Review: Two Light Horror Tales for the Price of One
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 03 7, 2014
Evans Light may not be the most prolific horror writer on Amazon, but he's among the most versatile. Within the broad category of horror, his tales run the gamut from twistedly funny to claustrophobia inducing. In his latest story, "Dark Curtains," he manages to pull off a seemingly impossible feat of giving readers two remarkably different experiences arising from one single story.There's a twist to "Dark Curtains" and it's no spoiler to reveal it. The story actually has two different endings, written at different times. According to Light, he thought of the story as a complete work, ending and all, but when he showed it around, people suggested he change it. But, he liked the original ending as well and wound up including both of them in this volume. Like a DVD with alternate endings, readers can decide which they like best."Dark Curtains" is an old fashioned ghost story. James and Claire, a young couple, move into a large old house that was across the street from the house in which James lived as a child. When he was young, Sophie, the daughter of the couple who lived there, died under tragic circumstances. Now, the couple is willing to sell the house to the adult James at a very reasonable price. James and Sophie shared a history, and, as you might guess, strange things begin happening in the house and James feels the spirit of Sophie is still there.Light sets up the right spooky but not outright scary atmosphere in the house as James is inexorably drawn to the upstairs room where Sophie lived. Claire feels it as well, and there's a lot of erotic tension and rivalry present. Light ratchets up the tension gradually, even though this is a fairly short novelette, until ... well, actually until two very different things happen, depending on which ending you read. The real beauty of this story is the fact that it reads equally well, equally logically, and equally dramatically with either ending, even though the feelings the reader has at the end are completely different.I'm usually hesitant about giving a very high review to a short piece on Amazon that the author charges for because some readers may object to paying money for a short, stand-alone work. In this case, however, the book works best as a fairly short work because readers can better appreciate the subtlety of Light's writing and the impact the alternate endings have. In some cases, an alternate ending to a story might be a gimmick; here, it's a way (or, more precisely, two ways) of demonstrating Light's considerable story telling talents.