On the other hand, his actual messages felt muddled to me, and I was left feeling vaguely disappointed at what felt like intentional ambiguity and buried messaging. On one hand, he seemed to be almost fiercely defending horror as intellectual, which I whole-heartedly support. I didn’t always think he stuck his landings, but I agree with the tricks he was going for. His insights were at times so keen as to be startling. And I put about four sticky tabs at various passages that knocked my socks off. He has a knack for unique but believable dialogue that I found really easy to slip into. His prose was always more than competent and frequently wonderful. Now they are about to learn what happens to those who believe they can bury the past - and get away with murder.”įirst and foremost, Straub can write. Here’s the Goodreads summary: “For four aging men in the terror-stricken town of Milburn, New York, an act inadvertently carried out in their youth has come back to haunt them. I should note that this book is nearly impossible to summarize in a compelling way that doesn’t give things away.

Yes, I thought it was occasionally scary and I can definitely see how some people would find it entirely scary. Let’s address those three promises right off the bat, shall we? Yes, I whole-heartedly agree that it qualifies as literary horror, a hard thing to find. The fact that I immediately sat down to write about it tells you something, doesn’t it? This might not have been my favorite book of all time, but boy oh boy did it take me for a ride. I’ve heard it called literary horror (one of my absolute favorite niche genres), I’ve heard it called “the scariest book I’ve ever read” by more than a dozen people (right up my alley), and I already had it on my bookshelf because my dad owned it (always a good sign). (Educating yourself on all the “classics” is a never-ending task, especially if you read in many genres.) Recently I finally sat down to read what is perhaps his most famous novel, Ghost Story. He’s a big name in horror, but I just hadn’t gotten around to him yet. Peter Straub has been on my to-read list for a long time.

Ghost story straub novel