Wylding Hall, by Elizabeth Hand

[rachelmanija]

A fantastic dark fantasy/understated horror/Gothic short novel about a group of musicians in the 60s who record an album at an old English house in one of those old English towns where everyone who lives there knows where not to go and what not to talk about. It's told entirely in interviews with the surviving band members and a few others, with complete with offhand remarks that are utterly chilling in context.

The style is very different from what I've read by hand before: very pared-down, as fits the conceit, while her other works I've read were very dense and lush. The style works beautifully with the old-school horror in which there is no graphic violence, no gore other than a few (fucking terrifying, in context) drops of blood, and almost everything is scarier for being glimpsed and hinted at rather than shown or explained.

And then every now and then something is shown, and it nearly gives you a heart attack.



MORE THAN ONE ROW OF TEETH.



The band seems to be loosely based on Fairport Convention, which also spent a month at an old building rented by their manager so they could record an album and recover from a tragedy. (Their roadie fell asleep at the wheel; in the ensuing accident, all of them were injured, some severely, and their drummer Martin Lamble and Jeannie Franklyn, Richard Thompson's girlfriend, were killed.) Like the band in the novel, they were all in their late teens and early twenties. Though Julian, the singer/songwriter, seems based on Nick Drake.

The atmosphere of the 60s folk-rock scene is beautifully evoked, as is the atmosphere of creeping horror. I read this book before going to sleep, and dreamed that I was lost inside what had at first appeared to be a normal apartment complex, but I couldn't find my way out and I kept coming across horrifying things. The only one I remember was the sort of amusement-park type pool that has life-size dolphins attached to moving rods so they move above the water and then go under it. Only instead of fake dolphins, it was those horrible mummified "mermaids" made by sewing the top half of a monkey to the bottom half of a fish, and they were dolphin-sized and rotting.

The audio book has multiple narrators; I'd love to listen to that. But not at night.

Wylding Hall





skygiants, thanks so much for the rec!

Comments

[just_ann_now]

I loved that book! It was the first Elizabeth Hand I'd ever read.

[scioscribe]

I love this one. I think it was the one-two punch of reading this and Generation Loss that made me start buying up all the Elizabeth Hand books I ran into.

[rachelmanija]

I haven't read Generation Loss. What's it like?

[scioscribe]

It's this really dark and unusual mystery novel. Cass Neary, the narrator, is middle-aged, burned out, and barely scraping by, but she was a kind of punk/avant-garde photographer in the New York art scene in the eighties, one with particularly dark inclinations. She gets a job to interview a reclusive photographer in Maine, but when she goes there, she winds up embroiled in danger and mystery. It's got a haunting, lush atmosphere, and it's full of interesting details about photography. I've read the first sequel, Available Dark, which is even darker and weirder, involving amazing Iceland tourism and murders staged to look like things associated with Krampus. It's also great.

There's at least one more, but I haven't read it yet.

[rachelmanija]

That sounds great. I will check it out.

[osprey_archer]

Ohh, that sounds excellent. Although clearly a book to read at ten o'clock in the morning!

[havocthecat]

Ooh, wait, this sounds familiar. I might have read this one! I should go dig it up and see if I've read it or if it'll be fresh and new. Either way, I should read it!

[owlectomy]

I thought that I remembered this one, but no! I've read Black Light, her OTHER dark fantasy/folk horror book about musicians, in America rather than England!

I liked Black Light very much. I want to read Wylding Hall but I think I'll get to the Cass Neary books first.

[cat_i_th_adage]

It looks interesting. Thank you for the rec.

[skygiants]

That final set of images is just SO viscerally unnerving! (That, and the bit where the one band member ends up climbing up the endless Utena stairs....)

[rachelmanija]

Yes, the stairs. And the music no one is singing. And the casual mention of "When they dig up the barrow."

[radiantfracture]

Thanks for this! I checked out the audiobook from the local library (yay local library) and started listening yesterday. The multi-cast reading is pretty fun.

[evewithanapple]

It's funny you posted this now, because I just finished a re-read - my book club did a Secret Santa recommendation exchange, and I gave my assignee this book, so I figured I should reread it before the next meeting. It's just as evocative and spooky as I remember, although nothing will ever supplant Waking the Moon as my favourite Elizabeth Hand book. (It rocked my world in high school and I never went back.)

[rachelmanija]

How funny!

Waking the Moon was also my first, but Wylding Hall has supplanted it as my favorite.

[cahn]

Amazon should get a commission from you, I feel like about every other time you post a book review I end up buying the book. :P Non-traditional narratives are my jam. So far I'm super intrigued (about 20% in).

[rachelmanija]

YAY! Looking forward to your reaction.