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Product Description
Review
“[The Little Stranger] reflects on the collapse of the British class system after WWII in a stunning haunted house tale whose ghosts are as horrifying as any in Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House.”
— Publisher’s Weekly “Pick of the Week” (starred review)
“Waters pulls such a sensational sleight of hand that you can get to the last page of this novel, sigh contentedly, and immediately turn to the first page and begin reading a story that resonates in a completely different register…. Delightfully eerie…. A welcome addition to the Waters canon, confirming her place as one of the best of our contemporary historical novelists.”
— The Gazette (Montreal)
“A full-on, down-the-hatches ghost story…. Hundreds Hall is as much a characters as any of the humans in the book, animated by Waters’ masterful, highly visual descriptions…. If you read only one ghost story this summer, make it this one.”
— The Toronto Star
“This novel belongs in an 18th-century tradition, the Gothic line … timeless.”
— The Globe and Mail
“Closer to Henry James than Stephen King…. Waters is a great stylist and a master storyteller.”
— Winnipeg Free Press
“A deliciously creepy tale … haunted by the spirits of Henry James and Edgar Allan Poe…. A ghost story as intelligent as it is stylish…. [Faraday] calls to mind Patricia Highsmith’s clever psychopath, Tom Ripley…. Waters has made old bones dance again.”
— Washington Post
“Completely absorbing [and] full of mystery…. At the end of the book, Waters delivers a real shock…. Hundreds Hall is a pretty gloomy place, but I was thrilled to spend time there, under the guidance of this supremely gifted storyteller.”
— Newsday
“Sarah Waters has renewed a chilling genre. Just don't read her new book in the house on your own at night.”
— Evening Standard
“Terrific…. [Waters] tells a story like no one else.”
— NOW magazine
“Masterly, enthralling…. Waters has managed to write a near-perfect gothic novel while at the same time confidently deploying the form into fresher territory. It’s an astonishing performance, right down to the book’s mournful and devastating final sentence.”
— Salon.com
“A stunning ghost story that nurtures Turn of the Screw–style ambiguities.”
— TimeOut New York
“The spookiest book I've read in a long time…. The ending is perfect, leaving just enough to the imagination, and sending echoes back through all that has come before.”
— Columbus Post-Dispatch
“A classic gothic page-turner.”
— USA Today
“Sarah Waters is an excellent, evocative writer, and this is an incredibly gripping and readable novel.”
— The New York Times
“Waters has yet again written a classic thriller, styled as a classic thriller. It can be only a matter of time before a latter-day Hitchcock turns it into a film.”
— The Independent
“Waters’s masterly novel is a perverse hymn to decay, to the corrosive power of class resentment as well as the damage wrought by the war…. She deploys the vigour and cunning one finds in Margaret Atwood’s fiction. She has the same narrative ease and expansiveness, and the same knack of twisting the tension tighter and tighter within an individual scene.”
— Hilary Mantel, in The Guardian
“Waters is clearly at the top of her game, with few to match her ability to bring the past to life in a fully imagined world.”
— Tracy Chevalier, in The Guardian
“Two novels under one cover. One of these is a shrewd and highly readable social history of the late 1940s… [the other] is a classic ghost story of the haunted house, Edgar Allan Poe variety.”
— Fay Weldon, in The Financial Times
“Again displaying her remarkable flair for period evocation, Waters re-creates back-water Britain just after the second world war with atmospheric immediacy.”
— Timesonline.co.uk
— Publisher’s Weekly “Pick of the Week” (starred review)
“Waters pulls such a sensational sleight of hand that you can get to the last page of this novel, sigh contentedly, and immediately turn to the first page and begin reading a story that resonates in a completely different register…. Delightfully eerie…. A welcome addition to the Waters canon, confirming her place as one of the best of our contemporary historical novelists.”
— The Gazette (Montreal)
“A full-on, down-the-hatches ghost story…. Hundreds Hall is as much a characters as any of the humans in the book, animated by Waters’ masterful, highly visual descriptions…. If you read only one ghost story this summer, make it this one.”
