A Face at the Window Horror Book Review

Paperback: 320 pages Publisher: Broadway; Reprint edition (February 2, 1998) Language: English ISBN: 0767901304 Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches A Face at the Window is a rare treat—a critically acclaimed literary novel that is also a charming tale of the supernatural. The plot is a bit like Stephen King’s The Shining: a man who is sober after years of alcohol abuse undergoes a mid-life crisis while staying in a haunted hotel, and gets so involved with the ghosts he becomes estranged from his wife. The emphasis here, though, is on how the personalities of three ghosts (a violently drunken man, an adolescent girl with a split personality, and a bratty boy) mirror long-standing anxieties within the narrator. As the Boston Book Review writes, “By cleverly shifting the mystery of the novel from action to character, ... McFarland is able to imply that underlying our everyday lives are forces as inexplicable, with as much potential for horror, as any spine tingling tale.” But we horror readers already knew that, didn’t we?