A review by Kate O’Brien
“October, crisp, misty, golden October, when the light is sweet and heavy.” ~ Angela Carter
I am currently relishing in the crisp days of autumn where everything glows a little bit golden and orange. It has been an extremely busy few weeks, but I am excited about sharing some Spooky Season books and movies as we get closer to Halloween.
I am kicking off this year’s Spooky Season themed discussions with my review of Derek Landy’s latest book. The Haunted House on Hollow Hill was published on Sep 26th, 2024. This book follows the podcast of the same name, where listeners could tune into this episodic mystery. Now the world of the Hollow Hotel has been laid out on paper and readers can explore this mystery full of twists and turns …
Skulduggery Pleasant and Valkyrie Cain just wanted to interview Romeo Gideon, but the most haunted house in Britain should have been a clue that things would not go to plan.
On a dark, stormy night, as a deadly killer attacks one by one, Skulduggery and Valkyrie do not have much time to find the killer as they try to survive in this haunted hotel filled with the tortured spirits of the dead.
Before even opening the book, I was so happy to see it had so many things that I love. I am a huge fan of a dark and stormy night. It is such a simple yet effective setting. Instantly the tone is set and as readers, we are slightly on edge.
I love the gothic element of being trapped in a spooky house with no way out and being faced with scary events that protagonists must try to escape. The setting of a home is hugely important in gothic stories because home is such a key theme in so much literature. Finding one’s home is often a huge motivator in narratives. Home is often the safe place, the sanctuary, the place where one feels they belong, so when home is suddenly the danger site, the place we want to run from, that is interesting, and haunted houses are usually really alluring, dynamic settings because they so often intrigue as well as horrify. The image of this intimidating house on the hill, it looks so scary, and yet it almost pulls you inside.
There is a really satisfying, slow-build sensation that manifests itself very well in haunted house settings. The build from feeling that this huge, impressive house is kind of intimidating, to perhaps being awed by the place, yet there is this eerie undercurrent that something seems off, to that fear when you realise something is off, and now you cannot leave, is always really exciting and impactful in my opinion, whether you’re reading a book or watching a movie.
At its heart, this is a murder mystery. If you take away the supernatural elements, this plotline would have worked fantastically well as an episode of Murder, She Wrote, and I think fans of Agatha Christie would enjoy this book even if they were not fans of the Skulduggery Pleasant series. This book stands alone.
Readers who love the Skulduggery and Valkyrie dynamic will be glad to see that this book is filled with their usual banter as Derek Landy once again expertly weaves humour into his plots despite the pair investigating serious crimes.
I think the fact that this story was first introduced on a podcast is quite fascinating, as personally I like seeing how stories expand into different forms of media. There are many different ways to tell a story, and I think having the ability to not only read this story, but to listen to it as well, is great. Listening to a podcast is quite different to reading words written on the page. I haven’t listened to the podcast myself yet, but I imagine it would be lots of fun to hear these characters be brought to life, and based on the setting and the tone, I imagine it would be quite atmospheric, an ideal listen for the month of October if you want to fully embrace Spooky Season.
As the plot evolves and more twists and turns play out, the story does become more complex and because there are lots of characters in the fray, at later parts of the book, I do think that reading the words on the page would make it easier to keep track of everyone than it would be when listening, however that is just a personal thought and one that I have before listening so I could change my mind. I do plan to listen to the podcast too, because I am eager to see if the story feels different when listening after reading.
I really enjoyed this book; it was a fun October read. I am a fan of the world of Skulduggery Pleasant. I think Landy is a fun writer, he always has this knack for making plots feel very big and perhaps a bit wild as there are so many twists and turns, but he will ground it again because a detail that may have felt minor at the time has come up again and you see that Landy laid that foundation much earlier and now it has come full circle. I would describe him as a very visual writer, because reading this book and knowing it is possible to explore this story in the mode of a podcast as well made it really easy to also visualise this story. As I said earlier, I could visualise the Murder, She Wrote episode, and personally I enjoy when books feel cinematic as then it is easier to picture the world that is being built.
If you like ghost stories, if you like murder mysteries, if you are a fan of stories that take place in one setting and there is a time crunch, then this book is one that you need to add to your bookshelf this October. I would recommend The Haunted House on Hollow Hill by Derek Landy to readers aged 13+
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