The Woman In Black is a haunted ghost chiller by Susan Hill. Written in 1983, it has been adapted into a 2012 movie starring Daniel Radcliffe, two BBC radio plays, filmed for TV, and a London play which has been running for thirty-six years, making it the longest running non-musical play after The Mousetrap.
Written in the style of a traditional gothic thriller (and subtitled A Ghost Story) it's simpler and different than the Radcliffe movie, as young solicitor Arthur Kips recalls a strange and tragic story from his past. He was sent to organize and collect the papers of the late Alice Drablow from her large rambling home named Eel Marsh House in a small coastal town in northern England. The residents there are reluctant to help or talk about her, and warn him off staying. In the morning he hires a pony carriage to drive him out, reminded that the causeway to the house floods when the tide comes in, cutting him off from the mainland. He decides to stay overnight in the house. Over the next few days, knocking sounds are heard from behind locked doors, spectres appear half covered in shadow, and the dark history of the family emerges. Despite several attempts to leave, and attacks on his sanity, Arthur is pulled back to the house - unsure of, or unheeding the warning that when the woman in black appears to you, a child dies.
This was a quick read, but atmospheric and at some points delivered the requested chills. It's the kind of book that reminds you, as you are reading, that something might be, and probably is, just beside the doorway, in the darkened hall... Watching.
I was happy to see the novel was different from the movie. Having the chills amplified on screen didn't make them better than your own imagination. They also changed the story in ways that padded it out a little longer, but didn't improve it. The play is also an adaptation of this novel. Nothing beats reading the original, being right there in the dark candlelit room with Arthur as something unseen brushes against the back of your arm. A well written page turner.
My other reviews for Susan Hill:
1983 / Tradeback / 160 pages
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