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The Little Stranger / Sarah Waters
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One of the main characters in this neo-gothic novel is a crumbling old manor house in Warwickshire called Hundreds Hall, which has as much of a role in The Little Stranger as the mansion in Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” or Manderley in Du Maurier’s Rebecca.

Hundreds is the home of the Ayres Family, once-distinguished, but now suffering with the changes stirring in England after World War II, all the while trying to keep up appearances with ever dwindling resources. The path of a local general practioner, Dr. Faraday, connects with the landed family, and their fates become ever more entwined as the story progresses.

Strange goings-on begin to plague Hundreds. Grievous accidents occur, bells ring unexpectedly, strange writing appears on walls, and unexplained sounds are heard. The Ayres son is the first to fall and is institutionalized with his precarious mental state. Not long thereafter the mother is tormented by what she thinks is the spirit of her long-deceased daughter.

Dr. Faraday proposes marriage to the spinster daughter at Hundreds, but whatever happiness he envisioned is seemingly doomed by the curse attached to the house. Is it a poltergeist, a ghost, a mischievous servant, or someone or something else with evil intents on the house’s inhabitants? You’ll be guessing until the end, and I dare say, even after that.©Ken Vesey, 28 Jan 2010

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