Tuesday, February 12, 2013

House of Many Shadows and My Sister's First Book Review


House of Many Shadows
by Barbara Michaels
published by Fawcett Crest
Copyright 1974

She was trying to solve
a murder that was two
hundred and fifty years old...

When Meg's wealthy cousin Sylvia lent her the old house in Pennsylvania, Meg did not dream she would be drawn into a strange girl's distant past and into the brutal murder of three innocent people.

Meg saw them clearly. The old man, the servant, and the girl. She knew what horror lay in wait for them. But could she reach them across the years? Was it even safe for her to try?

Shuddery entertainment... The thrills keep coming..." - Publishers Weekly.

I haven't read the book but I like Meg already. Firstly, she is one of the few WRFH women who are actually appropriately dressed for fleeing. She looks warm, damn warm. And not in any anyway panicked despite the fact that there appear to be three shadowy men in pursuit. But, again, that could be due to the sensible boots and the confidence that can be instilled by a sweet pair of shoes.

Secondly, to my eye, Meg looks quite a bit like a young Linda Blair. 


I was also excited to see on the inside page of the book a review from my own hometown paper.

"Few writers can compare to Barbara Michaels when she conjures the inexplicable ... Fascinating too all who enjoy the eerie." - Columbus Dispatch

No legible signature but a very familiar style.

Well, on to other things.



My sister has never been much of a reader. In fact, she claimed to have not actually read a book since elementary school when she read Gertrude Chandler Warner's The Boxcar Children. This seems impossible but she swears it is the truth and no doubt that says something terrible about the state of our public school system.. 

Well a few weeks back she stopped by my office singing the praises of E. L. James' Fifty Shades of Gray. I personally have not read this book but am all for any book that inspires someone read, assuming said inspirational literature doesn't preach hate.

A BDSM-lite book seems quite the leap from a story of orphaned children living in a rusted out boxcar in the woods but sometimes you just have to jump in with both feet. She claims that if she had known there were books like that she would have started reading a long time ago. She had begged me to read it. And I have considered it if only so that we would have something terribly inappropriate to talk about in front of my dad, though the book sounds rather tame compared to a lot of things I have already read.

Well driven by the whirlwind of lust Fifty Shades appears to inspire, my sister has now moved on to the classic Anne Rice (as A. N. Roquelaure) Beauty series, which have been even more entertaining to talk about if only because I have read that, though years and years ago. And even my husband is familiar with the  infamous hot guy impaled on a stone phallus scene thanks to living in a college dormitory where it was apparently  passed around like a joint.

So, my sister's first book review ...

"Best book since The Boxcar Children." - HSM

Beautiful! Thank you H, can't wait to hear your next official review!

6 comments:

  1. I would think that big flowing cloak would help inspire self-confidence, as well. If nothing else, it would provide a subconscious sense of protection.

    As for H.—
    So after something like 30 years, the only thing she read was Twilight slashfic? That is ... disturbing.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think the warm colors of the entire ensemble also help. So often the one fleeing is dressing in a shade of flighty pink or palest blue and those colors just scream I'll likely change my mind about this.

      As for H - It's never too late to enjoy reading. And she now has a lifetime of books ahead of her!

      I am going to try and talk her into reading American Gods since it's my favorite. I plan to use the Shadow is hot angle and that he does bang that cat lady.

      Delete
  2. I sooo wish you could have
    the kinda accident I had [NDE]
    THEN! you'd know our lifelong
    demise is only a litmus test
    to see which direction we'll
    fly at our General Judgement.
    Check-this-out:

    Yes, earthling, Im an NDE
    so I actually know God exists:
    He rewards those who HONOR n RESPECT
    Him and strive to follow His Laws;
    for those who wanna know what
    Seventh-Heaven holds for your
    indelible, magnificent soul whom
    God has so carefully crafted:

    Find-out what RCIA means and join.
    [denying Hell will not prevent U.S.
    from falling INTO Hellfire, child]

    Jesus is the Just Judge.
    He only 'reads' what OUR past,
    mortal lifetime consisted of;
    I'd also strongly urge you to read
    'Lui et moi' by Gabrielle Bossis
    (a French writer, translated, into
    crystal-clear, 100,000W-GE-prose -
    a must have for anyone who's
    growin-UP in our predestined
    relationship determined by YOU).

