Synopses & Reviews
Isis Villiers, the youngest of four children, relocates with her family to a cold, ominous castle in England. Isis, along with Lewis, her eldest brother, and twin brothers Spence and Harvey, feels despondent about their move to their mentally unstable grandfather's estate. Gone are the days when they played with ease, performing their favorite play, Isis and Orisis, in which Isis brings her brother back from the dead. Worse still, the family burial crypt lies on the grounds. Between the raving madness of her grandfather, the ghost stories told by Old Marsh, the groundskeeper, and her evil governess, Edyth, Isis cannot help but feel a sense of foreboding.
All but ignored by brothers Lewis and Spence and her bedridden mother, Isis finds strength and happiness only in Harvey. He is her salvation, her protector. That is until they are aroused by the shrieks of Isis, who cries for dear life when Edyth pushes her in a fit of rage from an upstairs window. In a desperate attempt to save his sister, Harvey tries to pull Isis up, only to plunge to his own death.
Isis seeks the comfort of Old Marsh, who tells her twisted tales of people bringing their loved ones back from the dead through the majestic power of the burial crypt. Remembering her childhood play, Isis begins to wonder: can she channel her loss to bring Harvey back? And if so, will Harvey want to return from what might be the magnificent world of beyond?
Review
"[A] feat of old-fashioned storytelling....This brief chiller should be read aloud, in a happy company ready to be distressed, while a surplus of Halloween candy sweetens Clegg's bitter little masterpiece." BookPage
Synopsis
New York Times-bestselling author Douglas Clegg brings us "Isis," a beautifully illustrated, unforgettable novella that is sure to become a classic tale of the supernatural.
Synopsis
New York Times bestselling author Douglas Clegg brings us Isis, a beautifully illustrated, unforgettable novella that is sure to become a classic tale of the supernatural.
If you lost someone you loved, what would you pay to bring them back from the dead?
Old Marsh, the gardener at Belerion Hall, warned the Villiers girl about the old ruins along the sea-cliffs. “Never go in, miss. Never say a prayer at its door. If you are angry, do not seek revenge by the Laughing Maiden stone or at the threshold of the Tombs. There be those who listen for oaths and vows….What may be said in innocence becomes flesh and blood in such places.”
She was born Iris Catherine Villiers. She became Isis.
From childhood until her sixteenth year, Iris Villiers wandered the stone-hedged gardens and the steep cliffs along the coast of Cornwall near her ancestral home. Surrounded by the stern judgments of her grandfather—the Gray Minister—and the taunts of her cruel governess, Iris finds solace in her beloved older brother who has always protected her. But when a tragic accident occurs from the ledge of an open window, Iris discovers that she possesses the ability to speak to the dead...
Be careful what you wish for…it just may find you.
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About the Author
Douglas Clegg is the
New York Times bestselling author of
The Priest of Blood,
Afterlife, and
The Hour Before Dark, among other novels. His short story collection,
The Machinery of Night, won a Shocker Award, and his first collection,
The Nightmare Chronicles, won both the Bram Stoker Award and the International Horror Guild Award. He lives with his husband, Raul, in New England, with a small menagerie of rescued animals.
Visit Douglas Clegg at www.DouglasClegg.