Book Review: "The Room in the Attic" by Louise Douglas

So, Kindle Unlimited books are back on the menu. I wanted to read a paperback thriller, the kind you would find at the travel shops at train stations. However, I wasn't willing to spend the money on a buy-one-get-one-free deal on one book I really wanted and another book I just got to make up the deal. The hack is this: a lot of these books are available on Kindle Unlimited. I found out this hack today, shortly after another woman complimented me on my t-shirt. It was black and had the logo for The Rocky Horror Picture Show on it in giant lettering.

I'm going to do this in time order rather in order of how it appears in the book because it will be easier. In the book, the story goes back and forth between various storylines. In 1903, there's some fishermen in Dartmoor who discover a woman in a coma and a little girl with trauma in a boat. The fishermen take them to a place called All Hallows which is a weird asylum in the middle of nowhere. When the little girl wakes up, she's in an attic room under the care of Nurse Emma Everdeen.

This is quite a secluded place in the asylum and though we learn the little girl's name is Harriet - we don't learn too much more about her. Honestly, there's something really creepy about books set in weird, remote asylums with haunted, empathetic nurses. Of course there's the added layer concerning the way in which the child and the woman were found - Louise Douglas's story really does awaken a new yearning for older settings in thrillers - especially those from the day of asylums and institutions which didn't follow ethics and morals.

In 1993, All Hallows is a boarding school and by 2021 it is fully abandoned. In 1993 when Lewis Tyler's mother dies, he is sent away to the school when his father quickly remarries. He is put in the attic dorm with a boy called Isak and the two form a bond. Their routines and isolation begins to mirror that which Harriet experiences in the 1903 timeline. At the same time, the boys begin to witness strange things happening, for example: they often hear footsteps and the creaking of a rocking chair. Instead of leaving it alone, the boys begin to investigate what's happening. There are clear implications that the timelines will converge in some way. Honestly, I love the haunting and isolated atmosphere of this novel, it is so brilliantly done. Short chapters with lots of tension often allows for the reader to feel the pace in the best way.

As Lewis and Isak start to uncover things about the existence of the asylum, they also start to understand more about Harriet and what she was doing in the attic, learning even more so about why Emma had taken her there. The inherited trauma from the years manifests in more supernatural happenings and the boys start to experience whimpers in the night. They find parallels between the way in which the school treats its students and the way the asylum treated the inmates. I was pretty surprised about the turn this book was taking here because it would be really easy for the writer to do the obvious thing - in this case though, the writer wanted to take us on a moral journey through time. This was something so much more difficult and yet, so beautifully crafted.

This really is a story about brutality and shared experience. But on top of that it is also a story about the way in which places are often connected to people's stories. From the outset of the novel when Lewis Tyler returns to All Hallows to go back to the time - he sets off in search of place. Returning to the place to find peace is part of the journey. He needs to stop waking to nightmares in the middle of the night and he needs to stop worrying about his own mind. The only way he can do this is to confront the place because that is where his own trauma lies and the traumas of so many other people.

Louise Douglas does a beautiful job of crafting a story with a sense of place, a brilliant pacing and a story that is really unforgettable. I am quite surprised it was available on Kindle Unlimited but I am very glad I read it.