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The Haunted

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The Haunted

Written by: Bentley Little
Narrated by: Dan Butler
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About this listen

The Perry family's new house is perfect - except for the weird behavior of the neighbors, and that odd smell coming from a dark corner in the basement. Pity no one warned the family about the house. Now it's too late. Because the darkness at the bottom of the basement stairs is rising.

©2012 Bentley Little (P)2012 AudioGO Anthologies & Short Stories Genre Fiction Horror Suspense Thriller & Suspense Scary Exciting
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The first 1/3 of this book is a masterclass in how to tell a horror story. Sure, it's a little hypersexualized, but Bentley Little develops a creepy atmosphere using genuinely chilling imagery, effective vivid description, and relatable characters that are easy to empathize with (Little writes the most realistic children I have read in a long time). Readers can easily put themselves in the story and feel the terror.
The author builds the tale using a most-interesting storytelling structure. The book is written in Third Person Omniscient - each chapter relating a frightening episode told from the perspective of a different character [Ex: Mom (Lawyer Claire) in the shower; Dad (Web Designer Julian) in his home office; Son (James - 10) in the backyard; Daughter (Megan - 14) playing Ouija with friends during a sleepover]. It works marvellously.
Unfortunately, Bentley veers into the bizarre, overly-involved, and questionably-relevant for the middle third of the novel, and then descends into the sappy and ludicrous for the final third. Additionally, he starts to rely on gore and explicit sex to maintain interest when the tale starts to fall apart - Little probably should have shelved this book, started another, and came back to finish it later.

The reading from Dan Butler is expressive and professional. His tone is appropriately sombre and he conveys fear very nicely. Despite delivering passable dialogue, however, his voice-acting is decidedly average (child and female voices are realistic, but sound similar). He furthermore reads at a too-slow pace - this book is best consumed at 1.15X - but Blackstone Audio did well to assign Butler to the project (and the sound engineers do a fantastic job adjusting the volume of whispery segments).

Despite being a Free offering with the Audible 'Plus' initiative, this book is worthy of 7.5 stars out of 10. 'The Haunted' is definitely disappointing (it could have been a peerless modern haunted house story).. but downloading this audiobook with decent writing, capable performance, and impressive quality standards is reasonable for listeners looking for a scare.

What Happened After Chapter 16?

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The story was pretty good. Not a whole lot struck me as new or groundbreaking, but it is a decent haunted house / family type story.
I feel it didn't have to be as long as it was. it could have been a 6-hour book with the same story. That said, I did enjoy the journey and was never bored. I would recommend this, but above this I would recommend the author's collection of short stories. I will give his other books a chance. 3.5 out of 5 is my total score.

Nice Family Drama with Horror Elements

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When I first started the book I couldn’t stop listening. I listened for 5 hours straight. I ended up finishing the book in a few days. It was great and kept me on the edge of my seat!

Great read!

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Not my usual but it was okay. Could have been more. Especially within character.

Okay read.

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I don’t want to say I enjoyed it. I felt uneasy when I was listening to it and when I wasn’t listening to it. I had to finish it hoping to rid the gross feelings it gave me. The story has a way of getting under your skin and burrowing into your life. 10/10 recommend if you like that creepy feeling. 0/10 if you don’t like that feeling.
Full disclosure: if I was reading this book I would’ve skimmed it to finish faster. I wanted to rid myself of the hebejeebees as fast as possible. Audible does not allow that so you have to stay creeped out until the bitter end.

Made me feel uneasy

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