Nightshade [Mass Market Paperback]

John Saul (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 29, 2001

Fifteen-year-old Matthew Moore seems to have a charmed life . . . until a mysterious fire forces his grandmother to move in with his family. The elderly woman insists on recreating the bedroom of Cynthia, her favored child who died tragically more than a decade ago. Soon Matt's life insidiously begins to change. At night he finds himself haunted by nightmares of unimaginable terror. In the morning the smell of Cynthia's perfume seems to linger in his room. While his grandmother drives a wedge between his once devoted parents, Matt transforms from a gregarious teenager to a hostile loner. Then a shocking tragedy shatters the family beyond repair--as a horrific shadow from the past takes on an implacable life of its own, clawing toward Matt with ferocious hunger. . . .

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

There's no such thing as a happy family in John Saul's dark imagination. He made this chillingly clear in Suffer the Children and The Right Hand of Evil, and he deepens this impression in Nightshade, a perfectly macabre tale of a household ripped apart by malevolent forces.

Meet New Hampshire couple Bill and Joan Hapgood and their teenage son, Matt. They have a huge home, many friends, and the glow of Matt's glory as a high school football star. Life couldn't be sweeter, right? Wrong!

Trouble begins when Joan's mother, Emily, accidentally burns down her own house and moves in with the Hapgoods. Matt is terrified of his foul-tempered grandmother, who refers to him as "Joan's bastard." Emily's odd behavior reaches a fever pitch when she insists that the bedroom of her long-dead (and much-favored) elder daughter, Cynthia, be recreated, prom dress, dolls, and all. The household's normal warmth vanishes, "the sense of welcome and comfort was gone." Matt complains of strange, perverted dreams in which the staggeringly beautiful Cynthia visits him, leaving behind the pungent scent of her Nightshade perfume. Joan also feels the presence of her dead sister, and has painful flashbacks to a childhood best left forgotten. A murder and three disappearances befall the small town, Matt spirals into depression, and Joan loses her mind. Throw in child abuse, torture, and a wickedly irritable ghost, and we have one whopper of a nightmare. Nightshade contains gobs of gore, melodramatic (and occasionally bumbling) prose, and a deviant, twisted ending--John Saul's famous recipe for family disaster and reader delight. --Naomi Gesinger --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

The life of high school student Matt Hapgood turns into the stuff of nightmares when his grandmother moves in with his family. She brings with her the terrifying spirit of her dead daughter, Cynthia, the beautiful, beloved, older sister of Matt's mother, Joan, who had been the tormented, abused younger child. All the suffering of those early years is brought into Matt's household from the moment his stepfather is shot to death while they are hunting together. Soon Matt, his mother, and his grandmother have horrifying visions of Cynthia in all her malevolent beauty, and they watch helplessly as she instigates brutal killings. But is it really Cynthia? There are hints that perhaps Joan has taken on her sister's persona, and the answer is left until the last page. It is unfortunate that Saul's leaden prose has turned a provocative theme into a boring novel. This book has little to offer, but the author is popular (e.g., Second Child), and librarians should expect large reader demand.
---Patricia Altner, Information Seekers, Bowie, MD
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: Ballantine Books (May 29, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0449005909
• ISBN-13: 978-0449005903
• Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 1.1 x 6.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (86 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #608,620 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

House of Reckoning is John Saul's thirty-sixth novel. His first novel, Suffer the Children, published in 1977, was an immediate million-copy bestseller. His other bestselling suspense novels include Faces of Fear, In the Dark of the Night, Perfect Nightmare, Black Creek Crossing, Midnight Voices, The Manhattan Hunt Club, Nightshade, The Right Hand of Evil, The Presence, Black Lightning, The Homing, and Guardian. He is also the author of the New York Times bestselling serial thriller The Blackstone Chronicles, initially published in six installments but now available in one complete volume. Saul divides his time between Seattle, Washington, and Hawaii.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Up all night..., June 22, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Nightshade (Hardcover)

I haven't read a John Saul novel in at least ten years. I picked up "NIGHTSHADE" at the library, and I have to tell you this is a thoroughly enjoyable book. It's well thought through, the plot is delicately planned, leading the reader this way and that. IT's a whodunit, a mystery, a family novel, a thriller, a detective story, but most of all a true ghost story. It had my heart pounding at times, and I had to read the final 200 pages well into the night to get to the end or I wouldn't have been able to sleep. Well done, Mr. Saul. Well done indeed.

34 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Nightshade, June 14, 2000

By 

"purelyjoy" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Nightshade (Hardcover)

Nightshade is a poisonous European plant, also known as Belladonna. This title implies that something is deteriorating rapidly - the world of New Hampshire's Hapgood family. Actually one more meaning, I'll mention it later in this review.

Let's start with the Hapgood house, we've Matt Moore, his mom Joan, his stepdad Bill Hapgood and his grandmom Emily Moore.

Life looks great and sweet but it starts turning to nightmare when Emily (she has Alzheimer's Disease, a brain disease that impairs mental and emotional functions) accidentally burns down her own house and moves in with the Hapgoods. Then Emily claimed Cynthia (who is Joan's sister and dead) has returned. Moreover, Matt starts to have erotic dreams that Cynthia satisfies herself on him and leaving behind the pungent scent of her Nightshade perfume. Then one day Bill is killed while hunting with Matt and no doubt Matt is then accused to be the killer. Finally, Joan is trying to find the real killer and the story continues...

The author weaves a fascinating prose with dark family incidents. Trepidation, dread, doom all gathering. It's a enjoyable read of horror and suspense.

16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not exactly horror, June 11, 2000

By 

mellion108 (Michigan, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Nightshade (Hardcover)

Let me say this right up front: I like Saul's writing style. He has a way with words. BLACKSTONE CHORONICLES led me to this author, and I've tried several of his works since then.

With that said......NIGHTSHADE is the second Saul novel I've read in as many weeks. I was extremely disappointed in the other novel, and NIGHT only scores a bit higher due to some of the darker family issues raised in it. The Hapgoods appear for all the world to be a loving, happy, content family. That all shatters quite quickly when grandma Emily, suffering from Alzheimer's and seemingly intent on making everyone around her feel lower than dung, moves into the Hapgood's estate. Constantly comparing Joan Hapgood to her beautiful, smart but dead older sister, Cynthia, Emily strikes out to totally deflate her younger daughter. Teenage grandson, Matt, starts having violent, erotic dreams that plague him. Then the body count starts to rise. What ensues is an attempt to create a sharp psychological thriller. It almost succeeds. However, too much of the novel is repetitive with some passages being repeated almost word for word. The PSYCHO-like feel to the story is interesting, and as I stated above, Saul creates incredible word pictures. Unfortunately, the villain is too easily figured out very early in the novel, and not a lot actually happens through a great deal of the story. In its favor, NIGHT is a quick read that could be enjoyable if you are looking for light suspense or horror.

This novel brings out some very disturbing family dysfunctions. As in RIGHT HAND OF EVIL, Saul digs out those family secrets and weaves them in with the sinister aspects of his story. Child abuse, incest, and mental illness all come together here, but they are also all too neatly wrapped up without deeper inspection throughout this story. There was great potential for a darker sort of story. I give this 3 stars because of Saul's knack for word art, but I, for one, wasn't too enamored of the book overall.