The Good House

De: Tananarive Due

Narrado por: Robin Miles

Tananarive Due, author of The Living Blood won the American Book Award and is praised as Stephen King's equal by Publishers Weekly. In The Good House, Due sets a story of ancient powers and modern retribution in a small Pacific Northwest town. When a young woman returns to her grandmother's empty mansion, she is pitted against demonic forces that have poisoned her family for generations.©2003 Tananarive Due (P)2004 Recorded Books, LLC

Reseñas de la Crítica

"Due handles the potentially unwieldy elements of her novel with confidence, cross-cutting smoothly from past to present, introducing revelatory facts that alter the interpretation of earlier scenes and interjecting powerfully orchestrated moments of supernatural horror that sustain the tale's momentum....[Due is] a writer who grows better with each book." (Publishers Weekly)

An absolutely compelling horror story

The first thing you need to know is that I don't read horror. I don't read anything really dark. I just don't.

Except sometimes I do. Usually because someone said, oh, this is good, and I didn't ask enough questions. A bunch of people said this was good.

They were right.

It's very, very good.

It's also every bit as dark as you'd expect from something entitled The Good House, and maybe a bit darker than that. Lots of really bad stuff happens. And I kept listening to the audiobook, all the way to the end, because it was worth it.

Angela Toussaint Hill has returned, with her son Corey, to the Good House, the house she inherited from her grandmother, Marie Toussaint, for their annual summer visit, in the Pacific Northwest town of Sacajawea. Her ex-husband, Corey's father, shows up unexpectedly, but things are going better than she expected, as they head into the Fourth of July and the party Angie is throwing.

The party starts well. It doesn't end well.

Marie Toussaint was a vodou priestess, and in the 1920s, she saved a girl from demonic possession and, in the process, angered the powers. Her family is cursed, and with Marie gone, her family is unprotected--unless Angie can figure out how to fix things.

Angie isn't even aware of the problem.

The story alternates between the summer 2001 events surrounding the Fourth of July party, Corey's unguided curiosity, and the uncertain relationship between Angela and her ex, Tariq, and culminating in tragedy, and the events of 2003, when Angie returns to Sacajawea, hoping to make some decisions about the house, and deal with her grief.

The characters are absolutely compelling. The story is twisty, dark, and creepy, and Angie has a lot of issues to work through, not just the vodou curse on her family that has cost her everything important in her life. Due builds her story, the family, and the town with detail and atmosphere, and simply made it impossible for me to stop reading.

Important note for some readers (including me): The dog does not die. For some of us, this really is a critical point.

Highly recommended.

I bought this audiobook.

The Good House

Any additional comments?

The Good House is in the vein of Stephen King, Dean Koontz, i.e., you must enjoy horror, the hide-behind-the-couch-scary stuff.

The story centers on demonic possession, voodoo, magic spells, and death of the innocent and bad guys alike. A spooky Good House on a hill and an ancient curse, will grip the reader. Anticipation will satisfy the ghoulish heart in you!

The story could have been shorter by a few chapters, in my opinion. The author is extremely adept at stretching out the story, creating new scenes of terror. All fit into the plot, but ultimately some didn’t really add much to the tale. Credibility is an issue for me with the behavior of Cory; he’s a teenager with the volatile hormones of a young man, but follows through with behavior that’s a bit too responsible for even an adult in the same position.

The books I’ve listened to in this genre usually have me rolling my eyes, but Tananarive Due does a great job. Narration is very well done by Robin Miles. At over twenty-one hours, The Good House is a long audiobook, but if you like the genre, it’s probably just about right!

I could not put it down!

This was such a great book! I could not put it down. I was on the edge of my seat wondering was was going to happen next! Ms. Due is a gifted writer, and I will look forward to reading more of her books. A great imagination is one of the essential talents of a great storyteller. Ms. Due is a talent!

Superb

I was extremely pleased with this selection. Interesting, riveting and very well written. I cannot wait for something new from this author.

Great book!!

What did you love best about The Good House?

What did I like best . . . well, the setting, I liked that it was set in the Pacific Northwest. I liked the realistic characters and their relationships. I liked the magic that was integral to the plot but not the WHOLE plot. I liked just about everything about this book.

What other book might you compare The Good House to and why?

This book reminded me a little of The Shining, in that the PLACE itself felt haunted, like the hotel in The Shining was, but it also reminded me of the movie Poltergeist, in that not EVERYTHING haunting the house and the land, the people, was evil.

Which character – as performed by Robin Miles – was your favorite?

I enjoyed the young adults the most. The adolescent boys seemed especially realistic to me. I also like the - well, i just liked them all, and I thought the narrator did a great job reading them.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I found this book to be exhilarating in its descriptions, heart poundingly real. I didn't feel like The Good House was blatant in your face Horror like other books in the horror genre, but it was definitely spine tingling and suspenseful, and I couldn't stop listening. I was on the edge of my seat.

Any additional comments?

This book was slower to start than I expected. I was thinking there was going to be more jump out and scare you type action from the very beginning, but it was a slower build than that. I appreciated the slow build in that I got a firm grasp of the characters and their families just in time for everything to start coming undone. The slow build up lead to more impact for me. A great story, a great performance, a great book.