***
Literary horror novel about a stir-crazy woman who convinces her husband, son, and her husband's elderly aunt to take a suspiciously affordable mansion as a summer home, not realizing at first that the house has plans of its own. Marasco skimps a bit too much -- on plot (very little actually happens) and on character (the husband, for example, is frustratingly and incomprehensibly weak) -- to entirely succeed in his main objective, which is a sense of mounting dread, but at its best the novel is both suspenseful and frightening. Marked by Stephen King as a "particularly important" work, and it is perhaps no surprise that his own work -- especially The Shining -- echoes Marasco's ideas and style (though King would improve upon them both). Made into a film in 1976.
Literary horror novel about a stir-crazy woman who convinces her husband, son, and her husband's elderly aunt to take a suspiciously affordable mansion as a summer home, not realizing at first that the house has plans of its own. Marasco skimps a bit too much -- on plot (very little actually happens) and on character (the husband, for example, is frustratingly and incomprehensibly weak) -- to entirely succeed in his main objective, which is a sense of mounting dread, but at its best the novel is both suspenseful and frightening. Marked by Stephen King as a "particularly important" work, and it is perhaps no surprise that his own work -- especially The Shining -- echoes Marasco's ideas and style (though King would improve upon them both). Made into a film in 1976.
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