— The Toronto Star
“This novel belongs in an 18th-century tradition, the Gothic line … timeless.”
— The Globe and Mail
“Closer to Henry James than Stephen King…. Waters is a great stylist and a master storyteller.”
— Winnipeg Free Press
“A deliciously creepy tale … haunted by the spirits of Henry James and Edgar Allan Poe…. A ghost story as intelligent as it is stylish…. [Faraday] calls to mind Patricia Highsmith’s clever psychopath, Tom Ripley…. Waters has made old bones dance again.”
— Washington Post
“Completely absorbing [and] full of mystery…. At the end of the book, Waters delivers a real shock…. Hundreds Hall is a pretty gloomy place, but I was thrilled to spend time there, under the guidance of this supremely gifted storyteller.”
— Newsday
“Sarah Waters has renewed a chilling genre. Just don't read her new book in the house on your own at night.”
— Evening Standard
“Terrific…. [Waters] tells a story like no one else.”
— NOW magazine
“Masterly, enthralling…. Waters has managed to write a near-perfect gothic novel while at the same time confidently deploying the form into fresher territory. It’s an astonishing performance, right down to the book’s mournful and devastating final sentence.”
— Salon.com
“A stunning ghost story that nurtures Turn of the Screw–style ambiguities.”
— TimeOut New York
“The spookiest book I've read in a long time…. The ending is perfect, leaving just enough to the imagination, and sending echoes back through all that has come before.”
— Columbus Post-Dispatch
“A classic gothic page-turner.”
— USA Today
“Sarah Waters is an excellent, evocative writer, and this is an incredibly gripping and readable novel.”
— The New York Times
“Waters has yet again written a classic thriller, styled as a classic thriller. It can be only a matter of time before a latter-day Hitchcock turns it into a film.”
— The Independent
“Waters’s masterly novel is a perverse hymn to decay, to the corrosive power of class resentment as well as the damage wrought by the war…. She deploys the vigour and cunning one finds in Margaret Atwood’s fiction. She has the same narrative ease and expansiveness, and the same knack of twisting the tension tighter and tighter within an individual scene.”
— Hilary Mantel, in The Guardian
“Waters is clearly at the top of her game, with few to match her ability to bring the past to life in a fully imagined world.”
— Tracy Chevalier, in The Guardian
“Two novels under one cover. One of these is a shrewd and highly readable social history of the late 1940s… [the other] is a classic ghost story of the haunted house, Edgar Allan Poe variety.”
— Fay Weldon, in The Financial Times
“Again displaying her remarkable flair for period evocation, Waters re-creates back-water Britain just after the second world war with atmospheric immediacy.”
— Timesonline.co.uk
Book Description
From the multi-award-winning and bestselling author of The Night Watch and Fingersmith comes an astonishing novel about love, loss, and the sometimes unbearable weight of the past.
In a dusty post-war summer in rural Warwickshire, a doctor is called to see a patient at lonely Hundreds Hall. Home to the Ayres family for over two centuries, the once grand house is now in decline, its masonry crumbling, its garden choked with weeds. All around, the world is changing, and the family is struggling to adjust to a society with new values and rules.
Roddie Ayres, who returned from World War II physically and emotionally wounded, is desperate to keep the house and what remains of the estate together for the sake of his mother and his sister, Caroline. Mrs. Ayres is doing her best to hold on to the gracious habits of a gentler era and Caroline seems cheerfully prepared to continue doing the work a team of servants once handled, even if it means having little chance for a life of her own beyond Hundreds.
But as Dr. Faraday becomes increasingly entwined in the Ayreses’ lives, signs of a more disturbing nature start to emerge, both within the family and in Hundreds Hall itself. And Faraday begins to wonder if they are all threatened by something more sinister than a dying way of life, something that could subsume them completely.
Both a nuanced evocation of 1940s England and the most chill-inducing novel of psychological suspense in years, The Little Stranger confirms Sarah Waters as one of the finest and most exciting novelists writing today.
