Review of A Stir of Echoes

Dated but in a creepy way, A Stir of Echoes remains a spine-chilling read even more than a century after it was first released.

A tale of hypnosis and ghosts and the thin line between the here and the ever-after, thebook poses psychological questions with the subtlety of a breeze but then tends to answer those questions with the delicacy of a back-handed slap.

Tom is a quiet company man in 1950s America (this time period is never quantified by the author although the language gives it away) and he lives a quiet life until, one quiet evening, he is hypnotised by his brother-in-law and his psychic abilities are quietly awakened.

He goes from hearing the thoughts of his neighbours to channelling the spirit of a woman who previously lived in his home.

In short, his life becomes a waking
nightmare.

More renowned for his first book, the ground-breaking, I Am Legend, Richard Matheson was apparently horror supremo, Stephen King’s biggest inspiration and from this book, it’s easy to see the similarities in the writing. Both men tended to take humdrum life and interpose a person’s daily boredoms with that-which-shouldn’t-be.

Both men write with a languid but colourful style and both have the ability to shock when it is least expected.

In A Stir of Echoes, Tom’s daily boredoms give way to fantastic occurrences which, in turn, give way to hair-raising tension and those aforementioned back-handed slaps.

Poe-ian in its scope of desperation and one man’s descent into darkness, don’t read this one alone at night.