Haunting of Hill House finished; The Time Traveler's Wife started

I only have a couple of recurring dreams. Both of them are nightmares, both of them are about houses. The first involves being in a house that goes on forever - like in a Flintstones cartoon where Fred is running, and he is in the center of the screen as the wall of the house scrolls by endlessly until he smashes into something (and that something is never the adjoining wall). There are windows all along the walls without stopping, and there are things outside that want to get in. It's like living in a school hallway (if your school was always in danger from marauders, that is).

The other dream is that I live in a very large house. It has a lot of rooms, and I keep forgetting that one of them exists. I will suddenly discover that room, and it makes me feel really nervous, like all along the room has been hiding from me. Why would it do that? What's it got to hide?

I've been in houses that feel warm and inviting instantly. I've been in houses where I feel unwelcome if I'm left alone there without the owners. My first girlfriend rented an old house that had a dirt cellar between the kitchen and the back door. A friend of hers who claimed to have psychic abilities said that a child had once been abused there - locked up and forced to live in this small room on the dirt floor. I don't know that I believe in her psychic abilities, but no one liked that room. If she or her roommates had to go through it to the backyard, especially at night, they would run through it as quickly as they could.

When I was in my early 20s, I spent a lot of time house-sitting for other people. It was a way to both make money and live in a place that was totally mine for a week, and all I had to do was take care of other people's pets. I learned a lot about what makes me happy or uncomfortable in a house - high ceilings are bad. So are windows that can't be covered. Small entertainment rooms - "man caves" if you will - are good. The house I was most nervous in was occupied by four cats. All my other customers had a variety of pets, but also at least one dog. Dogs make a place better. Whenever I buy my first house, I plan to get a dog within my first week there.

Haunting of Hill House taps into this exact kind of delicate discomfort with houses. What makes a house feel inviting? What makes it feel unwelcoming? The house is described as having a strange architecture - uneven lines, a lack of symmetry, doors in unexpected places. I imagine Shirley Jackson had the Winchester Mystery House in mind when writing it - Hill House is not that extreme, but definitely borrows a lot of its terror from strange appearances. Eventually it does more than just look unsettling, as it's evil spirits begin to work on the minds of the visitors, all of whom have shown up to observe and collect data for a doctor who enjoys researching the paranormal. Of course, science and logic are no match for the horrors within the house. Still, despite the story's age it still contains some real genuine moments of terror as the house seeks to destroy the visitors.

They should have brought a dog with them.
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I've started The Time Traveler's Wife, which was made into a film not long ago. All I know about the film is that it wasn't very good according to everyone I know who has seen it. I've really enjoyed the book so far, though.

Pyramids finished; War of the Worlds finished; Dragon*Con visited; Haunting of Hill House started

I've gotten behind on my blogging due to costuming, Dragon*Con, and life in general. So here's a quick review bringing this up to speed.

I finished yet another Discworld novel, although finished much more slowly due to my heavy costuming regiment.
In Pyramids, Terry Pratchett takes on a very ancient culture in order to poke a little fun at ancient cultures in general. Pteppic is the son of the king of Djelibeybi (ancient meaning: child of Djel), and is sent to the assassin's school in Ankh-Morpork. While there he picks up many modern habits, and becomes better known as Teppic. When his father dies he has to return home and figure out how to be king, while also trying to figure out how to live in a country that hasn't changed for thousands of years.

As usual, Terry Pratchett pokes fun at many things that we romanticize and seldom question. In this story, the foolishness of preserving tradition is called out for examination, as we learn that Djelibeybi is bankrupt as a result of spending so much money on pyramids for deceased royalty. Because this is the Discworld we are able to see into the lives of dead people, and we learn that the Djelibeybi belief that death is when you really start living is incorrect, and Teppic's dead father is just hanging around near his own dead body and rethinking his beliefs.

It was good with several laugh out loud moments, which is about what I expect from any Discworld novel. Terry Pratchett just keeps adding to the number of novels I need to finish with this list as the Discworld catalog continues to grow, but they are always fun to read and I look forward to getting to some of the more modern entries in the series.

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I also took an unusually long amount of time to finish H. G. Wells's War of the Worlds. Partly this is because I picked it up from the library prior to Dragon*Con, which meant that I didn't even get started on it until after the con. Partly, this is because it was boring. Yes, it's a very short book but it is really dull. It's written as a first person account of the invasion of Victorian England by martians, and it describes every small event in detail.

Part of the problem here is that I am not familiar with the British countryside. It's clear that the details were meant to allow readers to envision the path of the martians across the land. Partly, the problem is that the descriptions of the martians and their technology have been so frequently used in sci fi that they are now outdated.

At any rate, it felt like work to sit down and read it for a while. The story is completely predictable if you've ever seen one of the movie adaptations (I've seen the 1953 film) or heard the Orson Wells radio drama (which might be the best way to consume this story).

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Next up: it's October, so it's time for a horror story. My choice this year is The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson. I'll also be putting up my review of Dragon*Con soon.