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26 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
It's scary how awful this is!, January 10, 2010
I'm a social history dork. I also love old houses. AND I love anything medical, especially anything having to do with pregnancy and birth. I thought that this book was going to combine all of those loves and wrap them up into the sort of horror story that you can't put down at night, partly because you keep wanting to know what happens next, and partly because you don't want to turn out the lights. You know those sorts of scary books that leave you as a grown adult afraid to get out of bed at night to go to the bathroom? That's what I was hoping for.
I didn't get it.
There's just not enough back story on the birthing house, for starters. Conrad moves in and the previous owner hands him a scrap book of the house. Conrad spots a picture that looks like his wife - and throws the whole book in the fire. The history dork in me recoiled in horror. That was probably the scariest part in the book for me. We have an old house, built in the 20s. Lots of people buy old houses and find interesting stuff in them. We didn't find a whole lot. Some old keys, some old wall paper. Nothing great. This guys gets an entire album of pictures and clippings - the history of his house handed to him on a silver platter - he freaks out and burns it. Why would he not verify who this woman is? Why would he not research the house? This could have gone somewhere - but it didn't.
Then the story tells you a little bit about weird things that happen to those previous owners - but not enough to really understand anything. Yes, their kids are all deformed. There's references to no one being able to keep track of how many kids there were. WHAT HAPPENED??? It could have been so interesting!
What you do get is a lot of slimy sex scenes, neighbors who don't have a clue, characters you can't keep straight, and a virgin snake birth that doesn't go anywhere. I could not figure out who was going crazy, what was really happening, who was the good guy, who was the bad guy. Someone else mentioned, WHY was he drinking so much iced tea?? Was there a point? What happened to the dead baby in the crib??? Why was all the history of Alma and the doctor and the birthing house crammed in in the last few pages? By then I was so sick of this book I just blew through it to be done, but even reading slowly, I don't think I would have had any idea what really went on.
I'm comforted to see so many others who feel they have no idea what went on. I know a little confusion is what builds a good horror story, but in the end it's supposed to all fall together. This did not fall together for me. The biggest mystery for me ended up being, am I getting dumber as I get older, or was this book just really bad? I think it was the book!
This book just left me puzzled. It seemed like it had such potential - it looked like it was written for ME. Since it seems people can't help but crack puns based on the title, I'll give you one of my own - this book was a false positive.
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32 of 40 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
THERE'S ALWAYS VANILLA, June 27, 2009
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
In every reviewer's repertoire there is always one word they hold in reserve, like saving one bullet in your gun in case you happen to find yourself surrounded by a horde of ravenous zombies, it's a killing word, it's a word that sums up their true feelings on a subject and for me that word is: DUMBFOUNDED. I was literally dumbfounded by THE BIRTHING HOUSE. A complete mish-mash rip that by the close of CHAPTER TWO had me questioning the sanity of both the author and the publisher - just what were they thinking?
THE BIRTHING HOUSE tells the tried and true story of a house "haunted" by the ghosts and gimmicks of classic horror tales and the want of modern writers to take what used to be left best read between the lines and shove it in your face...sex. From the classic interpretation to the internet's excesses it seemed Ransom, like his hero, Conrad Harrison, has no real self control, or will or ability to edit himself - he's merely a cork on water, rising and falling with the swells, but never taking on water, never truly going beneath the surface. He's simply follows Ransom's futile splashing of prose to get him to move, but it never works. Ransom is hopelessly locked into a plot that feels like he's following the floor plan of a carnival spook house, that again, by the end of CHAPTER TWO, you'll realize that you've already read this a dozen times before.
And the house is not just haunted, it's "out, loud and proud" haunted (two snaps). Conrad isn't in the house for more than a moment before he's already being sucked into the house's neatly ordered vortex of evil. And the funny things is...he knows it, right from the start. Again and again when something isn't right he puts the blame squarely on the house and he's right. It is the house. Get out. But Conrad stays, dragging his often gone, cheating wife with him in hopes of finding some peace and starting a family. And it's from here that Ransom moves his plot between the slow boil of a watched pot, to popping a Hot Pocket in the microwave - it's as if he found in the back of his closet a game of CHUTES & LADDERS as imagined by RAMSEY CAMPBELL and CLIVE BARKER. One moment Ransom is dragging it out, when there appears, like a hound on your doorstep with a dead bird in its mouth, a scene of horror that feels exactly like a commercial break...it's not that it matters, it's just what pays the bills. It's what you expect and long before you finish THE BIRTHING HOUSE you'll find yourself peeking ahead, fast forwarding through the chop, seeing the end clearly before you get there and then when getting there, feeling cheated.
In the end, THE BIRTHING HOUSE is the kind of story you write in college, for a grade, for a demanding, but narrow minded teacher who's idea of prose feels like a drawn out text message mixed with poetry (Ransom channels his inner Tolkien towards the end, laying down the italics to help clear up the story) with a plot designed to please the front row only. Avoid.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Ultimately, a disappointing entry in the genre, July 6, 2009
Customer review from the Amazon Vine™ Program (What's this?)
I'm a fan of supernatural stories, especially haunted house stories and was truly excited at the opportunity to review this latest entry into the genre. Though the story starts off on a promising note, it sort of fell apart towards the end.
The story centers on Conrad, a 30-year-old unemployed guy who is trying to figure his life out. His marriage to successful and driven Jo is falling apart and after inheriting a large sum of money from his deceased father's estate, Conrad decides the best thing to do is to move out of LA and start a new life - far away in a small town in Wisconsin. The house Conrad picks is no ordinary house either - it's a 140-year-old birthing house. From the beginning, the house exerts an unnatural pull on Conrad, but it is only after Jo leaves for a training course in Michigan that Conrad begins to uncover the eerie aspects of the house. Obviously, the house is haunted - there's a strange 'woman' haunting the premises, cries of babies are heard, and Conrad feels like he is losing his mind. Add to that the strange atrraction Conrad feels for Nadia Grum, pregnant and confused next-door neighbor, a 19-year-old teenager who also seems to fear the birthing house. The house apparently seems to thrive on creating life - Conrad finds out his wife Jo with whom he hasn't had any relations with for a while is pregnant [leading him to suspect infidelity], his pet snake apparently has a virgin birth, and even Nadia's pregnancy seems to have sinister origins.
As is typical in such novels, things slowly but inevitably spiral out of control leading to a shocking and twisted climax. I felt that the last few chapters of the book got to be very confusing and the plot basically fell apart. I can't go into details without giving too much away but it did seem like the author tried to tie everything up together, but failed to do so credibly. The writing throughout is uneven - there are some good passages, but on the whole, this is not really literary fiction in the supernatural genre. The characters often feel like stereotypical cardboard cut-outs.
The reason I gave it 3 instead of 2 stars is because I felt it wasn't altogether bad as a first novel, and perhaps the author will do a better job with his second effort, if any.
Those who love a really good haunted house story should check out "The Dwelling" by Susie Moloney. It is highly atmospheric and plain old spooky with a very interesting premise - a house looking for its perfect occupant. There's a British horror writer, Jonathan Aycliffe who also writes really good supernatural stories, and one in particular "Naomi's Room" remains my favorite to this day [I actually had nightmares after reading this book].If you enjoy supernatural literary fiction, then John Harwood's "Ghost Writer" and more recently, "The Seance" are compelling reads. As for the Birthing House, it is an average supernatural read.
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