Showing posts with label Lancashire. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lancashire. Show all posts

Sunday 29 April 2012

Review: Simon Bestwick, The Faceless (Solaris, 2012)


The Faceless is a new horror novel by Simon Bestwick, and published by Solaris. Set (mostly) in the Lancashire town on Kempforth, it tells the story of the investigation into a series of missing person cases, and the apparent appearance of the local bogeymen, ‘the Spindly Men’, previously only known as a nursery tale used to scare children. The blurb on the back of the cover promises that it will be ‘a breath-taking tale of the supernatural’.

I must admit, I was a little worried about reading this book and writing a review. Simon Bestwick was one of the writers I contacted in my role as Project Co-ordinator for Hic Dragones, and, as a result, he took part in the Manchester Monster Convention that my company organized. Simon was a great guest speaker – funny, engaging and supportive – and his novel, The Faceless, sounded so fascinating, so I was just a little bit nervous… what if the book was disappointing and I ended up having to write a bad review? That would have been awful!

Fortunately, and I’ll say this upfront, my worries were completely unfounded. The Faceless is well-written, compelling and utterly creepy.

Although the missing persons investigation is an important part of the plot, this is not a police procedural story. Sure, as detectives Joan Renwick and Mike Stakowski (and the rest of their team) begin their search for four people who don’t seem to have much in common – except that the ‘Spindly Men’ were sighted around the time each one disappeared – there are moments that will be recognizable from other crime fiction: the team don’t always trust Renwick’s methods; there’s pressure from a boss desperate for ‘results’; the lead detectives are haunted by the demons of their own pasts. However, Bestwick’s detectives (particularly Renwick and Stakowski) are three-dimensional and sympathetic – much more than simply generic stereotypes.

In addition to this, the police investigation is only one aspect of the story. It is intertwined with two other plotlines. The first involves Anna Mason, her brother Martyn and his child Mary. Anna is a local historian who has moved back to Kempforth to be with her family. Early on in the book, Martyn (recovering from a breakdown) has experienced a serious trauma, and Anna is trying to help him cope. After an early confrontation with the ‘Spindly Men’, Anna and Martyn become dragged into the horror that is beginning to engulf Kempforth.

At the same, celebrity psychic Allen Cowell is called by his apparent ‘spirit guides’ to return to his home town and assist the police investigate the disappearances. Allen and his sister, Vera, escaped their brutal childhood in Kempforth years earlier, and had vowed never to return. However, in order to escape his own personal ghosts, Allen must do as his guides instruct and head back to, as Vera puts it, ‘the bastard North’. I wasn’t expecting to find Allen and Vera particularly interesting – as, on face value, a celebrity psychic involved in a police investigation doesn’t seem to be anything too new – but Vera was, probably, my favourite character of the entire novel. The bleakness of the pair’s lives, and the brutality of their history, was really gripping.

These three main storylines weave around one another, before eventually coming together, as Renwick and Stakowski, Anna and Martyn, and Allen and Vera must team up to work out what exactly is going on. Again, while this might seem like a bit of a cliché, there is a fresh and engaging quality to the way Bestwick constructs it. A lot of this is a result of his ability to create real and believable characters. There are no cardboard cut-outs in this book.

That said, The Faceless is a horror novel. And while my own preference might be for horror that is driven by compelling and well-rounded characters, some of you might be wondering when I’m going to actually say something about the dark stuff…

In this respect as well, Bestwick’s novel does not disappoint. I must admit, I was somewhat skeptical about the return of childhood demons as actually figures of horror – I’ve read that in other books, so was not sure whether the ‘Spindly Men’ could go where other nursery rhyme monsters have not gone before. In fact, these are not the real vehicle of horror. Although they are truly creepy creations, they are far from being the most horrific things the protagonists must face. Readers, like the characters in the novel, might initially blame the deaths and disappearances on these supernatural beings, but the truth (as it is slowly revealed) is much, much more disturbing.

