 10, 2024
"As to it being an 'unquiet house,' that's also not true. My research clearly indicates that the places where these feelings occur, where people experience these things, are quiet houses, places where the din of the world recedes and allows other things to be heard. This isn't about ghosts or ghouls or demons any more than it's about telepathy or psychokinesis or psychosis; it's about places. There are places that hold feelings, hold memories, hold sights and sounds, in ways we don't understand, that can be read in certain circumstances by certain people."
Our protagonist, Mr. Richard Nakata, delivers this lecture near the very end of the book, after the reader has already encountered, by my rough count, eight ghosts, a cosmic horror, and two paranormal constructs (for lack of a better thing to call them). In the next chapter, there will be another several ghosts. Several of these things will have rather direct corporal effects on the world. And that's about the level of care in story telling you will get both from Mr. Nakata and from the author. This was fairly fun in places. If I weren't slightly annoyed about the portmanteau thing (it's just a collection of interconnected stories) and the bizarre similies, and the weird decisions to sexulize random monsters, and the fridgings, and the... OK you see how I ended up at the the two stars, yes? I'm going to avoid any further pursuit of Mr. Nakata and go back to wishing Sarah Monette would write more Kyle Murchison Booth.
January 8, 2014
I've never been around the area that Unsworth uses as his settings but this was a great book nonetheless, very atmospheric and at times unpleasant. It's written with a very fluid anthology framework and would make an excellent film. Certain parts like the Heysham Head section are just crying out to be filmed. At moments it reminded me of the BBC series Sea of Souls, due to similar subject matter (the last two stories, 24 Glasshouse and Stack's Farm in particular), though Unsworth's writing style is more direct and in places less subtle.
I had a few minor issues with it, in particular there were quite a lot of typos and wrong but similar sounding words used which tended to break the flow. I am in no way a master of grammar and spelling but if I noticed all these mistakes (probably about 20 overall without properly counting) it makes me wonder why any proof-reader, editor, or beta reader wouldn't.
I had a few minor issues with it, in particular there were quite a lot of typos and wrong but similar sounding words used which tended to break the flow. I am in no way a master of grammar and spelling but if I noticed all these mistakes (probably about 20 overall without properly counting) it makes me wonder why any proof-reader, editor, or beta reader wouldn't.
January 16, 2015
"Do you live in a haunted house?....do you have a story to tell?"
What a wonderful book! The stories blend together so well by Richard Nakata, the researcher. I enjoyed how he visits different places, each with its own unique mood and setting. Fantastic atmosphere, especially in Beyond St. Patrick's Chapel. The church, the cemetery.....the grassy fields beyond. I used to think of this very same thing when I was a kid....it was almost as if Unsworth put my imagination to paper. Brilliant!
What a wonderful book! The stories blend together so well by Richard Nakata, the researcher. I enjoyed how he visits different places, each with its own unique mood and setting. Fantastic atmosphere, especially in Beyond St. Patrick's Chapel. The church, the cemetery.....the grassy fields beyond. I used to think of this very same thing when I was a kid....it was almost as if Unsworth put my imagination to paper. Brilliant!
July 20, 2012
Exceptional portmanteau work of supernatural incidents investigated by an objective researcher. Unsworth gives the screaming victims short shrift and focuses on the horror of the ghosts themselves. Well worth the read if you are a bit bored with the standards of supernatural reads.
June 15, 2013
An enjoyable read with a connection between the stories and the narrator Nakata. I am not the greatest reader of short stories but these were of interest to me due to the UK locations and the fact that the stories were based on actual buildings.
August 16, 2023
So, uh, this book.
I’ve read some stuff by Unsworth before. Stuff I liked. It’s hard to remember that now! Quiet Houses sounded good: a novel of connected short stories about haunted houses, each story framed by a ghost hunter-scientist charged with proving ghosts and the afterlife are real, speaking to witnesses and collecting data. He’s been hired by a defense lawyer because proving ghosts are real will somehow help his client’s case.
Gee, it sounds stupid when I write it up.
The first immediate problem is our hero, who clearly has a Very Serious ghost story of his own to tell. He is completely lifeless. If you never really understood what a cipher was, look no further. Unsworth never makes his protagonist come alive. He’s a Japanese(-British?) guy. The end.
