Tagline: The past is always present in the Nightmare Room.
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MY REVIEW
I love it…Don’t go in the basement. LOL Bad things happen in the basements of horror novels and I must admit, at least through words, I want to be one of the first to venture into the dark, dank depths of the abyss.
Once you read The Nightmare Room, you will realize how appropriate the tag line is to the story.
As soon as Peter Larson returned to his home town, Maple City, I knew…it’s on. The scenario made me think of Steven King and I am eager to see if Chris Sorensen can meet my expectations.
Peter’s life is messy and it’s not getting any better since the move. One problem after another. Isn’t that life for all of us? Peter is the thinker, Hannah is the doer.
Hannah thinks positive, when she sees the house:
A broke place we can put back together.
I wonder how long she’ll be saying that. LOL
Peter thinks:
This was every house in every horror movie he’d ever seen.
He saw the padlock and I thought, walk away dude. Don’t open that door. Don’t do it….then I thought, DO IT. DO IT. DO IT, as a big smile lit up my face. Oh yeah, some call me Scary Sherry and I’m proud of it!
A haunted house, yes, but it is so much more than that. Peter meets it up close and personal, while Hannah is along for the ride.
The suspense and anticipation kept me flipping the pages. Plenty of chills, thrills, and bumps in the night. First I feared for Peter, then Hannah, who would not let him face IT alone.
The story seemed familiar, but, it didn’t stay that way. I love the spin Chris Sorensen gave The Nightmare Room, and the ending…Well done. In the last chapter, each page unfolded giving more delight than the last. Surprised me and I dare say it will surprise you too.
I voluntarily reviewed a free copy of The Nightmare Room by Chris Sorensen.
4 Stars
Book Description
A boy in a basement, a man in a booth and a darkness that threatens to swallow them both…
New York audiobook narrator Peter Larson and his wife Hannah head to his hometown of Maple City to help Peter’s ailing father and to put a recent tragedy behind them. Though the small, Midwestern town seems the idyllic place to start afresh, Peter and Hannah will soon learn that evil currents flow beneath its surface.
They move into an old farmhouse on the outskirts of town—a house purchased by Peter’s father at auction and kept secret until now—and start to settle into their new life.
But as Peter sets up his recording studio in a small basement room, disturbing things begin to occur—mysterious voices haunt audio tracks, malevolent shadows creep about the house. And when an insidious presence emerges from the woodwork, Peter must face old demons in order to save his family and himself.
The man threw open the basement door. A rush of mildewed air rose up from the darkness, like the hideous breath of some subterranean thing. He flicked on the light, and the cascade of descending stairs came into view. Among their number was the treacherous one midway down, the one that bent like a bow at the slightest
weight.
“Are you going down on your own or do I have to make you?”
The boy looked up at his father. The anger that had fueled him thus far was fading, seemingly sapped by the trip from the boy’s bedroom. Instead, his father looked pained. If he didn’t know better, he might think the Old Man was about to cry. But his father had said he was tired. Dead tired. And perhaps it was as simple as that.
“I’ll go,” the boy whispered, and he took the first tentative step down.
The change in temperature was immediate; it was like diving into a cold pool. He took another step down, and another.
He paused on the third step and looked back at his father. The bare bulb above paled the man’s countenance. The grey circles under his eyes made him look like he’d been bludgeoned.
“Git!” the Old Man snarled. The boy went. When he reached the sagging step, he stopped, took a breath and leaped over it. His heel hit the lip of the next step, but the wood was damp, and the boy came down hard on his butt.
“Get some sleep. And no more dreams.”
As if he could help it.
His father closed the door, and the lock clicked. It would not open again until morning.
The boy descended the final few stairs and stepped onto the floor. Ice-cold cement sucked heat from his soles. He squinted, trying to adjust to the dark.
The usefulness of the light bulb ended a few feet into the basement. And there was no more source of light until he reached the…
The gears in his head ground to a halt, stopping short of allowing the dreaded name to be uttered.
He started picking out objects around him. The solemn metal face of the furnace, a stack of water softener salt bags, the frame of an old bicycle.
