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A review by nancyotoole
Audrey's Door by Sarah Langan
1.0
After breaking up with her boyfriend, Audrey finds herself on the lookout for a new place to live, but it needs to be cheap. Then she finds The Breviary, a beautiful apartment that not only works for her wallet, but seduces the architect in her. To Audrey, her new apartment is almost too good to be true. Unfortunately, that's because it is. There is evil in this apartment that speaks to her in her dreams, begging her to build a door.
Audrey's Door is the October selection for calico_reaction's bookclub. Although I don't read too much horror, the title seemed more than appropriate the Halloween season, making me quite interested in reading it. Unfortunately, it didn't take too long before I realized that something was very wrong. I had a really, really hard time connecting with the main character. I didn't even really feel all that sorry for her. Given the fact that her life had been so traumatic, this was shocking to me. In fact, Audrey kind of drove me a little nuts, and the secondary cast wasn't that much better. This made it really hard for me to look forward to reading this book.
Unfortunately, my issues with Audrey's Door go beyond characterization and into plot as well. Everything seems to set up nicely at the beginning. This is clearly a classic haunted house story, with the twists being the fact that its an apartment and the horrors that exist inside Audrey's mind are what's the most terrifying. But it wasn't too long before the book began to feel awfully repetitive. We're delivered scene after scene of Audrey's nightmares, and moments where Audrey acts crazy. These were fine at the beginning but they began to grow old rather fast. The horror elements of the novel also didn't always work for me. Maybe it's because I prefer more subtle kind of horror but Andrey's Door (especially near the end) felt way too over the top to me, even to the point where the book was border lining on comical instead of creepy. I also found the writing to be a little week to be honest, as the author seemed to occasionally fall into the old trap of telling instead of showing.
Final Thoughts: I always feel a little guilty about giving negative reviews (not just in this case where the author lives here in Maine, meaning I might actually run into her one of these days. There aren't that many people up here), but despite an interesting set up in the beginning, this book really didn't work well for me. Perhaps it's because I don't read a ton of horror but I found the horror elements to be a over the top and therefore ineffective, the plot to be repetitive, and the characters to be unsympathetic. I have no plans on picking up any other books by Sarah Langan.
Audrey's Door is the October selection for calico_reaction's bookclub. Although I don't read too much horror, the title seemed more than appropriate the Halloween season, making me quite interested in reading it. Unfortunately, it didn't take too long before I realized that something was very wrong. I had a really, really hard time connecting with the main character. I didn't even really feel all that sorry for her. Given the fact that her life had been so traumatic, this was shocking to me. In fact, Audrey kind of drove me a little nuts, and the secondary cast wasn't that much better. This made it really hard for me to look forward to reading this book.
Unfortunately, my issues with Audrey's Door go beyond characterization and into plot as well. Everything seems to set up nicely at the beginning. This is clearly a classic haunted house story, with the twists being the fact that its an apartment and the horrors that exist inside Audrey's mind are what's the most terrifying. But it wasn't too long before the book began to feel awfully repetitive. We're delivered scene after scene of Audrey's nightmares, and moments where Audrey acts crazy. These were fine at the beginning but they began to grow old rather fast. The horror elements of the novel also didn't always work for me. Maybe it's because I prefer more subtle kind of horror but Andrey's Door (especially near the end) felt way too over the top to me, even to the point where the book was border lining on comical instead of creepy. I also found the writing to be a little week to be honest, as the author seemed to occasionally fall into the old trap of telling instead of showing.
Final Thoughts: I always feel a little guilty about giving negative reviews (not just in this case where the author lives here in Maine, meaning I might actually run into her one of these days. There aren't that many people up here), but despite an interesting set up in the beginning, this book really didn't work well for me. Perhaps it's because I don't read a ton of horror but I found the horror elements to be a over the top and therefore ineffective, the plot to be repetitive, and the characters to be unsympathetic. I have no plans on picking up any other books by Sarah Langan.