Laura's Reviews > The House of Lost Souls

When I was a kid reading a good book meant immersing myself in the story so deeply that often coming back to the "real world" was like waking up from a dream. That rarely happens now that I'm an adult, there's a part of my brain that always remains distant from the story and never really stops thinking about things like groceries and whether the dog needs a bath. I miss that feeling of really losing myself in a book and am always on the lookout for a book that can help me recreate it. I am happy to say that F.G. Cottam's The House of Lost Souls is that kind of a book.

I find myself wanting to use the word "atmosphere" to describe Cottam's book. Many times while reading I'll find myself skimming over the descriptions because they never stop being words on a page, but Cottam can describe the way the afternoon light slants in through a window, or the sound of a neighbor's stereo, in a way that you can see - and almost feel - the reality of the scene. Not only does this give his characters and story more depth, but it makes the scary parts much, much scarier. I found myself haunted by some of the scary images in Cottam's book the way I hadn't been since I first read The Shining. And not necessarily even the climactic scenes, in fact one of the scariest moments for me was when Paul Seaton notices a shopkeeper looking at him through a store window. Paul is across the street in a phone booth, the details are indistinct and they don't exchange a word, but the scene is terrifying.

The only problem I had with House of Lost Souls was that when I was done reading it I couldn't settle down to read anything else. Nothing else was as well written, as atmospheric and most of all as frightening as Cottam's book. In the end the only way I could solve the problem was by going to bookdepository.com and ordering both his other books. I may still be dissatisfied with other books, but at least that gives me something to look forward to.