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A review by brennanlafaro
The Siren and the Specter by Jonathan Janz
5.0
Not very long ago, I asked Horror Twitter to help me expand my collection of haunted house stories. I got such great responses and added an unreasonable number of titles to my wishlist. One of the titles that kept coming up from all kinds of different people was The Siren and the Specter by Jonathan Janz, so I put it right at the top of my list. My friends, this is the haunted house book I've been looking for.
The first third or so reads as more gothic horror, creating an atmosphere of both dread and doubt combined with tragedy and accompanying drama. In other words, the book sets the stage for us with a little bit of everything, but leaves us unsure of where we are going.
Twists aside, I assumed we might be in for more of a character study with hints of the supernatural. As it stands, we do get to know David Caine well, and even though Janz writes him as almost a Robert Langdon-type, we get to decide whether he is the hero of our story. We get to decide if he does indeed find, or earn, redemption.
The third act of the story throws everything, including the kitchen sink, at the reader. I could imagine some people being turned off by the step away from subtlety, but I loved every page of it. These pages are gruesome, extreme, vile, and genuinely terrifying. The goings-on at the Alexander house, to me, are right up there with Hill House, and even though Judson Alexander, the antagonist, really only gets a proper introduction halfway through the story, he is a scary dude. Alexander manifests in such a way that people who don't lose sleep over a traditional ghost story are going to wind up with a case of the creeps.
Besides conjuring some pretty unwholesome imagery, this story consistently manages to tug on the heartstrings and direct our sympathy toward a number of characters. It's easy to see how Janz took situations that could have gone the way of the soap opera, and managed to craft them to perfection.
This is my first foray in the land of Janz, but you can sure as hell bet, it won't be the last. If you're a sucker for ghost stories, haunted house, or just well-written human interaction, make time for this book in your life.
The first third or so reads as more gothic horror, creating an atmosphere of both dread and doubt combined with tragedy and accompanying drama. In other words, the book sets the stage for us with a little bit of everything, but leaves us unsure of where we are going.
Twists aside, I assumed we might be in for more of a character study with hints of the supernatural. As it stands, we do get to know David Caine well, and even though Janz writes him as almost a Robert Langdon-type, we get to decide whether he is the hero of our story. We get to decide if he does indeed find, or earn, redemption.
The third act of the story throws everything, including the kitchen sink, at the reader. I could imagine some people being turned off by the step away from subtlety, but I loved every page of it. These pages are gruesome, extreme, vile, and genuinely terrifying. The goings-on at the Alexander house, to me, are right up there with Hill House, and even though Judson Alexander, the antagonist, really only gets a proper introduction halfway through the story, he is a scary dude. Alexander manifests in such a way that people who don't lose sleep over a traditional ghost story are going to wind up with a case of the creeps.
Besides conjuring some pretty unwholesome imagery, this story consistently manages to tug on the heartstrings and direct our sympathy toward a number of characters. It's easy to see how Janz took situations that could have gone the way of the soap opera, and managed to craft them to perfection.
This is my first foray in the land of Janz, but you can sure as hell bet, it won't be the last. If you're a sucker for ghost stories, haunted house, or just well-written human interaction, make time for this book in your life.