31 Days of Halloween { review } The Blood Harvest by S.J. Bolton
The Blood Harvest by S.J. Bolton. © 2010 Minotaur Books. ISBN 9780312600518. Hardback. Horror. 384 pages. $25.99 US. Source: LibraryThing Early Reviewer Program
Synopsis: The Fletchers’ beautiful new house is everything they dreamed it would be. Built between two churches in Heptonclough, a small village on the moors that time forgot, it ought to be paradise for this young family of five, but they barely have a chance to settle in before they find that they’re anything but welcome. Someone seems to be trying to drive them away–at first with silly pranks but then with threats that become increasingly dangerous, especially to the oldest child, ten-year-old Tom Fletcher, who begins to believe that someone is always watching him.
The adults in Tom’s life are trying to help, including his parents; the vicar next door, younger and more dashing than you’d expect a vicar to be; and a therapist, Evi Oliver, who believes him more than she wants to. But there are other clues that something isn’t quite right in Heptonclough, including the mysterious accidental deaths of three toddlers over the last ten years. It is not until Tom’s siblings, two-year-old Milly and five-year-old Joe Fletcher, go missing in turn that the little village’s evil secret turns the Fletchers’ dreams into a nightmare.
Review: This is easily one of the best books I’ve read in ages. I had a very hard time putting it down. It’s got everything a good gothic horror story should have: creepy atmosphere, a strange ghostlike creature, an old church, someone in trouble, even English moors!
The Fletchers have moved into the tiny village of Heptonclough. It wasn’t exactly easy, as the town’s “ruling” family, the Renshaws, didn’t want them moving in at all, let alone building a new house on the moors near the churches (one a medieval ruin, the other “new”–Victorian-era).
The Fletchers’ two boys, Tom and Joe, take to playing in the church and the graveyard as it’s been abandoned for quite some time. But not long after the Fletchers move in, a new vicar is installed in the church. He likes the boys and takes an interest in their welfare and that of their sister, Millie. Which is a good thing because he starts to hear that Heptonclough isn’t a safe place for little girls.
Add to this a young woman who believes that her daughter who died in a fire a number of years ago is still alive and living on the moors (and the psychiatrist trying to help her), disembodied voices, strange medieval (or older) rituals that take place in the town, and a strange creature only seen by the Fletcher children, and you’ve got one creepy story.
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