In a dusty post-war summer in rural Warwickshire, a doctor is called to see a patient at lonely Hundreds Hall. Home to the Ayres family for over two centuries, the once grand house is now in decline, its masonry crumbling, its garden choked with weeds. All around, the world is changing, and the family is struggling to adjust to a society with new values and rules.
Roddie Ayres, who returned from World War II physically and emotionally wounded, is desperate to keep the house and what remains of the estate together for the sake of his mother and his sister, Caroline. Mrs. Ayres is doing her best to hold on to the gracious habits of a gentler era and Caroline seems cheerfully prepared to continue doing the work a team of servants once handled, even if it means having little chance for a life of her own beyond Hundreds.
But as Dr. Faraday becomes increasingly entwined in the Ayreses’ lives, signs of a more disturbing nature start to emerge, both within the family and in Hundreds Hall itself. And Faraday begins to wonder if they are all threatened by something more sinister than a dying way of life, something that could subsume them completely.
Both a nuanced evocation of 1940s England and the most chill-inducing novel of psychological suspense in years, The Little Stranger confirms Sarah Waters as one of the finest and most exciting novelists writing today.
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Most helpful customer reviews
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
An Atmospheric Ghost Story,
By
This review is from: The Little Stranger (Hardcover)
Reason for Reading: Sarah Waters had a new book out! Need I say more!Comments: The Ayres family have lived at Hundreds Hall since the early-mid 1700s and now in post-war times (WWII) there remain three family members, one live-in servant and one half-time servant under its roof. During the war, they did their part for the war effort giving their rooms over to soldiers, their land over to the army for its use, their silver for melting, their furs, woolens, linens, etc for cutting apart and making clothing, handing down clothing they didn't need for those left without homes after the bombings and now that the war is over they have little left. Mrs. Ayres, in her fifties, not old by any means, seems old as she belongs to a different generation and the children try to keep the facts of their penury from her. Roderick, returns from the war a cripple and after recovering from his wounds tries to keep the dairy farm and the estate running for his mother's sake even if it kills him. Caroline is called home from the WRENs to nurse her brother through the long recovery from his injuries at his homecoming and then settles down to help with the estate; a robust, active, yet plain woman she is many years past the expected age of marrying yet she still hopes and now she can be found either in the kitchen with the women help or out on the land helping out the dairy farmer. But this is nothing especially special about the Ayres family, this is a situation that a geat many of the landed gentry of England found themselves in post WWII and the only way they managed to survive was to sell off the land piece by agonizing piece. What makes the Ayres special is Hundreds Hall itself. Naturally without the money, the manpower or the resources it is falling to pieces and slowly crumbling around them. Most rooms have been completely closed off and more and more are closed off each season but that is not it either. Upon the new live-in maid's arrival she immediately falls ill of a stomach ache and confides in the doctor that something bad is in the house. He tells her she is homesick and not to be silly. The other maid eventually becomes aware of a presence causing trouble in her kitchen. Roderick is found many times bumped and bruised in the night and he claims someone is moving large pieces of furniture in his room. In fact Roddie starts having many unexplained, even dangerous, episodes. Mrs. Ayres is not herself anymore. She has heard voices and seems to be living in the past. Caroline herself is looking at books on Poltergeists and Phantasms in the library. While the Doctor is trying to cope with everyone's mental state he finds out first hand that there are some things that no matter how much he tries to explain them away reasonably, he knows what he has seen with his own eyes and heard with his own ears and can't quite shake the feeling. Has an old family madness caught up with them all? Is there a ghost in the house? A poltergeist perhaps? Or maybe, it is that the house itself is evil? This is something a little different for Waters. I've only read Fingersmith myself so far but I've read plot summaries of the others and feel confident in saying this is not her usual comfort zone. I loved the time period and the look inside the lives of post war gentry, while the doctor who comes from a poor background adds contrast to the two different ways of life even in hard times. There is a romance between the doctor and one of the female characters that slowly develops during the book and doesn't really come to a head until near the end of the book but it is an element that keeps the story on a basic plot, the relationship between the two, as all the madness is going on sometimes taking over the plot but always returning to that basic thread; which holds the book together well in my opinion. In fact, it is the ending of this book that infuriated me. It did not end the way I had expected and I was quite shocked with the outcome and actually quite annoyed that things ended up the way they did. I've had time to recuperate now, but that is the sign of good characterization, when a book's characters mean so much to you that you are invested in them and want all to end well for them all. When a book can make you get mad at it, because you are on the charaters' side that's when I know I've just read a brilliant book. Sarah Waters is a brilliant storyteller. Right from page one I was dragged into her world and could not escape. I read this book much more quickly than I would another book of the same page length. I took it everywhere with me and could not stop reading. Comparing it to Fingersmith, it didn't have as many twist and turns and excitement but then it is a different type of book. This is an atmospheric book and a splendidly well-crafted ghost story. Enjoy!