All of the haunted house stories are very, very dryly told. Even when explicit stuff happens, you don’t care. While I get that these “investigations” are meant to be scientific and objective they’re a complete bore to read. Worse, when at last the protagonist is called upon to reveal his own subtly hyped up ghostly experience it’s a complete joke. As a PHD student he was involved in creating “ghosts.” Something similar to the ideas found in Nigel Kneale’s The Stone Tape (never really saw what the fuss over that was, personally.)
The novel tries very hard to be Super Cereal, You Guys; yet we’re to believe that two PHD students were allowed to bring a man dying of cancer into their experiment house in the hopes that he would leave a ghostly impression. Anyway, the punch line is that they ended up creating a racist ghost. (Because the cancer guy was racist, and the protagonist was Japanese: or at least his surname is.) And some nonsense about the power of love. I’m not kidding.
Somehow in this very serious scientific novel our Marty Sue manages to convince a judge to let him take a jury out to a haunted house. Stupidity compounded on stupidity, that’s what this book is!
So dumb. I don’t know what Unsworth was thinking. The premise is not untenable, and some of the stories, provided they were injected with some spirit, could be okay. Overall, Quiet Houses is far, far less than the sum of its parts.
This book took me half a year to read. Half a year of putting it down and picking it up, over and over. Until, finally, finally, I finished it. And in this exact same time frame I had the exact same experience with Episode 13, another novel about scientific ghost hunting. I’m not a killjoy but I am one of those unimaginative types who get no thrill from watching tv shows where ghost hunters react hysterically to scientific instruments in the dark. Why I thought not one but two books doing the very same thing sounded good, I no longer recall.
I’ve read some stuff by Unsworth before. Stuff I liked. It’s hard to remember that now! Quiet Houses sounded good: a novel of connected short stories about haunted houses, each story framed by a ghost hunter-scientist charged with proving ghosts and the afterlife are real, speaking to witnesses and collecting data. He’s been hired by a defense lawyer because proving ghosts are real will somehow help his client’s case.
Gee, it sounds stupid when I write it up.
The first immediate problem is our hero, who clearly has a Very Serious ghost story of his own to tell. He is completely lifeless. If you never really understood what a cipher was, look no further. Unsworth never makes his protagonist come alive. He’s a Japanese(-British?) guy. The end.
All of the haunted house stories are very, very dryly told. Even when explicit stuff happens, you don’t care. While I get that these “investigations” are meant to be scientific and objective they’re a complete bore to read. Worse, when at last the protagonist is called upon to reveal his own subtly hyped up ghostly experience it’s a complete joke. As a PHD student he was involved in creating “ghosts.” Something similar to the ideas found in Nigel Kneale’s The Stone Tape (never really saw what the fuss over that was, personally.)
The novel tries very hard to be Super Cereal, You Guys; yet we’re to believe that two PHD students were allowed to bring a man dying of cancer into their experiment house in the hopes that he would leave a ghostly impression. Anyway, the punch line is that they ended up creating a racist ghost. (Because the cancer guy was racist, and the protagonist was Japanese: or at least his surname is.) And some nonsense about the power of love. I’m not kidding.
Somehow in this very serious scientific novel our Marty Sue manages to convince a judge to let him take a jury out to a haunted house. Stupidity compounded on stupidity, that’s what this book is!
So dumb. I don’t know what Unsworth was thinking. The premise is not untenable, and some of the stories, provided they were injected with some spirit, could be okay. Overall, Quiet Houses is far, far less than the sum of its parts.
This book took me half a year to read. Half a year of putting it down and picking it up, over and over. Until, finally, finally, I finished it. And in this exact same time frame I had the exact same experience with Episode 13, another novel about scientific ghost hunting. I’m not a killjoy but I am one of those unimaginative types who get no thrill from watching tv shows where ghost hunters react hysterically to scientific instruments in the dark. Why I thought not one but two books doing the very same thing sounded good, I no longer recall.
November 13, 2016
A collection of objectively decent short stories about haunted houses, framed within a larger narrative that never quite gels. The stories, in order:
--"The Elms, Morecambe": a haunting image in search of an actual story, with plot and characters.
--"The Merry House, Scale Hall": slow-moving 70s Dr. Who-style story with bonus child torture and death, in case those are a concern.
