The Wicker Man

By Robin Hardy, Anthony Shaffer,

Book cover of The Wicker Man

Book description

First published in 1978, five years after the release of the classic horror film from which it is adapted, The Wicker Man by director Robin Hardy and screenwriter Anthony Shaffer, is a gripping horror classic.

A novelization of the haunting Anthony Shaffer script, which drew from David Pinner's Ritual, it…

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Wicker Man as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

I love the film The Wicker Man (released in 1973) and was delighted to discover this novelisation from its director and screenwriter.

Full of pagan religion and ritual sacrifice on remote Summerisle, it is wonderfully creepy. Nor is it a flat retelling of the film but an expansion of the character of poor Sergeant Howie. Set up by Lord Summerisle to be the May sacrifice, he is tormented and abused as he searches for a missing child and on film is shown as priggish and cold.

Yet in the book, he is brave, vulnerable, doggedly trying to do the right…

From Stephanie's list on the dark delights of folk horror.

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Truth told, folks still ask if Saul Crabtree sold his soul for the perfect voice. If he sold it to angels or devils. A Bristol newspaper once asked: “Are his love songs closer to heaven than dying?” Others wonder how he wrote a song so sad, everyone who heard it…

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