The other
Ratings10
Average rating3.9
15
Ratings10
Average rating3.9
Holland and Niles Perry are identical thirteen-year-old twins. They are close, close enough, almost, to read each other’s thoughts, but they couldn’t be more different. Holland is bold and mischievous, a bad influence, while Niles is kind and eager to please, the sort of boy who makes parents proud. The Perrys live in the bucolic New England town their family settled centuries ago, and as it happens, the extended clan has gathered at its ancestral farm this summer to mourn the death of the twins’ father in a most unfortunate accident. Mrs. Perry still hasn’t recovered from the shock of her husband’s gruesome end and stays sequestered in her room, leaving her sons to roam free. As the summer goes on, though, and Holland’s pranks become increasingly sinister, Niles finds he can no longer make excuses for his brother’s actions. Thomas Tryon’s best-selling novel about a homegrown monster is an eerie examination of the darkness that dwells within everyone. It is a landmark of psychological horror that is a worthy descendent of the books of James Hogg, Robert Louis Stevenson, Shirley Jackson, and Patricia Highsmith.
Reviews with the most likes.
This is a period piece set in a small rural town of the 1930s. While on the surface it may appear as a “bad seed” story about two pre-pubescent teen boys, much like several of Stephen King's novels, it weaves horror with nostalgic memories of what it was like to be young in a final summer before the reality of adulthood intervenes. Horrible things are done, but the reader is left with the impression that something more, perhaps supernatural, has also taken place. It's these sorts of lingering questions that make such stories so memorable.
