Book Review: Starve Acre by Andrew Michael Hurley

After Richard Willoughby’s father dies, he inherits the lonely old house known as Starve Acre. Richard’s wife Juliette is enamored of the idea of country living, and thinks it will be the perfect place to raise their young son Ewan, away from the hustle and bustle of the city of Leeds. Richard isn’t so sure. His own mother, a city transplant herself, was never really welcomed by the villagers, and young Richard went to a series of boarding schools well away from the countryside where his parents lived. But Juliette has her heart set on a perfect pastoral upbringing far different from her own stifling Edinburgh childhood. Wanting to please his wife, Richard swallows his misgivings and moves his young family into his childhood home.

At first, everything seems fine, or fine enough. Once Ewan is old enough to go to nursery school though, strange things start to happen. Ewan complains of hearing voices and begins to engage in acts of senseless and increasing violence. Richard tries to reassure his wife:

“It’s all for attention,” Richard said. “Nothing else.”

 

“But he doesn’t want our attention,” said Juliette. “He wants to be on his own.”

 

“Deep down, I mean.”

 

As far as Richard could see, Ewan was as needful of his parents as any other child.

 

“Do you like him?” Juliette asked. “As a person, I mean.”

 

“Of course,” said Richard. “Why? Don’t you?”

 

“I don’t know,” she said. “Genuinely. I can’t say.”

 

“He’s still our Ewan,” said Richard, and she looked at him as though that were the problem. He was whatever they had made him. If they didn’t like what they saw, then it was their own fault.

Juliette’s insecurities as a parent do little to calm the strange energies swirling around and through their home. When Ewan suddenly dies, Juliette is overwhelmed by her grief at losing him and her guilt over how she could have been a better mother. 

Unable to console his wife, Richard submerges his own emotions by continuing his father’s eccentric studies into local history. Legend has it that an enormous oak tree once stood in the barren field that’s part of their property. Its abrupt death poisoned the entire acre, hence the name of the Willoughby’s home.

Richard believes that there must be some grain of truth to the legend, and is glad to utilize his skills as an archaeologist to carefully dig for evidence while Juliette grieves. But the outside world refuses to let Juliette and Richard be. Spurred into action by well-meaning friends and family, Richard finally confronts Juliette about the less than rational beliefs she’s nurtured since Ewan’s death, only to have her turn on him:

“This is proof,” she said, brandishing her notebook at him. “I’m not mad, Richard, despite what you think.”

 

The pages were filled with lists of all the moments of contact she’d had with Ewan since the funeral. Lists had become much shorter in the last few weeks, sending her into an even deeper despondency. Hoping to pick up the faintest traces of Ewan that she believed were still left in his room, she used Richard’s portable Sony to make recordings each evening and had filled the place with mirrors. They sat on the window ledge and the chest of drawers, on the bedside table and against the walls, so that wherever Richard looked one reflected another and the room fell away into infinity.

After her need to contact Ewan from beyond the grave leads to a domestic visit from a group of spiritualists, Richard decides he’s had enough, and sides with Juliette’s family on the need for an intervention. But it’s Richard’s own folly that unwittingly opens the door to evil, as an ancient terror all too deftly insinuates itself into their lives.

The perfect horror novel, to me, balances the supernatural with human frailty such that the question of “who really did these terrible things?” provides an exquisite throb of suspense as readers raptly turn the pages to discover the truth. Is the monster in the narrative real or a convenient scapegoat for all-too-human emotions and actions? Regardless of where the answer lies, readers of great horror novels are left satisfied by the logical and emotional connections between the real and the uncanny.

Starve Acre fulfills that remit with flair, spinning a yarn of monstrosities birthed by human failure while still showing plenty of sympathy for the family caught in the middle of it all. There are no real heroes or villains here, as the Willoughbys do their best to do the right thing and fail utterly in the face of unthinkable evil. This novel is a deftly constructed, gorgeously written thriller that embodies the best of British horror writing. Little wonder that it will be turned into a movie starring Matt Smith and Morfydd Clark soon.