The Haunting of Hill House

By Shirley Jackson,

Book cover of The Haunting of Hill House

Book description

Part of a new six-volume series of the best in classic horror, selected by Academy Award-winning director of The Shape of Water Guillermo del Toro

Filmmaker and longtime horror literature fan Guillermo del Toro serves as the curator for the Penguin Horror series, a new collection of classic tales and…

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Why read it?

36 authors picked The Haunting of Hill House as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Jackson’s Gothic horror flows like black chiffon over a yawing window. That’s how I felt reading about Hill House. I loved the way the house sneaks up with its psychological weights swinging and jarring. Eleanor possesses a dark ambiance. She desperately needed to belong to something or someone, and I couldn’t let go of that.

Her emotions and fears were right there with me. But it was the romantic underbelly that got me: Eleanor’s romance with Hill House. The statuesque gardens, the light, and shadows, all tempted her into its sinister realm. As it tempted me. I felt deeply…

I read a lot of gothic literature, and very little actually scares me. This book does. Every time I return to this book, which I do every year, always after dark, in a silent place, I get that anxious chill that makes me want to pause, pull my collar a little tighter, and look around the room, just to be sure.

Jackson’s novel also has what I think is the finest opening paragraph in any work of the literary gothic, an opener so unexpected and so poetic that I know I’m in for more than a typical haunted house story.…

From William's list on both literary and gothic.

In this book, Shirley Jackson states that some places are evil for no reason and that some people are drawn to them and feel at home in them. Hill House is evil; it's built without straight angles, which leaves one feeling disoriented. It claims lives and urges people not to leave. 

I love how the book weaves psychological abuse into its plot and how one feels inside Hill House: disoriented, gaslit, and manipulated. The central theme of toxic relationships and co-dependency surprised me. 

I also enjoy its simple style, which is almost childlike yet so immersive that it packs a…

From Susana's list on haunting books from beyond the grave.

Draakensky: A Supernatural Tale of Magick and Romance

By Paula Cappa,

Book cover of Draakensky: A Supernatural Tale of Magick and Romance

Paula Cappa Author Of Draakensky: A Supernatural Tale of Magick and Romance

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Why am I passionate about this?

Author

Paula's 3 favorite reads in 2024

What is my book about?

A murder. A wind sorcerer. A dark spirit.

On Draakensky Windmill Estate, magick and mystery rule. Sketch artist Charlotte Knight is hired to live on the estate while illustrating poetry under the direction of the reclusive spinster, and wind witch, Jaa Morland—who believes in ghosts. Charlotte quickly encounters the voice of a ghost and a sinister figure lurking in the shadows. 

Charlotte takes refuge in Marc Sexton, a charismatic local with knowledge of Celtic magick—who wears a silver wolf amulet around his neck. With his dark secrets of the Otherworld and his magickal powers, they delve into a world of…

Draakensky: A Supernatural Tale of Magick and Romance

By Paula Cappa,

What is this book about?

A murder. A wind sorcerer. A dark spirit. On Draakensky, magick dictates destiny.

The Chief of Police discovers an elderly woman dead in the Mianus River. There is a ghost who resides here and flings its words through the spinning air. River magic too, streams across Draakensky Windmill estate, conjuring a secret in Bedford, New York.

Sketch artist Charlotte Knight arrives on Draakensky to a bright opportunity. She is hired to illustrate the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke under the direction of Jaa Morland, the recluse spinster of Draakensky. Jaa, a believer in ghosts, instructs Charlotte to ‘draw the ghosts.’…


My mother’s favorite horror story. (She called them “Ooo-yeah!” stories) It’s a ghost story where the principal characters are as haunted as the mysterious house they’re investigating. It's a terrific character study with lots of subtle hints that the ghosts are real. Or are they?

One lasting memory is the scene where Eleanor and Theodora are in bed and terrified by growing sounds that imply something other-worldly is closing in on them. One asks the other to stop squeezing her hand so tight, to which the other replies. “I’m not holding your hand.”  Yikes.

For me, this is the book that started it all. When I was 10 years old, I stole it from my Granny’s shelf, curled in her BarcaLounger, and finished in one ravenous sitting.

The world I emerged into was changed: the main character Nell’s spiraling, exuberant, increasingly unhinged interiority echoed in my mind. I remember walking afterward through the Maine woods, the green more vivid than ever before, pulsing with a new sense of menace and aliveness.

Each sentence in this masterpiece about a sentient, malevolent house is electric, and if I could only read one paragraph for the rest…

The novel’s prose is breathtaking. Jackson tells us from the start that Hill House is not sane and that sets the tone for the unraveling of the other characters’ minds.

For me, one of the best things about the novel is that it gives the reader space to create their own horrors. Nothing is explicitly stated and that makes it all the more frightening. Add to that an unreliable narrator and this novel captured my mind from the moment I read it. 

Of the many ghost stories in my collection, this must be my favorite and the one I recommend most to both newcomers and veterans of Gothic literature. (With nary a ghost in sight!) Once again, none of the adaptations can fully capture the dark magic at the novel’s heart.

Building on the emotional and psychological elements first touched on in Henry James’s, The Turn of the Screw, Jackson reinvented the haunted house genre and gave us an instant classic to which all other such tales must inevitably be compared. Cherished by horror writers and readers everywhere, this book captivates…

I was late in coming to this and was glad to find its popularity richly deserved.

The characters are quirky enough to be entertaining on their own, and the house is a formidable opponent. I found the climactic scene where the ghost is banging on all the doors genuinely frightening, and then the plot took a completely unexpected turn. I was the one who succumbed to the haunting in the end.

From Linda's list on good old-fashioned haunted house.

Of all the genres, horror is the most difficult to write successfully because it requires technique. And I’m referring to true horror, not gore-or, as the great Stephen King writes (I can hear the boos aimed at me already).

Considered a classic by many—including Mr. King—The Haunting has one of the greatest opening paragraphs of all time, and illustrates perfectly the technique involved as Jackson describes the features and construction of the House—subtly, benignly, and then...“and whatever walked there, walked alone.” 

The story, a traditional haunted house tale, is short and filled with such unseen creepiness and can be…

In the real estate market of haunted houses, Hill House remains a hot property decades after the book’s publication in 1959.

Shirley Jackson is queen of slow-burn Gothic suspense, and her premise is incredible: a group of strangers arrive at an eerie mansion as part of a scientific project to find evidence of the paranormal.

Jackson doesn’t use flashy jump scares, but rather spins a subtle dread that makes even quiet scenes feel unbearably tense.

Haunting of Hill House remains my top recommendation for scary novels. It’s rare for a book to have me leaving the lights on at night,…

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