The Haunting of Hill House, by Shirley Jackson

A small group experience some strange goings on when they assemble at Hill House to see if ghosts exist.

This is my second Shirley Jackson novel. In a lot of ways, I'm surprised that it took me so long to discover her. I read We Have Always Lived in the Castle a few years ago and loved its eerie, macabre weirdness. It was her final novel and many consider it her best.

The Haunting of Hill House was published in 1959, some three years before We Have Always Lived in the Castle. It's more overtly comic and brought to mind American writers such as Patricia Highsmith and James Purdy. There are even similarities to the Australian classic Picnic at Hanging Rock, by Joan Lindsay.

The story concerns a Dr Montague, who wants to investigate abnormal psychic phenomena - basically, whether ghosts exist. He decides to rent out an old, isolated house that has a dark history and is considered haunted. He recruits two women. Eleanor is flighty and anxious, with a troubled background. She's long been a carer for her mother and has never had anything of her own. Theodora is more of an extrovert, confident and at ease with other people. The nephew of the owners, Luke Sanderson, is asked to overlook the house for the duration of the summer lease, and so forms a part of the group. Early on he's described as a liar and a thief, but his character turns out to be quite whimsical and almost charming. His smoothness reminded me a bit of a ventriloquist's dummy.

Various odd things happen during the group of four's short stay - writing on the walls, voices, violent weather - but it's hard to figure out whether these events are merely figments of the imagination.

In the later part of the novel, the doctor's wife, Mrs Montague, arrives with her companion, Arthur. She's a bossy figure, and a believer in ghosts. She commands a planchette, a device used in seances to communicate with ghosts and spirits. Mrs Montague is an almost comic figure, like the domineering women in James Purdy novels who appear at dramatic points in the story, invariably twirling a parasol.

What makes The Haunting of Hill House a success, besides the brilliant set pieces, moody atmosphere and campy comic relief, are the psychological portraits of the main characters, especially the wonderfully neurotic Eleanor. Shirley Jackson excels at drawing the inner life, our anxieties and worries about how we fit into the world around us. Eleanor swings between confidence in her friendships and place at Hill House and insecurity. Inevitably her confidence always collapses and she returns to her old, helpless self. While Eleanor is a pathetic figure, it's easy to feel sympathy for her.

Wonderfully enigmatic and moody, every word in this tale of terror sticks and won't leave you alone. A master story teller.