Softspoken [Hardcover]

Lucius Shepard (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 2007

A chilling and mysterious voice becomes audible to Sanie shortly after she and her husband Jackson move into the decaying antebellum mansion that is the Bullard ancestral home in rural South Carolina. At first, she wonders if the voice might be a prank played by Jackson's peyote-popping brother Will or his equally off-kilter sister Louise. But soon Sanie discovers that the ghostly voice is merely a single piece in the decadent, baroque puzzle that comprises the Bullard family history rank with sensuality, violence, repression and madness.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In this sultry contemporary Southern gothic from Shepard (Trujillo), Sanie Bullard, a 28-year-old frustrated writer, is stuck in a stultifying marriage and husband Jackson's dilapidated antebellum family mansion in South Carolina, where the couple has returned so he can study for his bar exams in peace. His brother, Will, is addled with peyote as well as the family's weirdness; sister Louise is stranger still. Sanie, at loose ends in the "eminently hauntable" family home, hears voices. Unafraid of the ghostly voices, Sanie sees the house—and the Bullards—not as monstrous but as a "frail, musty puzzle she wants to solve." However, the puzzle is stranger and far darker than Sanie imagines. This memorable short novel careens through the mundane realities of a Southern small town, from bizarre revelations of decadent family history and strange supernatural theory to a violent and unexpected conclusion.
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From Bookmarks Magazine

Hugo and Nebula Award winner Lucius Shepard reveals himself as the master of the ghost story in Softspoken, a short novel packed with plenty of atmosphere and big scares. (Shepard's best work to date has been his novellas, which explains the success of such a compressed novel.) Critics favorably compare Softspoken to The Haunting of Hill House, Ghost Story, and Bag of Bones, among other horror classics, and to the work of Tim Powers and James Blaylock, who have similarly crossed over. They also praise Shepard's ability to balance a conventional southern gothic—including convincing minor characters—with the tautness of a well-paced psychological thriller.

Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 179 pages
• Publisher: Night Shade Books (May 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1597800732
• ISBN-13: 978-1597800730
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,421,610 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars not your ordinary haunting, June 13, 2007

By 

Joe Sherry (Minnesota) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Softspoken (Hardcover)

With Softspoken Lucius Shepard puts his spin on the ghost story / haunted house sub-genre of fiction. Sanie and her husband Jackson are transplants from Chapel Hill, North Carolina down to South Carolina so Jackson can study for the bar. To get away from all distractions, Jackson and Sanie are living in Jackson's childhood home. From the start Sanie hears voices, somebody calling out her name. After ruling out Jackson's brother and sister, who are each living at the house, Sanie starts thinking about ghosts.

Where the average author would tell a simple ghost story and veer into some Hill House related horror, Lucius Shepard does something different. He changes the nature of the game. Softspoken is not a simple ghost story. It is not a simple anything. Shepard presents us Sanie, a well put together woman who is pulled away from everything she knows to support her husband's studies. From a vibrant community she now lives in an insular town where Jackson Bullard's family has a bit of a reputation for madness. It is this madness which Sanie faces along with the voices and as the house and the town begins to exert some sort of influence on her husband and on herself.

Lucius Shepard is a master at packing in the most story and the most feeling into a short novel. Softspoken is, no pun intended, a haunting novel of hidden voices, ghosts, a breaking marriage, and the influence of small towns and family history. In a tight little package, Softspoken delivers a gripping story which gets more complex as the novel progresses and Shepard peels away layer after to layer to reveal far more than the reader initially anticipated. Lucius Shepard is a top shelf writer. Read him.

-Joe Sherry

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Haunted-House Tale in Years, October 2, 2007

By 

Robert Kruger (North Bend) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Softspoken (Hardcover)

Shepard effectively uses a haunted house to symbolize a one-sided marriage and the trap it creates for both husband and wife. The Bullard family home seems to afford Sanie's husband the isolation and comfort he needs to finish his legal studies, but it is haunted by his family's ancestral madness, a force that propels the story toward a conclusion that is both inevitable and surprising. Though as engaging as any good genre read, Softspoken has the broad relevance, well-drawn characters, and keen psychological insight of the best mainstream literature.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Spoken too soft, December 12, 2008

By 

T. G. Gutheil "Genre fan" (Brookline, Mass., USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Softspoken (Hardcover)

Shepard is truly a giant in the short story and science fiction fields but I found this a good and interesting read without the power of his other work. It is only a cut above a standard ghost-based thriller, with interesting characters and a somewhat banal plot. Worth a look for Shepard fans and ghost addicts.