Lynnwood
Thomas Brown
June 2013
ISBN-13: 978-1907230387
ISBN-10: 1907230386
This atmospheric chiller is perceptibily meancing from the first sentence. Set in the idyllic village of Lynnwood, set on the edge of the New Forest in England, the truth of the village’s heritage is glimpsed through the eyes of villager, Freya. She discovers the charred remains of a pig on a morning walk with her dog, and this stirs a hunger in her. Freya has been a vegetarian for years, ever since her husband, inexplicably and suddenly left her; and this renewed hunger for meat is disturbing.
The villagers are a superstitious lot, friendly to the tourists that come to visit, but always glad to see them leave. However, there have been disappearances of visitors and villagers alike over the years; put down to being either lost in the Forest, or the victim of the legendary Bauchan, the hungry spirits of the local brook and Forest since the fourteenth century. These skeletal creatures can be seen only from the corner of the eye slipping between the trees of Forest. But that’s what they are; a local legend; a story told to children to keep them safe from falling into the waters of Bauchan Brook. Or are they? As Midwinter draws nigh, it is said that the hunger of the Bauchan intensifies, and the villagers can do naught but lock their doors tight against the night, peeking through drawn curtains with fear filled eyes.
Freya is friends with the vicar; Joan Andrews, a seventy-one year old, steady woman who whispers of a dark recurring dream she has each night. Of a fly faced woman that draws ever nearer, one step closer with each dream. Freya convinces her to confront her night-time fears by visiting the clearing in the Forest where the dream occurs. Together they go to the Forest, but the vicar never returns. Bereft by the loss of Ms. Andrews, Freya seeks solace with her best friend, Catherine, the local vintner, both drinking large quantities of wine to drown their loneliness and growing sense of dread. Then, one day, Freya goes to Catherine’s house to find her gone.
Freya, in clearing our the old Vicarage, comes across diaries of those who came before, and learns of the history of Lynnwood. That its first years were filled with starvation; a hunger so deep and desperate that some committed unspeakable acts. And that the hunger remains to this day.
This gripping gothic novella drew me in and kept me turning the pages until the horrific revelations of the last pages. This debut novella is a fast read, good for both young adults and adults that enjoy horror that is more edgy than gory.
