Lingui5t’s Reviews > The Haunting of Kinnawe House > Status Update

Dude has scars all over his body that start bleeding at random and he's just... cool with it? We learn about a car crash, okay maybe that's the scars but why the bleeding when he experiences paranormal things? Then he finally explains to a doctor, 41% of the way through, that he was STABBED. (?!)

The reader is told about events that happened 'off-screen' WAY too often, and the characters experience emotions about these events WAY too seldom.

'Kellyce nodded and Matthew went to retrieve Kellyce’s tote from the rented Ford Focus, hurrying back inside when he heard gunshots. Kellyce had found the guest bedroom. The door was closed. After tapping on the door and leaving the overnight bag in the corridor, Matthew went into the master bedroom, sat on the bed, and stared at the moonlit ocean. '

WE NEVER HEAR ANYTHING ABOUT THESE GUNSHOTS?!!?!?!

The scratching and scraping came from her shoes dragging the earth as the vine swayed from side to side.

Rose of Sharon looked young and beautiful. This sane version of her had visited him once before, when he was unconscious from his morphine drip. Then, they’d traded fond memories. Feeding the ducks at the pond. Cobbling together a few dollars to buy books at a local bookstore. ...

The vines’ long, sharp thorns left lengthy scratches on his arms as he hacked away at the overgrowth, but he made good progress, and within an hour the vines lay in an entwined mass at his feet.

The scraping began as the sun dipped under the western horizon. He turned and found himself face to face with his mother, who dangled by the neck from the vines wrapped around one of the willow trees. Her eyes were open. ...

This passage is symptomatic:

'

First, though, he wanted to use the remaining daylight to trim the vines that surrounded the back door of Kinnawe House, the door facing the road. He didn’t like those vines. They scratched against the house at night like the fingernails of tiny demons.

(cont'd)

Emotionless characters. No time is spent on reactions or emotional responses. Oh, a strange man just handed me a putty that I absent mindedly rolled into a ball and used as a salve in a wound caused by a phantom snake that may not have been real. On with the story! No need to dwell on it. If the characters aren't afraid then how can I be?!

Picking back up. No real motivations or psychic connections are made, and the characters are a little uni-dimensional. Also, there's no sense of progression, eating the heart out of someone's chest and other such occurrences happen at a steady clip all throughout. Doesn't feel like a story as much like a series of episodic scenes from someone's imagination.