Reviews

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

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tottles's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

Content Warnings

venysnizel's review against another edition

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2.0

I don’t really get the hype about this book. I’d seen the movie, so I went into it with what I thought was relative knowledge of the story. While it was great for its strong characterization of Eleanor, I feel like for a short book, it was a daunting read. I usually knock out 500 page books in a day. This was 182 pages and took me two weeks to get through. The last twenty pages were definitely more fast paced and interesting, but as a whole, I feel like the book built up a lot of anticipation and suspense for something that never really manifested. The ending fell flat for me and just left me feeling kind of robbed.

amelody's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Content Warnings

maiafeliu's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

crystalllite's review against another edition

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4.0

Shirley Jackson: the original master creep. I find Jackson's writing incredibly refreshing having been born to an era where books, movies, and TV are loaded with violence and gore that serves to shock its intended audience sometimes without finesse. The Haunting of Hill House is written delicately and despite the fact that all of the supernatural action fails to produce the usual pile of human grit it achieves its full on creep in the same way that Shelley manages to horrify readers with Frankenstein. It's all in the language and misdirection.