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A review by aquamare7
The Vanishing by Wendy Webb
dark
hopeful
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
The Vanishing by Wendy Webb opens with a medium, long ago, conducting a seance and accidentally unleashing something evil. Then the story cuts to modern day where we meet the main character, Julia. Her husband has just killed himself after being caught embezzling and has left Julia not only in financial ruin, but with all his enemies. Luckily, however, a handsome man, Adrian, shows up on Julia’s door and offers her a job taking care of his elderly mother at their family manor. His mother, Marian, used to be a renowned horror novelist whom the world now thinks is dead; because of something bad that happened in her past, she like Julia, needed to disappear.
At the manor within her first few days, Julia has run-ins with the supernatural and Marian tells her the manor’s history: in the 1800’s Andrew McCullough ran into a windego while fur trapping and was saved by a Native shaman, but at a price. He was never able to leave the land he was saved on again, so he built the manor.
Over the course of her stay, things become increasingly strange for Julia. Not only does she keep having déjà vu, but everyone at the manor, the family and the staff, are overly familiar with her. Finally, near the end of the book, we find out that Julia is a descendent of the medium from the beginning and had actually been at the manor before to conduct a seance at Marion’s request. Marion wanted to reenact what happened years ago with the medium from the beginning of the story, though just like her, Marion releases something evil and causes Julia to forget all her memories of the house.
Alright, so first off, I didn’t like this book. It wasn’t scary like it advertises itself as; Marian is supposed to be a renowned horror novelist whom is likened as “the female Edgar Allen Poe”. Having just come off an Agatha Christie kick, if you’re going to have a character who’s an author in your story, you need to make your story as interesting as the boasted works of the fictional author’s are. Christie was able to do that. Wendy Webb, not so much. The most chilling passages of The Vanishing are literally the first and the last where we’re transported in time through the eyes of a medium having a horrific experience. The rest of the book is drab; instead of focusing on the ghosts and building up the horror for the final battle that takes place, we’re left with infuriating passages about Julia’s past life with her husband and his dealings. When someone supposedly breaks into the manor one night, it’s suspected that it’s one of the late husband’s enemies and more focus is brought on that than it being a dark spirit. It takes so long to finally get back to the ghost story aspect that by the time the big battle to vanquish the evil spirit takes place, I didn’t care.
Second, when we’re told the history of the manor, you’d expect that to come back around and have something to do with the hauntings at the house, but it doesn’t. Not really.
A: There’s a character named Drew who comes along and reveals his full name is in fact, Andrew McCullough. You would think he’s the ghost of THE Andrew McCullough who built the manor, as Julia first thinks this too, and throughout the story there’s passages of the family giving him looks whenever he mentions something about the house. But he reveals that he’s only a descendent of Andrew McCullough and it’s left at that. Now, having him have been a ghost would have helped this book be an actual scary tale. Not only that, but it would have made the boring and cliché romance between Drew and Julia much more interesting. Throughout the book, Julia has encounters with spirits that a lot of the time only she can hear. Before it’s revealed that she’s a descendent of the original medium, I was hoping that she WAS the original medium. The original medium and the original Andrew were said to have been deeply in love with each other but both were married, and after having unleashed evil in the manor, the medium vows never to return and endanger Andrew’s family again, so they’re torn apart.
It would have been much more interesting and hauntingly beautiful if Julia and Drew were the ghosts of these two lovers FINALLY reunited again! The reveal would have also given the story the spook-factor it sorely lacked.
Now, the way the author, Webb, writes, this could have been the case and she was just not saying it outright, but, personally, I hate that. Leaving the story up to speculation is a great way to get me to never read anything else by you again. Sorry.
B: the story of the windego. What’s unleashed in the manor comes out of what the characters call, a devil’s toy box, that the original medium’s husband got form India. Not an Algonquian tribe. India. Now, I’m not one that really understands the gatekeeping of Native legends; I think what helps those legends stand the test of time is to share them and to share them with outsiders. But what I do have a problem with is when those outsiders haphazardly throw those legends into their own stories for dramatic effect without actually taking the time to showcase the legend and respect the Native peoples from which it came. Which is what happens in The Vanishing. Not only does this windego that’s unleashed in the house come from a box made in a country its legend doesn’t even come from, the box’s name and the ensuing vanquishing of the creature has Christian origins. Not Native ones. It’s a disrespectful mess to me.
Third, Julia’s characterization. Her going back and forth on believing and then not believing in the supernatural gave me whiplash. Same with her reactions to everything going on. Within the same conversation, she tells Adrian she’s happy to be at the manor, yet is scared out of her mind and wants to leave. What??? She’s also constantly sad about her husband’s death and remembers him fondly rather than being angry that he lied to her their entire marriage and then chose to kill himself rather than face the people he hurt and face prison.
Another problem I had with Julia is her personality. She’s written like Anna from Frozen, and like a lot of modern female characters today: overly-bubbly, hiding nervousness with sarcasm, and fake/forced naiveté. The line that sealed my hatred for her was when she dresses for a formal dinner and both Drew and Adrian compliment her and she responds, “It’s amazing what a bath and the right dress can do for a girl.” Like, girl, you’re a lady not a dog. Have some class when someone compliments you.
Anyway, The Vanishing by Wendy Webb was not my cup of tea. It’s definitely not a scary novel like it advertises itself as being, I found the main character annoying, the love story trite, and the windego legend being carelessly thrown in disrespectful.