--"Beyond St. Patrick's Chapel, Heysham Head": By far the weakest story of the lot. Okay parapsychologist, you're afraid of grass. Cool.
--"The Ocean Grand, North West Coast": My favorite of the collection, this is basically a love story to an old Art Deco hotel with ghosts. Very cleverly done, but needed a longer build up of tension to get a good frighten on.
--"The Temple of Relief and Ease": My other favorite in the book, this had the technical accomplishment in its writing, the details and well-written description of place and space that a lot of the other stories lacked. In addition, you really wind up sympathizing with the ghost as a character, and that happens exactly nowhere else in the book.
--"24 Glasshouse, Glasshouse Estate": A unique idea for a story, but, supposing that the incident described is supposed to be the main tragedy for the book's protagonist, the execution is flat and cold and, at its climax, ridiculous.
--"Slack's Farm, Trough of Bowland": Okay that was spooky and scary and disturbing.
I think my biggest problem overall is Unsworth's difficulty describing the interiors of rooms and exteriors of houses. That sounds small, but the book's ostensibly all about haunted houses, and each story is supposed to center around one particular house, so not being able to describe those houses well takes a lot of wind out of the sails.
The other problem is that the book is peopled entirely by men. Every character interacting in a story is male; the only women who appear are dead, or the protagonist can't be bothered to remember their names, symptomatic of the author's lack of interest in including them as subjects in the stories. In "Glasshouse", the one female character with more than one line of dialogue winds up with about seven lines (she is still dead), but mostly she exists to react to the protagonist and antagonist. I feel like there's no way you do this accidentally, as an author, and that's appalling.
Overall, some wonderfully big ideas in here, mostly ruined in the execution.
--"The Elms, Morecambe": a haunting image in search of an actual story, with plot and characters.
--"The Merry House, Scale Hall": slow-moving 70s Dr. Who-style story with bonus child torture and death, in case those are a concern.
--"Beyond St. Patrick's Chapel, Heysham Head": By far the weakest story of the lot. Okay parapsychologist, you're afraid of grass. Cool.
--"The Ocean Grand, North West Coast": My favorite of the collection, this is basically a love story to an old Art Deco hotel with ghosts. Very cleverly done, but needed a longer build up of tension to get a good frighten on.
--"The Temple of Relief and Ease": My other favorite in the book, this had the technical accomplishment in its writing, the details and well-written description of place and space that a lot of the other stories lacked. In addition, you really wind up sympathizing with the ghost as a character, and that happens exactly nowhere else in the book.
--"24 Glasshouse, Glasshouse Estate": A unique idea for a story, but, supposing that the incident described is supposed to be the main tragedy for the book's protagonist, the execution is flat and cold and, at its climax, ridiculous.
--"Slack's Farm, Trough of Bowland": Okay that was spooky and scary and disturbing.
I think my biggest problem overall is Unsworth's difficulty describing the interiors of rooms and exteriors of houses. That sounds small, but the book's ostensibly all about haunted houses, and each story is supposed to center around one particular house, so not being able to describe those houses well takes a lot of wind out of the sails.
The other problem is that the book is peopled entirely by men. Every character interacting in a story is male; the only women who appear are dead, or the protagonist can't be bothered to remember their names, symptomatic of the author's lack of interest in including them as subjects in the stories. In "Glasshouse", the one female character with more than one line of dialogue winds up with about seven lines (she is still dead), but mostly she exists to react to the protagonist and antagonist. I feel like there's no way you do this accidentally, as an author, and that's appalling.
Overall, some wonderfully big ideas in here, mostly ruined in the execution.
August 20, 2024
This is a collection of ghost stories, loosely connected by a framing investigator. All the stories are set in real places, or very close approximations thereof, and there's an awful, terrifying sort of melancholy about them. They're good short stories, they are, but when I think of this collection - and I started reading it a couple of years back and never quite finished, for reasons which are about to be apparent - there's one story in particular that I think of. The others, as I said, are good, but "Beyond St. Patrick's Chapel"...?
That story gives me the creeps. It really does. A couple of years back, and I was reading this book one night, and came across this story and noped out of it. Well, not exactly. I finished the story, shut the book with thoughts of possibly never sleeping again, and never picked it back up. Well I've read and re-read it all now, and that "Chapel" story is still horrific. It's not even about a chapel. A guy walks past the chapel, onto the nearby headland, and this invisible pack of something starts to silently track him through the grass. That's it. It's not complicated. It's not high concept. It's just plain terrifying.
