Book review. The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters.

This book could give you nightmares, it certainly made me want to sleep with the light on. However, it isn't your typical ghost story. There are no "Casper" looking ghosts, yet there is something odd and unexplainable happening at Hundreds Hall. The novel leaves the reader in confusion. Is there a supernatural force or are the characters suffering from madness and hysteria?

Sarah Waters writes the book well. It made me want to keep reading, I couldn't put it down. She creates suspense beautifully. I found myself wanting something to happen, as the build up throughout the story was fluent but slow. As the reader, I could tell that there was something mysterious happening in the hall. It isn't  proven that there is a supernatural force causing trouble, yet the strange occurrences add to the mystery.

We witness the events through the eyes of Dr Faraday, our first person narrator. Faraday's reliability as a narrator is questionable. For instance, he doesn't witness many of the events which happen. Instead, they are reported to him by the characters who live in the hall. Perhaps Faraday is suffering from madness, and the characters are trying to provoke him? Or, maybe there is a poltergeist? Faraday being a doctor means that he is a man of science. He persists that the supernatural doesn't exist, and everything that happens is just a coincidence. At the end of the novel, he seems to change his mind and doesn't know what to think. Can we therefore trust what we have been told, since he goes back on his word? Faraday is also in love with a female who lives in the Hall. Could he have pursued the events because of a broken heart, or is he seeing everything through love tainted eyes?

An unreliable narrator is just one of the gothic techniques which Waters uses. Hundreds Hall is a decayed manor which is beyond repair. Typically, it is isolated from the town, only surrounded by land. A classic gothic technique. It seems more likely that a ghost would haunt an old, isolated place with lots of history. At times, the reader grows frustrated with Faraday, as from the outside we can clearly see that the characters who live at the hall are in trouble, yet he often fails to do anything until after the incident has happened. Waters clearly knows how to leave the reader frustrated, with many questions unanswered at the end of the novel.

If you like gothic fiction, or just fancy a change from your normal taste, I'd recommend reading this book. See if you can come to a conclusion, Waters leaves the book so open to interpretation, that I think each reader will take away something different.