House of Windows

The haunting debut novel by the Bram Stoker Award-winning author—“think Henry James and Joyce Carol Oates with just a few paragraphs of Joe Lansdale” (Tor.com).   For the last few years, Veronica Croydon has been at the center of scandal, first as the younger woman for whom her famous professor left his wife, and then as his apparent widow. When a writer staying at the same vacation home as Veronica has the chance to hear her story, he jumps at it. What follows takes him to the dark heart of a father's troubled relationship with his only son, in a story that stretches from the Hudson Valley to Afghanistan; and from post-9/11 America to Victorian England.  House of Windows is a haunting exploration of a marriage under strain from forces both psychological and paranormal. With its combination of literary complexity and chilling supernatural violence, it is widely considered a masterpiece of contemporary horror fiction.  New introduction by Adam NevillReading Group Guide included  “John Langan is a writer of superb literary horror. Both House of Windows and The Fisherman are dark and unsettling contemporary masterpieces.” —Peter Straub, New York Times bestselling author

From Publishers Weekly

A two-time International Horror Guild Award finalist for short fiction, Langan pens a surprisingly plodding first novel. Lovely widow Veronica Croydon corners the unnamed narrator at a party and offers to relate the weird story of her husband, Roger, and his disappearance. She spins an odd tale of adultery, family struggles and a house possibly haunted by the spirit of Roger's son, Ted, a Special Forces officer who died in Afghanistan after Roger disowned and cursed him. Though Veronica's story spans two nights, the level of detail stretches the confessional conceit well beyond the bounds of believability. Literary allusions offer a spark of interest, but even fans of Lovecraft and Peter Straub, whom Langan tries hard to emulate, will find it difficult to navigate the unnecessary tangents and repetitious minutiae that plague this pseudoliterary potboiler. (Oct.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author

John Langan is the author of two novels, The Fisherman and House of Windows, and two collections of stories, The Wide, Carnivorous Sky and Other Monstrous Geographies and Mr. Gaunt and Other Uneasy Encounters. With Paul Tremblay, he co-edited Creatures: Thirty Years of Monsters. He is one of the founders of the Shirley Jackson Awards, for which he served as a juror during their first three years. Currently, he reviews horror and dark fantasy fiction for Locus magazine. His third collection, Sefira and Other Betrayals, is forthcoming in 2017. Langan has been nominated for the International Horror Guild Award and the Bram Stoker Award. He is an adjunct instructor at SUNY New Paltz, where he teaches classes in creative writing and Gothic literature. He lives in New York's Hudson Valley with his wife, younger son, and a house full of animals, some of whom he suspects move his things while he's asleep. (He's looking at you, cats.)

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