Wild Fell by Michael Rowe

The crumbling summerhouse called Wild Fell, soaring above the desolate shores of Blackmore Island, has weathered the violence of the seasons for more than a century. Built for his family by a 19th-century politician of impeccable rectitude, the house has kept its terrible secrets and its darkness sealed within its walls. For a hundred years, the townspeople of Alvina have prayed that the darkness inside Wild Fell would stay there, locked away from the light. Jameson Browning, a man well acquainted with suffering, has purchased Wild Fell with the intention of beginning a new life, of letting in the light. But what waits for him at the house is devoted to its darkness and guards it jealously. It has been waiting for Jameson his whole life - or even longer. And now, at long last, it has found him!

So I picked this up because it was billed as a Gothic ghost story...I was very disappointed. The first chapter is pretty good and decently scary. That is where it stops, the book then spends the next 100 or so pages (it's only a 180 page book) detailing the life of Jamie, his lonely childhood and best friend Hank (a girl who wants to be a boy) there is a bunch of normal kid stuff with the added bonus of a semi creepy "imaginary" friend named Amanda who lives in his mirror and a dead turtle.


Amanda is only in about two chapters and while she seems a bit evil and I could tell it was important for later, the author then goes into Jaime growing up, graduating school, getting married, divorced and finally his dad getting Alzheimer's. Jamie has to put his dad in a home, then gets into a horrible accident and gets a butt load of money with which he buys a huge rambling house called Wild Fell. He buys it sight unseen aside from the pictures and even though it's a rambling estate no one has lived in for years, it is in perfect condition;and has "not aged."

Finally we get to the good stuff, the house is awesome, description great, history of the Blackmore family creepy and tragic; incest, death, and old money. There was some magic that seemed out of place for the type of story being told however and a really gross scene where Jamie has an R rated dream about his dad. Then we get to the meat of the whole story (keep in mind at this point we are about ten pages from the end)

The reason this got two stars was because the good stuff was SO brief. less than 1/4 of the novel is about the house and the evil ghost that lives in it. Two of the three twists were totally predictable and stereotyped. Then there was the biggest twist of all, which was just ridiculous and very, "timey wimey" but not in a fun Doctor Who kind of way. &The ending was confusing and rushed and made me just go, "meh, eh and BORED NOW!"

There were also no rules, weird magic, and a all powerful ghost. I kid you not, she could do ANYTHING, control ANYTHING,. This ghost has no Achilles heel, no rules, just an unlimited supply of evil and power with no logical (or even illogical) back story about how she got this power. In the end I was just done with this book.

You want a good ghost story? Don't pick this one.