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Unsettling!,
By Izzy E "Izzy" (Toronto) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Little Stranger (Hardcover)
Personally, The Little Stranger had a disturbing blend of being both impossible to put down, and having the story told exclusively through an (intentionally) irritating and unlikeable unreliable narrator. Due to the ambivalent experience I had during my intense read of the novel, I am unable to say that I loved it outright the way I did Waters' Fingersmith. Undoubtedly, The Little Stranger was eerie, and I found myself shrinking back just a little while following the characters around Hundreds Hall. When I first reached the end of the story, I was slightly dismayed to discover that the plot was a linear one without any brilliant plot twists as in some of Waters' previous works...or so I thought. Without introducing spoilers, I must say that I have already mentally revisited the story and have all but thrown away my initial dismissal of the plot as altogether lacking intricacies. Yet again, Waters has proven that she is one step ahead.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
If you liked the Thirteenth Tale, pick this one up!,
By
This review is from: The Little Stranger (Hardcover)
It is 1949. Britain is still feeling the effects of the war. In rural Warwickshire, Dr.Faraday is called to Hundreds Hall to check on the well being of a servant in the Ayres family home. As a child Dr. Faraday was in the house once. His mother was a nursemaid there when she was younger. He was captivated by the house, the family and their wealth. On this visit, he is dismayed by the decline of both house and family. Mrs Ayres lives there with her son Roddie, who was injured in the war and is struggling to keep the family home afloat. Daughter Caroline was called home to help when Roddie returned from the war and never left. The only live in servant left is a fourteen year old girl.From that first visit, Dr. Faraday slowly becomes part of the family's life. He is called on often to treat Roddie. Something ails Roddie besides his physical injuries. The young servant girl insists there is something 'wrong' with the house. Caroline begins to wonder this as well, as more misfortune befalls the family. " This house is playing parlour games with us, I think. We shan't pay it any mind if it starts up again." She confides in Dr. Faraday and enlists his help. " I don't know what's going on here, any more than you do. But I'd like to help you figure it out. I'll take my chances with the hungry house, don't worry about that." This is a tale with a 'gothic' feel to it, a ghost story of sorts. But it doesn't involve overt frights or over the top scenarios. Instead it is all the more delicious for the subtle and insidious manner in which the story unfolds. Everyday items and occurrences suddenly take on a sinister bent. The interplay between the characters is just as much a part of the story. Dr. Faraday is a bit of an enigma. He is from a lower social class than the Ayres. At times he is made painfully aware of this. At other times, the Ayres family seems to depend on him excessively. Is he there for himself, for personal gain or simply to be in the house again? The other main character Caroline is also a mystery. At times she is playful, other times aloof, practical yet playful. What does she really want from the good Doctor? Many of the other characters give us a glimpse into the social life and mores of the time period. Waters is a master of building a story. The tension grows and we are left wondering if the house is indeed perpetrating these calamities or is it the residents of the house?
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