Straight ahead lay a distance of twenty or so feet before he’d come to a door. Three-quarters of that stretch was in pitch black. To get to the door, to get to the room, he had to dash through the darkness until his hand found the doorknob. Then, he would throw the door open, reach to his right, flip the wall switch and presto. An island of light in an ocean of black.
He girded himself for the sprint.
“One…two…”
He hesitated…but why? He’d already made this run two times this week. Both Monday and Thursday, he’d awakened screaming, bringing down the Old Man’s wrath, and sending him here. To the penalty box. To time out. To the Night—
“Three!”
The boy startled at the sound of his own voice, and he lurched into motion. He hurtled into the darkness, his feet slapping the floor, echoing off the walls in hollow
applause.
He bumped into something and spun, temporarily throwing himself and his inner compass off balance. He skidded across the floor and came to a stop.
Heart pounding in his chest, he quickly located the lit stairs off to his left. He made a rapid calculation and turned to face the invisible pathway to the room. He bolted, coming to a halt only when he slammed head-on into the door.
His hand floundered before finding the knob. He launched into his practiced routine. Open door, flip switch, step inside.
In seconds, the boy slipped into the room and slammed the door shut. A pink light overhead bathed him in imaginary warmth—he had made it.
He stepped back and sank into the waiting beanbag chair, facing the door. The small room with its mint green walls and rollaway bed felt almost welcoming, an odd feeling for a place that was meant as a punishment.
The boy pulled a quilt from the bed and wrapped it around him tight. For the first time in his life, he felt safe here in this room—in the Nightmare Room.
Because he hadn’t bumped into something out there in the dark. He had bumped into someone.
He was almost certain of it.
He kept one eye on the door as the minutes hummed past on the illuminated clock on the nightstand. He busied himself with crayon and paper, doodling to keep his mind quiet. Soon, his vision began to flutter; the room began to strobe. And, in the space between two breaths, the boy sank into his beanbag chair and fell into a fitful sleep.
The doorknob twitched.
The boy bolted upright. He pressed back into the chair. His whole body started shivering, and he feared he would wet himself for the second time that night.
A thought…no, a voice crept into his head.
Coming in.
The door quivered as if someone was leaning against it, trying to stifle a laugh. Nails scratched against the wood.
“Dad?” the boy whispered. The door shuddered.
“Is that you?” Knowing it was not. Coming…
“Please don’t.” Coming…
“No.” Coming…
“No!” In.
About the Author:
Chris Sorensen spends many days and nights locked away inside his own nightmare room. He is the narrator of over 200 audiobooks (including the award-winning The Missing series by Margaret Peterson Haddix) and the recipient of three AudioFile Earphone Awards. Over the past fifteen years, the Butte Theater and Thin Air Theatre Company in Cripple Creek, Colorado have produced dozens of his plays including Dr. Jekyll’s Medicine Show, Werewolves of Poverty Gulch and The Vampire of Cripple Creek. He is the author of the middle grade book The Mad Scientists of New Jersey and has written numerous screenplay including Suckerville, Bee Tornado and The Roswell Project.
6 thoughts on “Horrorlicious – The Nightmare Room by Chris Sorensen #Chris Sorensen @RoxanneRhoads”
Oooo, I’m reading this one right now and it is so creepy. I’m loving it!
Isn’t it though. I loved the cover and it did keep me turning those pages.
It sounds as if this one plays around with the genre and then puts its own spin on it, Sherry. If I wasn’t such a wuss, I’d definitely be tracking down this one…
I am always up for a surprise.
This sounded like a fun read. I like that there is a thinker and a doer!
I like that too. Opposites attract and these too work well together.
4 Stars
Oooo, I’m reading this one right now and it is so creepy. I’m loving it!
Isn’t it though. I loved the cover and it did keep me turning those pages.
It sounds as if this one plays around with the genre and then puts its own spin on it, Sherry. If I wasn’t such a wuss, I’d definitely be tracking down this one…
I am always up for a surprise.
This sounded like a fun read. I like that there is a thinker and a doer!
I like that too. Opposites attract and these too work well together.