The House in the High Wood (Western Lights Series)
Dark Sleeper, Barlough's fantasy debut, earned kudos for its impressive recreation of the tone and texture of the Dickensian triple-decker. This second volume in his Western Lights Series duplicates the feat, immersing the reader in a Victorian pastiche thick with earthy characters, social politics and supernatural intrigue. Although set in a peculiar alternate world where modern civilization abuts a prehistoric wilderness, the novel focuses on daily life in rural Shilston Upcot and its disruption when mysterious Bede Wintermarch moves into Skylingden House, a brooding deserted mansion in the hills overlooking the town. Once the site of a monastery of mad friars, the house has been gossip fodder for decades, since its former owner was implicated in the shame and suicide of a vicar's daughter. Secrets dislodged by wagging tongues and the nocturnal activities of a giant predatory owl soon have rationalist Squire Mark Trench and his guest, writer Oliver Langley, exploring caverns beneath Skylingden and digging up clues to a macabre revenge plot. Barlough keeps the fantasy effectively low-key, grounding it in the eccentricities of a large, vividly drawn supporting cast that includes smarmy barrister Thomas Dogger and besotted bible-spouting stonemason Shank Bottom. Their vivid personalities sustain the multilayered plot through its subtly orchestrated build to a chilling crescendo, and affirm the author's talent for working a dark comedy of manners into an eerie Gothic melodrama.Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.