A Head Full of Ghosts
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A Head Full of Ghosts
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Narrated by:
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Joy Osmanski
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Written by:
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Paul Tremblay
About this listen
A chilling thriller that brilliantly blends psychological suspense and supernatural horror, reminiscent of Stephen King's The Shining, Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House and William Peter Blatty's The Exorcist.
The lives of the Barretts, a suburban New England family, are torn apart when 14-year-old Marjorie begins to display signs of acute schizophrenia. To her parents' despair, the doctors are unable to halt Marjorie's descent into madness. As their stable home devolves into a house of horrors, they reluctantly turn to a local Catholic priest for help and soon find themselves the unwitting stars of The Possession, a hit reality television show. When events in the Barrett household explode in tragedy, the show and the shocking incidents it captures become the stuff of urban legend. Fifteen years later a best-selling writer interviews Marjorie's younger sister, Merry. As she recalls the terrifying events that took place when she was just eight years old, long-buried secrets and painful memories begin to surface, and a mind-bending tale of psychological horror is unleashed.
©2015 Paul Tremblay (P)2016 Bolinda Publishing Pty LtdCritic Reviews
"Terrific.... Generates a haze of an altogether more serious kind: the pleasurable fog of calculated, perfectly balanced ambiguity." ( The New York Times Book Review)
What listeners say about A Head Full of Ghosts
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
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- 04-03-19
A head full of voices
#spoilers Maybe 😶
I've been fascinated with the idea of reading "A head full of ghosts" by Paul Tremblay. Inspite of the mixed reviews I blindly trusted Stephen King when he said, "Scared the living hell out of me, and I'm pretty hard to scare."
Apparently I'm harder to scare, because the book neither inspired fear, nor terror and definitely not disgust.
If anything it's a retelling of a family, spiralling downward into irrevocable death, literally. The entire book alternates between Meridith and Karen Brisette.
Meridith Barett, now 23, recalls to famous author Rachel, the time 15 years ago when her possibly schizophrenic older sister, Marjory, was suspected of demonic possession. Wham, in the craze of docuseries and reality TV, when the word of Marjory's possession gets out, praying the demon out of her becomes into a highly rated reality TV show, The Possession.
Thanks to the fame of The Possession, the Barett mansion turns into a run down decrepit house of horrors, especially because of how the show ended.
Karen, a blogger who seems to have an unhealthy obsession with the show, 15 years later deconstructs the 6 part series in her blog, painstakingly, scene by scene.
Now that I'm done with giving the blurb, without giving away spoilers, let's talk about why the hell isn't this book scary?!
What I liked: Tremblay's portrayal of two young sisters, especially Merry (Meredith). Having a young son myself, the authenticity of an 8 year old's thought process, actions, fears and voice and bang on.
What I disliked: There's so much focus on Merry's character arc, that everyone else pales in comparison. Considering that Marjory, the parents and Father Wanderly had key roles in the story line, to me, many things remained unanswered. Also I would have liked had there been a doubt in my mind about Marjory's possession, but honestly there wasn't any and that's why it wasn't scary.
It was clear that Marjory was a disturbed child, but there wasn't a back story that would explain why Marjory was the way Marjory was.
Of course there were small flashes into the past, but not enough to connect the dots.
All in all, I would give this book a 3/5 rating. Also recommend that you read, not because you like things that go bump in the dark, but because it is heartbreaking to watch a family disintegrate from the eyes of an 8 year old.
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