Abigale Hall: A Novel

Lauren A. Forry

Apr 2017 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

Amid the terror of the Second World War, seventeen-year-old Eliza and her troubled little sister Rebecca have had their share of tragedy, having lost their mother to the Blitz and their father to suicide. Forced to leave London to work for the mysterious Mr. Brownwell at Abigale Hall, they soon learn that the worst is yet to come. The vicious housekeeper, Mrs. Pollard, seems hell-bent on keeping the ghostly secrets of the house away from the sisters and forbids them from entering the surrounding town—and from the rumors that circulate about Abigale Hall. When Eliza uncovers some blood-splattered books, ominous photographs, and portraits of a mysterious woman, she begins to unravel the mysteries of the house, but with Rebecca falling under Mrs. Pollard’s spell, she must act quickly to save her sister, and herself, from certain doom.

Perfect for readers who hunger for the strange, Abigale Hall is an atmospheric debut novel where the threat of death looms just beyond the edge of every page. Lauren A. Forry has created a historical ghost story where the setting is as alive as the characters who inhabit it and a resonant family drama of trust, loyalty, and salvation.

Ratings and reviews

The book begins with great promise. Forry's prose is polished, well-crafted, and detailed. Unfortunately, that same detail that begins to weigh down this novel's prose is entirely lacking from the plot. The exciting mysteries of Thornecroft fall completely flat on resolution. The final answer to the mystery is so cheap as to be boring. The pacing, which drags on through the middle, weighed down by countless fruitless dream sequences, picks up speed at the end until what should be moments of great weight flit by without depth or consideration. Characters fall into the old trap of the horror genre of becoming senseless and frustratingly stupid, with protagonists making terrible decisions and antagonists possessing seemingly psychic knowledge about protagonists' activities. Worst of all, Forry has painted mental illness, neurodivergence, and age all as matters of terror and disgust. Another trope of the horror genre, but one which, in the 2020s, feels incredibly tired and insulting. It is worth noting that the only mentally atypical people in this novel who are not shown to be unchangeably evil and grossly manipulative are the men traumatized by war. It doesn't look good. Skip it.

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About the author

Lauren A. Forry was brought up in Pennsylvania before living in the woods outside of London. She earned her MFA in creative writing from Kingston University. There she was awarded the Faber and Faber Creative Writing MA Prize for her thesis work, Abigale Hall. Her short stories have since been published by Brick Moon Fiction, Lamplight magazine, and other sci-fi and horror anthologies. She currently resides in Bucks County, Pennsylvania.