Shirley Jackson was born in California in 1916. When her short story, 'The Lottery'
, was first published in the
New Yorker in 1948, readers were so horrified they sent her hate mail; it has since become one of the most iconic American stories of all time. Her first novel,
The Road Through the Wall, was published in the same year and was followed by
Hangsaman,
The Bird's Nest,
The Sundial,
The Haunting of Hill House and
We Have Always Lived in the Castle, widely seen as her masterpiece. In addition to her dark, brilliant novels, she wrote lightly fictionalized magazine pieces about family life with her four children and her husband, the critic Stanley Edgar Hyman. Shirley Jackson died in 1965.Stepping into Hill House is like stepping into the mind of a madman; it isn't long before you weird yourself outAn amazing writer ... If you haven't read
We Have Always Lived in the Castle or
The Haunting of Hill House or any of her short stories you have missed out on something marvellousThe world of Shirley Jackson is eerie and unforgettable ... She is a true masterOne of the twentieth century's most luminous and strange American writersHer books penetrate keenly to the terrible truths which sometimes hide behind comfortable fictions, to the treachery beneath cheery neighborhood faces and the plain manners of country folkShe is the finest master...of the cryptic, haunted taleA novel which at one stroke puts her unquestionably among the great masters of the genre . . . as spine-chilling . . . as anything Edgar Allan Poe dreamed up.
The best-known of Shirley Jackson's novels and a major inspiration for writers like Neil Gaiman and Stephen King as well as the hit Netflix series, The Haunting of Hill House is a chilling story of the power of fear
'Shirley Jackson's stories are among the most terrifying ever written' Donna Tartt
Alone in the world, Eleanor is delighted to take up Dr Montague's invitation to spend a summer in the mysterious Hill House. Joining them are Theodora, an artistic 'sensitive', and Luke, heir to the house. But what begins as a light-hearted experiment is swiftly proven to be a trip into their darkest nightmares, and an investigation that one of their number may not survive. Twice filmed as The Haunting, and the inspiration for a 10-part Netflix series, The Haunting of Hill House is a powerful work of slow-burning psychological horror.
'An amazing writer ... If you haven't read her you have missed out on something marvellous' Neil Gaiman
'As nearly perfect a haunted-house tale as I have ever read' Stephen King
'The world of Shirley Jackson is eerie and unforgettable' A. M. Homes
'Shirley Jackson is one of those highly idiosyncratic, inimitable writers...whose work exerts an enduring spell' Joyce Carol Oates
