Houses Without Doors A Review

I know Peter Straub has co-authored with Stephen King, so when I found “Houses Without Doors” by Peter Straub at the book exchange, I thought, “Why not?” And now I wished I hadn’t.

“Houses Without Doors” is a collection of thirteen short stories, two of which I found quite disturbing.

None of the stories had any rhyme or reason to them. There were no endings, happy or otherwise.

“Blue Rose” was one of the main stories. It was about a dysfunctional family, to say the least. A mother who was a nurse and a child abuser, very demanding and domineering. The father was a drunk and they had 5 sons, two of which had enlisted in the service and moved out. The three remaining sons were, Rocky age thirteen, Harry age nine, and Little Eddie age six. They lived in poverty but I’m not sure they really had to. The nine year old, Harry, found a book on hypnotism in the attic, which the boys weren’t supposed to be in the attic since that is where the mom stored everything she treasured, (Fancy furniture, clothing that she never wore, pictures, books, etc.) and decided that he would hypnotize his little brother. The first time wasn’t bad, but the second and third time he tortured him and when little Eddie lost control the third time (because Harry had taken him back in time) and ran amok in the attic damaging much of their mom’s stuff, Harry decided to hypnotize Little Eddie to have a seizure and die. And except for dad, nobody seemed to miss him. Sad, really sad. Anyway, the story ended with Harry all grown up and in the service. He was writing a letter to his girlfriend back home telling her that when he got back that they would be together, etc. And then it says he never sent the letter. The end. No ending per say. No reason why, just; the end.

“The Juniper Tree” Was about a seven year old boy who would go to the movies instead of the daycare at the school like he was supposed to. One day he met a pedophile there, and the details were a little too much for me. He grew up. Never told anyone about the movies and there was no logical reason for this story. And no ending.

“The Buffalo Hunter” was strange and a little wordy, but made a little more sense than the others and it actually had an ending! Woohoo!

“Mrs. God”  Weird. I thought it was going along okay and then we came to the ending and then I was in the dark as to what the story was really about.

The rest of the stories were either one or two pages long and really weren’t stories at all.

I cannot recommend this book to anyone. I don’t think I’ll read any more books by him. The man is…

That’s the end of my review. 🙂

You can read other’s reviews for, “Houses Without Doors” Here

Have you read it? Have you read other books by Peter Straub? I’d like to know your thoughts.

Hope to see you soon. Till then: HUGS!

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• Posted in: Reviews ♦ Uncategorized
• Tagged: houses without doors, karen einsel, karens different corners, peter straub, reading, reviews, stephen king