The Woman in Black

What real reader does not yearn, somewhere in the recesses of his or her heart, for a really literate, first-class thriller -- one that chills the body, but warms the soul with plot, perception, and language at once astute and vivid? In other words, a ghost story written by Jane Austen? Alas, we cannot give you Austen, but Susan Hill's remarkable Woman in Black comes as close as our era can provide. Set on the obligatory English moor, on an isolated causeway, the story has as its hero Arthur Kipps, an up-and-coming young solicitor who has come north from London to attend the funeral and settle the affairs of Mrs. Alice Drabow of Eel Marsh House. The routine formalities he anticipates give way to a tumble of events and secrets more sinister and terrifying than any nightmare: the rocking chair in the deserted nursery, the eerie sound of a pony and trap, a child' scream in the fog, and most dreadfully -- and for Kipps most tragically -- The Woman in Black. The Woman in Black is both a brilliant exercise in atmosphere and controlled horror and a delicious spine-tingler -- proof positive that this neglected genre, the ghost story, isn't dead after all. --This text refers to the audioCD edition. ''Artfully crafted and absolutely capable of raising the hair on the back of your neck. The Woman in Black is quite as good as any of Edith Wharton's ghost stories.'' --myindividualtake.blogspot.com Praise for Susan Hill's The Man in the Picture : ''Hill manipulates the gothic darkness of her story with great dexterity and subtlety. . . Her tale is a commendable exercise in the tradition of the antiquarian ghost story.'' -- Publishers Weekly Praise for Susan Hill's The Man in the Picture : ''Hill manipulates the gothic darkness of her story with great dexterity and subtlety. . . Her tale is a commendable exercise in the tradition of the antiquarian ghost story.'' -- Publishers Weekly Praise for Susan Hill's The Man in the Picture : ''Hill manipulates the gothic darkness of her story with great dexterity and subtlety. . . Her tale is a commendable exercise in the tradition of the antiquarian ghost story.'' -- Publishers Weekly --This text refers to the audioCD edition. SUSAN HILL is married to the Shakespeare scholar, Stanley Wells, and they have two daughters. She lives in Gloucestershire, where she runs her own small publishing firm, Longbarn Books. --This text refers to the audioCD edition. Read more