What a fantastic story.
That story gives me the creeps. It really does. A couple of years back, and I was reading this book one night, and came across this story and noped out of it. Well, not exactly. I finished the story, shut the book with thoughts of possibly never sleeping again, and never picked it back up. Well I've read and re-read it all now, and that "Chapel" story is still horrific. It's not even about a chapel. A guy walks past the chapel, onto the nearby headland, and this invisible pack of something starts to silently track him through the grass. That's it. It's not complicated. It's not high concept. It's just plain terrifying.
What a fantastic story.
January 2, 2023
It was a twitter recommendation that sent me toward Mr Unsworth work, and now I’ve managed to read it I can confirm that it is as sensational as promised.
While this is a series of short ghost stories, it is linked together in an overall narrative that reminded me of the stage play Ghost Stories with Andy Nyman. An investigator looking into different tales of the paranormal, and with both sad and terrifying consequences within. While the final tale, Stack’s Farm, is a fitting crescendo, it was The Merry House that stood out for me.
This book has done what signifies a phenomenal read in my eyes: it has made me jealous of the stories told, and hungry to read more. Highly recommended.
While this is a series of short ghost stories, it is linked together in an overall narrative that reminded me of the stage play Ghost Stories with Andy Nyman. An investigator looking into different tales of the paranormal, and with both sad and terrifying consequences within. While the final tale, Stack’s Farm, is a fitting crescendo, it was The Merry House that stood out for me.
This book has done what signifies a phenomenal read in my eyes: it has made me jealous of the stories told, and hungry to read more. Highly recommended.
February 27, 2022
3.5
I really loved several of the stories and thought I'd found a new favorite until I got to Nakata's personal story. It had an interesting premise and like most of the other ones could have been expanded into a full book but several parts of it didn't work for me personally. Then the final reveal on why Nakata was collecting the stories came with little set up and left me feeling unsatisfied.
Despite those issues I am interested in checking out more by Unsworth in the future.
I really loved several of the stories and thought I'd found a new favorite until I got to Nakata's personal story. It had an interesting premise and like most of the other ones could have been expanded into a full book but several parts of it didn't work for me personally. Then the final reveal on why Nakata was collecting the stories came with little set up and left me feeling unsatisfied.
Despite those issues I am interested in checking out more by Unsworth in the future.
February 24, 2024
It was alright, not bad, but not my favorite. Short stories with a connecting over-story with a disappointing ending. The very last story was my favorite, but it left me wanting more. Got tedious in some places so it took me forever to read despite it being a small book, definitely not a page turner.
July 27, 2024
Good book overall. Some chapters gripped me and left me wanting to know more about the world, and others felt like they were a slog to get through. without spoiling much, I found this book to be incredibly enjoyable, and each story explores a different way to get the horror out of the idea, "What if the absences of humans in a location cause hauntings?"
February 11, 2018
As in his previous two collections, Lost Places and Strange Gateways, Unsworth's sense of the unease that can inhabit places is impeccable, making you question what lurks behind the veneer of "ordinary" we like to console ourselves with.
June 19, 2019
I absolutely devoured this book! The portmanteau aspect was amazing, and flawlessly executed. A super fun read, but it feels a little like it leaves you hanging, as if it cut off in the middle of the ending.
January 16, 2021
This book is a quiet house or safe house. But the reader inside it screams.
The detailed review of this book posted elsewhere under my name is too long or impractical to post here.
Above is one of its observations at the time of the review.
The detailed review of this book posted elsewhere under my name is too long or impractical to post here.
Above is one of its observations at the time of the review.
December 27, 2023
A fantastic collection of terrifying short ghost stories bundled together into a coherent, interconnected plot.
Dr. Nakata is an interesting character, and I love his scientific approach to ghost finding. I will be reading more from Simon I don't doubt it.
Dr. Nakata is an interesting character, and I love his scientific approach to ghost finding. I will be reading more from Simon I don't doubt it.
March 17, 2025
DNF. I just couldn't get into this one. I read four or five of the stories, I think, but I gave up in the one about the team camping in and documenting the contents of the hotel. It wasn't for me, unfortunately.