    Make Your Choice -SAW
    trustNjesus.
    ALWAYS.
    God bless you.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Dunno if you saw this before...
      yet, here it is once moe, curly:

      Greetings, earthling! Need summore new-fangled-thots N ideers? Look no firdr, brudda. Can't stay long. Done gotta git, Paw... yet, if Im a sower, we plant the Seed; if Im an artist, we RITE the Word: Would U please help a plethora of King Size, wildchild, rawkuss poetry/wordz which are lookin 4 a home in thy novelty?? Thx. Whew. They're pretty insane. They're bereft of reason. Oi! Blimey! They're bloody PINK spiders!

      Gotta gobba lotta shrewd, surreal, supersonic, sardonic satires, sassy N savvy elixers N electronic elegance (and palpable nuance) on our YOUTHwitheTRUTH blogs. Wannum? Have'm. N'joym. Gettm outta my hair!!!How mucha wanna betcha our sugar-high-mojo, pleasure-beyond-measure, fuse-blowin-exploits R a copious madhouse of one lavish bookay D.O.A.? Our proFUSE NRGod who leads U.S. to explosive fairy-tales in the 'one-stop-shop' symphony Upstairs? Almighty God's the BigDude, the Owner of ElysianFields, the Grand Prize, the Austere Overdrive, NoPurchaseNecessary: our bombastic tenaCITY on a Hill which'll plant the Seeds 4u2 grow-up to new N greater heights!! Mama mia! Thatsa good pasta!!

      CAUTION: our 22ish, avant-guard, accurately-atrocious, offa-the-reservation-like-Jimmy-Hoffa, metal breadcrumms R sooo out-of-order, toots, they're an intimate wealth of bottomless sophistication. And dats da lethal fak, Jak. Yeah. Go ahead. Sue me. Yawn. But, yet, here's the perennial KOO D'TAH: who else has actually SEEN the Great Beyond in spirit & lived to tella youse bout the bionic, bloated, brevity-like-earth we're living on?? Yes, earthling, Im an NDE, almost salivating4salvation. So gain altitude, never attitude: death has no intrinsick favorites.

      If Mr. abSUREditty's an ultra-great-reward, and not everyone enters, Q: why is it an excruciating deluge of epic-.357-caliber where the quality's a limitless bulldozer plowin, pushin-your-power-cord with eternal goodies? A: the Prize-A+-TheEnd just gives U.S. moe-curley-graphix 2 VitSee: an explosion-of-extravagance which few R asking 4 anymore! Grrr. They're too concerned withe grotesque sanity of ambivilant piss-ants which swiftly crawl like lemmings to their scorecard destruction. C'est la guerre.

      THANK GAWWWD!!! the Don has the ebullient BAWLS!!! to do the Manifest Destiny!!! To lead U.S. forward to the White House Upstairs with his SQUARES!!!

      So, break-free, earthling; be like a contraversial outgrowth of incredibly-intoxicating-effusiveness in your zeitgeist to give the ultimate, stunning, backknuckle potency: Wiseabove. Wanna join this useFULL idiot Upstairs 4 the most zany, kooky, X-acto-knife antidotes? Extremely exquisite, explicit endorphins in abundance? Puh-lenty of pulverizingly-tantalizing psychopathic psychosomatics with eXtras? i2i-kick-velocity's-ass-ultra-maximum-rocket-fuel-party-hardy at my pad ya ever encountered without d'New Joisey accent 4 an eternal slew of precarious, magnanimous & primeval absurdities indelibly etched in the granite corridors of eternity with a total-barrage-of-melt-in-thy-mouth 'depth-of-undenial'???

