3 out of 4 stars
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After a scandal causing him to lose his job, James Dawson relocates his family to Blackwater House. This new life is intended to help heal his marriage, especially as he can have his own law practice and provide his wife with her dream house. When they arrive the townsfolk avoid them, and it isn't long before weird happenings set back all of the work they have done to improve their marriage. Can the ghosts of the past be stopped before history repeats itself, resulting in tragedy?
Paul McParland's Blackwater: A Gothic Horror starts off slowly, creating a background story for the reader to better understand the problems that lead the family to their new home. Normally, I grow bored with such details, but by subconsciously remembering that this novel is subtitled “A Gothic Horror” made it enjoyable; truly gothic tales are not known for high-speed action, making McParland's novel slow start quite appropriate.
I liked that it is set in 1982 rather than in present day; with our current reliance on technology, it would have been too easy for the characters to whip out their cell phones to research the history of the house. Karen, James' wife and mother to their children, spends time going to the library to look through old newspapers to unravel the mystery of why the townsfolk act so coldly towards her family. I appreciated the work Karen had to do and the relationship she formed with the librarian; it truly reminded me of the days before the internet when micro-fiche machines were the way to find information.
Unfortunately, there were too many punctuation and grammar errors throughout the book to make it completely immersible. Early in the novel, there is an instance where James' mother tells Karen that she allows her husband to have his extramarital affairs, using them as leverage to get whatever she wants. I found this conversation to be surreal, but I am not from the same generation nor the same social class to understand the reasoning behind this scenario; even though I questioned the logic, I acknowledge that my lack of experience in these exact situations is not the fault of the author.
Overall, I rate this book 3 out of 4 stars. There were too many errors to be able to give it a perfect rating; these errors could be limited (if not entirely eliminated) with a few more rounds of editing. I would recommend this novel to fans of horror, but I would advise them that it is not action-packed and that there are several grammar errors.
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Blackwater
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