As the novel progresses, the cruelty and brutality (some might say ‘evil’) that runs through Kempforth’s history begins to come to light. As Anna Mason’s historical research is added to Allen’s visions and the detectives’ investigations, the extent of the dangers becomes apparent and the protagonists’ search for answers leads them inextricably to the long-since abandoned hospital at Ash Fell. This hospital is at once a grotesque and a chilling creation. Like all good horror locations, Ash Fell has its ‘real life’ historical basis, but it is taken to its ultimate and terrible conclusion. Perhaps, again, this my own personal preference, but it was the historical basis for Ash Fell that chilled me the most, and it was this that lingered with me after I’d finished reading the book. I won’t say any more, plot-wise, as this book has a lot of twists and I don’t want to stumble into spoiler territory – suffice to say, a lot of things are not what they seem.

There is a lot of plot of in The Faceless, but this is not a bad thing. The main strengths of Bestwick’s writing, for me, lie in his constructions of people and place. (As I said, my own preference is for books where I am genuinely rooting for the characters, but I also like to feel immersed in the ‘world’ of the book.) However, I would say that Bestwick has also created a story that is original and memorable, and it unfolds at just the right pace. His version of ‘ghosts’ and ‘hauntings’ is also unusual, and unlike much recent horror and supernatural fiction.

Overall, I highly recommend The Faceless, as one of the best UK horror novels I have read recently. I always slightly distrust reviews of horror where the writer claims to have been left scared after finishing the book, so I won’t say that. I will say, though, that The Faceless left me distinctly unsettled and disturbed. And what more could you ask from a piece of horror fiction?

Tuesday 22 November 2011

CFP: Capturing Witches: Histories, Stories, Images.

400 years after the Lancashire Witches.

17-19 August
Lancaster, UK

2012 will mark the 400th anniversary of the trial and execution of the Lancashire Witches. This conference is part of a year long programme of events which will take place in Lancaster and the surrounding area. This interdisciplinary conference uses the Lancashire witches as a focal point to engage with wider questions about witchcraft, and in particular how witchcraft is theorised and represented in and through history and across cultures.

CALL FOR PAPERS:

This interdisciplinary conference uses the Lancashire witches as a focal point to engage with wider questions about witchcraft: its definitions as maleficium will focus particular attention on how witchcraft is theorised and represented in and through history and across cultures. We particularly encourage considerations of literary, musical, artistic and filmic representations of witchcraft.

We invite proposals for 20-minute papers and panels on witches and/or witchcraft which might address - but are not limited to - the following themes:

- antiquity;

- religion and belief;

- Neo-Paganism;

- the developing world;

- human rights;

- gender;

- corporeality;

- location;

- ritual (ceremony, performance, magical practice);

- childhood;

- language;

- law;

- consumption ( dress, fashion, food);

- the arts (literature, music, film, painting, dance, theatre, graphic novels);

- the Gothic;

- new media

Proposals for contributions which go beyond the conventional academic format are also welcome.
Proposals (paper: 250 words, panel/other format: 500 words) including a 50-word bio for each contributor should be sent to the conference team by 1 December 2011 to the conference organizers. Decisions on submissions will be made by 31 January 2012. For more information, see the conference website.

Conference team: Charlotte Baker, Alison Findlay, Liz Oakley-Brown, Elena Semino, Catherine Spooner

Sunday 22 August 2010

Books We Like...

Lancashire's Sacred Landscape: from Prehistory to the Viking Age, ed. by Linda Sever (The History Press, 2010)

A new collection published by The History Press, and edited by a good friend and colleague of mine. As a Lancashire lass myself (well, near enough), I think it's great to see a book exploring some of the rich historical and folkloric heritage of the county. Here's what the publishers say:


Lancashire, situated in the north west of England, does not at first tend to conjure up an image of 'a sacred landscape'. But look a bit deeper and one will discover a vast array of sites of ritual and early worship. Archaeological remains of prehistoric stone circles, cairns and burial chambers, pre-Christian place-names, Anglo-Saxon and Viking stone sculpture, as well as tales of fairies and 'otherworldly' creatures within the folklore and legend are spread throughout the county. Within this book the reader will find a discussion of all these, including a comprehensive gazetteer of prehistoric sites, listings of place names, locations of stone sculpture and detailed analyses of carvings and the inscriptions upon them, as well as a personal, experiential approach to landscape. Extensive photographs illustrate the sites described within the chapters.

The contributors to this book are from a variety of academic disciplines - geology, archaeology, art history, history, place-name and folklore research. They have spent many years deeply engaged in their own different areas of research in order to produce this wide-ranging material. Each chapter is accompanied by details of how to visit the sites in discussion.
For more information, please click here.