- Paperback
- Publisher: Knopf
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 096506882X
- ISBN-13: 978-0965068826
- Product Dimensions: 22.4 x 14.7 x 2.5 cm
- Shipping Weight: 431 g
- Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (42 customer reviews)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
You can trust Cora Whitman. She's a minister's wife, gardener, food writer, and just the kind of narrator that you don't find in most horror novels. She is practical, skeptical, and her matter-of-fact telling of the events that took place in Dry Falls, Maine, makes this incredible story easy to believe.
Incubus begins with Cora Whitman's preface to the "case study" that is the novel. It's an almost scientific warm-up for the paranormal roller coaster that lies ahead. Arensberg's Dry Falls is a typical, small New England community, except during the summer of 1974 when the weather got unusually hot, the rain refused to fall, and the town was gripped by a sinister sexual spirit. The first signs of the incubus were relatively innocent--the town eccentric lost a few hours of her day, husbands became uncharacteristically ardent, schoolgirls saw a "ghost" in a graveyard. As the story progresses, the incubus grows more sinister, until it stirs up a supernatural hurricane with Cora Whitman trapped in its eye.
Arensberg, whose other works include Group Sex and Sister Wolf, has created a sophisticated work of literary horror with Incubus. She raises many questions about religion, marriage, and the supernatural, and handles the subject matter with unflinching objectivity. Her prose is simultaneously elegant and pointed, and her characters both unusual and familiar, making the story irresistible. --Mara Friedman --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
From Publishers Weekly
A tale of shape-changers and exorcism written with intelligence, restraint and style, Arensberg's compelling third novel (Sister Wolf; Group Sex) is another impressive example of this talented writer's work. In the summer of 1974, the town of Dry Falls, Maine, is subjected to a heat wave and drought that is so carefully circumscribed it doesn't even appear on the state's local weather maps. Even more disturbing evidence ensues of nature imbalanced, including a lack of sexual drive among the town's male inhabitants and cows that give birth to deformed calves, among other unusual events. Dr. Henry W. Lieber, Dry Falls's Episcopal priest and a man whose faith is fast fading, obsessively records each new incident, seeking signs of the supernatural. Cora Whitman, Dr. Lieber's wife and author of a weekly food column, is the skeptical narrator of this unsettling chronicle; this is a savvy move by Arensberg, as Cora's skepticism always precedes the reader's suspicions. Yet Cora comes to believe in the existence of a demon who disturbs women's sleep and, in fact, rapes the women of Dry Falls. But what this entity is, why it's attracted to this town and these women who know their herbs but practice no witchcraft?these are bones the readers of this beautifully written and carefully crafted novel can gnaw. Despite the rapture of the tale, Arensberg's greatest gifts here are not the plot or the research supporting her tale of the occult, but her precise insight into character and the portrayal of the workings of a small community, the life of a pastor and his wife and a marriage in many seasons. BOMC selection.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
3.0 out of 5 stars
Post-Modern Battle Between Good and Evil,
By
This review is from: Incubus (Paperback)
Whatever the larger story, allegorical or not, that Ann Arensberg weaves within the more than competent text of her horror novel "Incubus", her lack of sustaining the suspense and her inability to create an empathic connection with any of the ravaged women in her Hawthornian-cloned New England town, renders that second literary dimension where "message" and "symbolism" may be concealed, too obscure and tedious to determine.Is "Incubus" on a literary level, a retelling in reverse of one of Hawthorne's dark contemplative tales pitting good against evil? Is it like "Young Goodman Brown", the short story of a psychological journey where middle-aged faithless Cora, wife of an Episcopalian minister has been so inured by the late 20/21st century fascination in all things New Age mystical that her innate skepticism turns her towards finding an explanation for the odd occurrences in Dry Falls, Maine in the realm of aliens and UFOS rather than in believing in an actual manifestation of good old fashioned evil of the-tempting-by-Satan brand? Christianity and its traditions are not strong enough or viable enough to conquer the oddball extra-terrestrial imaginings that it does not define; its function is to save the soul. But what if you don't have a soul to save? What good is Christianity then? What a great concept for a story. If only it had worked on a purely suspenseful level. But, alas, I must submit to the bewilderment conjurred by Arensberg's mundane style that works when describing gardening hints, recipe advise and disdain over husband Henry's lack of interest in the more intimate realms of married life. Does she employ this same straight-forward technique when describing her coupling with the incubus of the title simply because she wants to appear 21st century jaded, immune to the truely horrific after a steady diet of the likes of Hannabal Lector and Freddy Kruger in all their graphic gory splendor? Perhaps. Or maybe she is just giving a respectful nod to old Nathaniel, imitating his 19th century style. And how this would have worked, if only the story had taken on big black leathery bat wings and soared into that part of the psyche that shakes weak traditions and the most steadfast of religious foundations. "Incubus" just doesn't go there---and I am not talking about Stephen King territory; throughout my reading of this novel I felt the need to beg for some episode which actually left my skin in a goosebump state on a purely mind game level. All of Arensberg's clever little Hawthorne reversals travel within a medium which doesn't have the clout to deliver any impact. We, the readers, wallow in our own jadedness, we wait for something to happen, some momentous moment where it will all click and allow some back-pedaling insight to wash over the montony of the story. This never happens. Alas.
3.0 out of 5 stars
Too mundane for horror genre,
By
This review is from: Incubus (Hardcover)
Cora's endless details of her mundane life drag this story down. The interesting scenes are buried in and amongst the chit-chatty monologues about her mother's garden, (...), her cooking, and the weather. I tried my best to get into this book but after 200 hundred pages, the horror bits were just too far and few between. There was too much local gossip. I think the author was trying to write in the style of Lovecraft but she kept getting bogged down in too much detail.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Disturbing but a tad too slow for my tastes,
By
This review is from: Incubus (Paperback)
I managed to find the book both compelling and, at the same time, a bit tedious. The underlying story was interesting enough for me to want to continue turning the pages while I often became frustrated at Cora's rambling style of telling the story and her lengthy descriptions of everything surrounding her. Some details were interesting (gardening) while others made me smile (especially those of her friends sex lives) but many were just plain dull. This tidbit, taken from a scene where Cora is describing herself, could just as well describe the author's method of telling her story: "When he (Cora's husband) told me a story I made him repeat himself. When he baptized an infant I asked him to describe the christening dress." (...)Guess this book disturbed me on a level that I wasn't aware of! And, here I thought I was too jaded to be bothered by a story.
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