The Dwelling
A Novel
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4.0 • 7 Ratings
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- $15.99
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
The house had history. Perhaps too much history.
362 Belisle Street is a homeowner's dream. A nice neighborhood, close to schools, new hardwood þoors, unique original detail. So why then, wonders real estate agent Glenn Darnley, won't this charming property stay off the market? Perhaps the clawed feet of the antique bathtub look a little too threatening. Or maybe it's the faint hospital-like smell of the room off the top of the stairs. It's possible that the haunting music that pours out from under the steps keeps the residents awake at night.
In the three parts of Susie Moloney's hair-raising novel The Dwelling, ownership of 362 Belisle changes four times -- with Glenn Darnley brokering each deal. The Þrst occupants are a young couple, Rebecca and Daniel Mason, who have big dreams of wealth and success. It doesn't take long for them to realize that they're not welcome in their new house. After a ghostly seduction and a violent confrontation, the property is once again for sale. Next comes Barbara Parkins, a divorcée, and her unhappy young son, Petey. Lonely and looking for companionship, the two Þnd comfort in some new, playful young friends. When the Parkins family leaves, the house is sold again. Last, ownership goes to Richie Bramley, a drunken writer and lost soul. But like the others, he can't settle down in this house -- which has a mind, and a heart, of its own.
For Glenn, however, the house is a dream, always warm and welcoming. The þoors gleam, and sun pours in through the windows. Owners come -- and 362 Belisle makes sure owners go. It's waiting patiently for its beloved to realize how much it loves her. It's waiting for Glenn, the very special person who can Þnally turn this house into a home.
The Dwelling is clever, scary, and ultimately moving. It's a novel for everyone who ever spent time looking for just the right house.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
It's not your typical haunted house: 362 Belisle Street, the central "character" in Susie Moloney's second novel (after A Dry Spell), is a two-story property with a Murphy bed, a working fireplace, phantom music that tinkles faintly at night and a collection of manipulative demons that play to the residents' vulnerabilities. The first buyers are a young couple whose marital tensions and financial strains leave them susceptible to the building's malevolent spirits. Then a divorced mother and her overweight, introverted son are seduced by the apparition of a playful orphan called Mariette. A near-alcoholic writer recovering from an intense break-up is the next to move in, only to suffer hallucinations of his dead father swinging from the ceiling. Moloney attempts to depict 362 Belisle as a being with a mind of its own, beckoning realtor Glenn Darnley throughout her multiple showings of the house, and claiming or rejecting its inhabitants. The tenants seem quite ordinary until mysterious events begin to occur, each episode terminating at a horrifying moment before Moloney launches into the next inhabitant's story. Newly widowed Glenn's travails connect the sagas of her three buyers, as her thoughts of her dead husband fill the gaps between stories. The perspective of the narrative similarly jumps, alternating between the fears of the three residents and the desires of this dwelling, a living and breathing macabre personality. Moloney manipulates the tension artfully, giving the reader glimpses of the house's history and leading to a suitably grotesque ending. 5-city author tour.
