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The Good House
The Good House
Author: Tananarive Due
From the American Book Award winner and author of "one of the most talked about debuts in the horror field since the advent of Stephen King" (Publishers Weekly) comes a terrifying story of supernatural suspense, as a woman searches for the inherited power that can save her hometown from evil forces.Tananarive Due's first three novels gain...  more »
ISBN-13: 9780743475983
ISBN-10: 0743475984
Publication Date: 9/2003
Pages: 320
Rating:
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Publisher: Atria Books
Book Type: Hardcover
Other Versions: Paperback
Members Wishing: 4
Reviews: Member | Amazon | Write a Review
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This book was suspenseful and disturbing, as a good horror story should be. I had many moments of saying "Oh no!" I found that I couldn't put it down even when the horror elements were a little nauseating for me. Due's got chops.

The book draws heavily on the persistence of African religion in African-American life. The protagonist is the grand-daughter of a practitioner of voudoun who has come under a curse from a malicious spirit in spite of her long service to the god Papa Legba. Several of the characters believed in a syncretistic mix of Christianity and traditional African religion. They engaged in "ritual practices to gain power"--magic.

I appreciated the way that the author credited her research, explaining that people who want to really understand this religious tradition should read non-fiction. That was respectful.

An interesting thing about this book for me was that the female protagonist could blame the bad (abusive, violent) behavior of her ex-husband and (and to a lesser extent, of her son) on demonic possession. This created what was for me a very uncomfortable scene where the ex-husband is really valiantly resisting the impulse to stalk and abuse his ex-wife.

Another piece that felt uncomfortable to me was the incorporation of real-life racist violence into the fictional narrative. Knowing what I know about African-American history, I could recognize some of the incidents that happened to the characters as too true-to-life to go into a story about demonic possession. Shouldn't all novels tell some truth? This one did, even though it was a horror story and all about making things exotic and entertaining. I want to read more by this author.


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