Dark Matter: the gripping ghost story from the author of WAKENHYRST

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His attempts to clean up soon lead to the deaths of thousands, then millions, of innocent citizens as he learns who is really behind the city's crime cult. Jack, setting off on a polar expedition, senses the supposed hostile sneers and low opinion of his more affluent and 'well-educated' companions; On board ship he encounters the seeming hostility of the captain of their transport ship, and gradually, as the adventure continues, he begins to sense and feel the hostility of the landscape even in amidst its beauty and then over-riding everything the glimpses he has caught of the 'dark figure against the glare, hands at his side, one shoulder higher than the other, something about the tilt of his head that I didn't like' suddenly morphs into the realization that this figure is not seeking recognition or help or comfort but revenge and that that hatred and hostility is focused directly on Jack. Despite its short length, the novel's greatest strength is its sense of place and the atmosphere it evokes: while reading Jack's first person account you'll feel as if you were there beside him in the deep north, chilled to the bone. When a radio play is this good, the devil really is in the details' Radio Times Summoned to a case of apparent possession, Father Karras is at first sceptical, then horrified. In the wake of the First World War, Jonathan Morgan stows away on an Antarctic expedition, determined to find his rightful place in the world of men.

The part when Mr Eriksons trapper friend turned up to check on Jack I felt genuine relief for him and I myself felt completely at ease while reading the book, but as soon as he left I also felt my anxiety levels go up. Because of this, combined with the likability of everyman narrator Stephen Pearce, I was pulled in from the beginning.Paver's descriptions are so evocative I felt like I was actually there, and could imagine exactly what Gruhuken looked like with absolute clarity. The initial beauty of the Arctic summer with its constant daylight, which makes the men optimistic and confident about their mission, feeling invincible even in the wild, remote region they feel themselves stranded in. He volunteers to hold down the fort and save the expedition effort single-handedly while Gus seeks medical attention, taking Algie with him. A week before the expedition, Stephen meets the reclusive Charles Tennant himself, but he reacts badly to Stephen’s questions and his news that they intended to follow Lyell’s route.

Paver is the mistress of suspense” agrees Amanda Craig in her review of children’s books for Halloween in The Times. The strength of the novel lies not only in the depiction of a detailed future of hardship and privation, but in the expert characterisation of Shah: a lone figure whose origins leave him open to prejudice within the police department, and whose problematic relationship with an intersexual courtesan reveals his own deep-seated prejudices. His experiences made me question my own love of/desire for solitude, and that is a rare thing indeed for me. There is an art to writing a good ghost story and one of the absolutes is in the appearance of authenticity. I would guess that this kind of tale requires a remote and dangerous setting, somewhere secluded and cut off the real world.The Sherpas are laughed at because of their beliefs, it turns out though that prayers and superstition are the only defence against what’s up on that mountain. Something bad has happened at this place; the ruins of an abandoned mine, a huge gathering of picked-clean bones and rusted tools, and a stained, solitary bear post are all that remains to stand vigil over Gruhuken. When Jack, Gus and Algie finally arrive by ship to their destination, they know that the captain believes the place is haunted. She shifted the story to the stone age and wrote Wolf Brother, the first book in the Chronicles of Ancient Darkness, which opens as Torak and his father are attacked by a demon bear. Yet with all this unrequited or at least unsatisfied love affair with snow on my part Michelle Paver still managed to make even me a little unnerved by the idea of the chill and bleakness and paralysing loneliness of a snowed landscape.

Ten years later, Torak, Renn and Wolf are, in fact, back, both in an upcoming TV adaptation of the first six books and in Paver’s latest novel, Viper’s Daughter. Dark Matter is a spellbinding read – the kind of subtly unsettling, understated ghost story MR James might have written had he visited the Arctic.Is the narrator, as well as his climbing partners, suffering altitude sickness or is there something more nefarious haunting them? there he will find meaning to his life, camaraderie and fellowship and an intense crush on one of his fellow adventurers, and an atrocious and deadly ghost. If I had any desire to climb a mountain it's totally erased now(I am scared) The atmosphere is impeccable.