      Make Your Choice  -SAW
      ...cuzz nobody gitts outta here alive, earthling.

      Delete
    2. Dunno if you saw this before...
      yet, here it is once moe, curly:

      Greetings, earthling! Need summore new-fangled-thots N ideers? Look no firdr, brudda. Can't stay long. Done gotta git, Paw... yet, if Im a sower, we plant the Seed; if Im an artist, we RITE the Word: Would U please help a plethora of King Size, wildchild, rawkuss poetry/wordz which are lookin 4 a home in thy novelty?? Thx. Whew. They're pretty insane. They're bereft of reason. Oi! Blimey! They're bloody PINK spiders!

      Gotta gobba lotta shrewd, surreal, supersonic, sardonic satires, sassy N savvy elixers N electronic elegance (and palpable nuance) on our YOUTHwitheTRUTH blogs. Wannum? Have'm. N'joym. Gettm outta my hair!!!How mucha wanna betcha our sugar-high-mojo, pleasure-beyond-measure, fuse-blowin-exploits R a copious madhouse of one lavish bookay D.O.A.? Our proFUSE NRGod who leads U.S. to explosive fairy-tales in the 'one-stop-shop' symphony Upstairs? Almighty God's the BigDude, the Owner of ElysianFields, the Grand Prize, the Austere Overdrive, NoPurchaseNecessary: our bombastic tenaCITY on a Hill which'll plant the Seeds 4u2 grow-up to new N greater heights!! Mama mia! Thatsa good pasta!!

      CAUTION: our 22ish, avant-guard, accurately-atrocious, offa-the-reservation-like-Jimmy-Hoffa, metal breadcrumms R sooo out-of-order, toots, they're an intimate wealth of bottomless sophistication. And dats da lethal fak, Jak. Yeah. Go ahead. Sue me. Yawn. But, yet, here's the perennial KOO D'TAH: who else has actually SEEN the Great Beyond in spirit & lived to tella youse bout the bionic, bloated, brevity-like-earth we're living on?? Yes, earthling, Im an NDE, almost salivating4salvation. So gain altitude, never attitude: death has no intrinsick favorites.

      If Mr. abSUREditty's an ultra-great-reward, and not everyone enters, Q: why is it an excruciating deluge of epic-.357-caliber where the quality's a limitless bulldozer plowin, pushin-your-power-cord with eternal goodies? A: the Prize-A+-TheEnd just gives U.S. moe-curley-graphix 2 VitSee: an explosion-of-extravagance which few R asking 4 anymore! Grrr. They're too concerned withe grotesque sanity of ambivilant piss-ants which swiftly crawl like lemmings to their scorecard destruction. C'est la guerre.

      THANK GAWWWD!!! the Don has the ebullient BAWLS!!! to do the Manifest Destiny!!! To lead U.S. forward to the White House Upstairs with his SQUARES!!!

      So, break-free, earthling; be like a contraversial outgrowth of incredibly-intoxicating-effusiveness in your zeitgeist to give the ultimate, stunning, backknuckle potency: Wiseabove. Wanna join this useFULL idiot Upstairs 4 the most zany, kooky, X-acto-knife antidotes? Extremely exquisite, explicit endorphins in abundance? Puh-lenty of pulverizingly-tantalizing psychopathic psychosomatics with eXtras? i2i-kick-velocity's-ass-ultra-maximum-rocket-fuel-party-hardy at my pad ya ever encountered without d'New Joisey accent 4 an eternal slew of precarious, magnanimous & primeval absurdities indelibly etched in the granite corridors of eternity with a total-barrage-of-melt-in-thy-mouth 'depth-of-undenial'???

      Make Your Choice  -SAW
      ...cuzz nobody gitts outta here alive, earthling.

      Delete