January 9, 2020
I enjoyed this! A collection of short stories, playing with the idea of ghosts forming in the spaces we live in and leave, and those ghosts not necessarily being actual people.
January 17, 2023
Quiet Houses is lovely, and lonely, and haunting, and I absolutely love it. The stories it tells are legitimately depressing without ever being self-pitying or fatalistic. The pacing and prose are excellent and I couldn't put it down once I'd picked it up. An absolute must read. 10/10 for me.
June 6, 2012
The framed anthology, or portmanteau, is a difficult device to pull off. I know I'm writing one myself. But as fans of Amicus films will tell you, when it's done right it lives with for a long time.
I think Quiet Houses is more Asylum than Tales That Witness Madness. The stories are connected seamlessly and each feels like it has earned it's place inside the overall arc of the book. I'd even go so far as to say it's closer to the Ealing classic Dead of Night in that respect. Also for the fact it's not really horror, but good old fashioned ghost stories told in a very modern way.
It's easy to see that Simon Kurt Unsworth not only has a great love for the genre, but also for the locations he chooses in these stories. Each setting also becomes a character in every story. It's when comfortably placed in these locations that the author turns the uncomfortable dial to ten and makes us look for the nearest taxi rank. Though knowing Simon Kurt Unsworth the cab would probably be driven by a spectre who would drive us to a very dark place inhabited by memories of death.
My favourite segment is 'The Elms, Morecambe'. Followed closely by '24 Glass House' and 'Stacks Farm'. Though saying that I can't really decide between any that easily.
If you like ghost stories written in an intelligent and beautiful manner. Or if have a love of portmanteau films and like a good scare, then you needn't look further than Quiet Houses by Simon Kurt Unsworth.
I think Quiet Houses is more Asylum than Tales That Witness Madness. The stories are connected seamlessly and each feels like it has earned it's place inside the overall arc of the book. I'd even go so far as to say it's closer to the Ealing classic Dead of Night in that respect. Also for the fact it's not really horror, but good old fashioned ghost stories told in a very modern way.
It's easy to see that Simon Kurt Unsworth not only has a great love for the genre, but also for the locations he chooses in these stories. Each setting also becomes a character in every story. It's when comfortably placed in these locations that the author turns the uncomfortable dial to ten and makes us look for the nearest taxi rank. Though knowing Simon Kurt Unsworth the cab would probably be driven by a spectre who would drive us to a very dark place inhabited by memories of death.
My favourite segment is 'The Elms, Morecambe'. Followed closely by '24 Glass House' and 'Stacks Farm'. Though saying that I can't really decide between any that easily.
If you like ghost stories written in an intelligent and beautiful manner. Or if have a love of portmanteau films and like a good scare, then you needn't look further than Quiet Houses by Simon Kurt Unsworth.
August 19, 2013
I recently read Hauntings, an anthology of ghost stories, and I thought Unsworth's story about the Pennine Tower Restaurant was by far the standout tale. I'd never heard of Unsworth, so went scurrying off to find more of his work. I was delighted to find that Quiet Houses was very much in the same vein as the story I'd read -- spooky happenings in very real-feeling locations, all tied together in this case by a supernatural detective character. Although the set-up might seem constraining, the stories in Quiet Houses offer a nice variety, from a ghost that inflicts people with the emotion of pure misery to an experiment that induces a series of hauntings in a brand-new model home. Many of the stories are very effectively creepy although some are stronger than others (the haunted lavatory didn't impress me), and Nakata the detective is an appealing character, much less silly than his forebears like Carnacki.
The book ends with a delightful author's note identifying the real-world locations that inspired the story settings. There's also a note that we can expect more Nakata stories -- I certainly hope so!
The book ends with a delightful author's note identifying the real-world locations that inspired the story settings. There's also a note that we can expect more Nakata stories -- I certainly hope so!
April 9, 2024
I first read Quiet Houses about 6 years ago and thought then it was very special. I've had excuse to re-read it this past week in a newly published edition and my estimation of it is reinforced. I think it's the best set of ghost stories I've ever read. It's a portmanteau, a collection of stories bridged together by connective prose, giving the effect of a novel. Whatever it is, it's brilliant...terrifying and heartbreaking in equal measures. For lovers of ghost stories or supernatural horror, or of beautiful, affecting prose and storytelling, it's necessary reading.
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