Lame heroine, otherwise engrossing story. ( )

Oh, goodness. I really did not like this one. Okay start with the good: short, compelling chapters; atmosphere; and quite the exciting climax.

The not so good: details, a lot of nitpicky details. I believe that this is meant to be a sort of "Southern Gothic" tale. And if you're going to write about the South and you don't live there, you had better do some research. I had trouble from the get go with the main character. She has no backbone (or very little of one), she's intimidated by her students, she gets completely steamrolled by the male faculty, and somehow she's on Duke's faculty without a research project? Please.

And then there are the botanical details. The leaves changing on the trees magically overnight I can forgive, especially if you are as unobservant as this character seems to be. The roses peeking through the brambles in what must be late fall, I can even forgive, because fine they might be blooming still if there hasn't been a frost. But smelling honeysuckle after the leaves have started turning. No, I'm sorry, no.

These, like I said, are nitpicky. But it is these things that take me out of the world of the story. Add to that the fact that even the Southern characters don't feel Southern. They feel like someone's idea of Southern. And, for me, it comes off as unauthentic. From the first crack about that "regional standard," "sugary concoction" (sweet tea) to the night blooming jasmine (mentioned so many times it is almost a character) to the oh-so-caricatured Southern Belle batting her eyelashes all over the place (nicknamed "Miss White Sugar"; perhaps Miss Priss was too cliché), I just wasn't into it. Sorry.

Oh and PS, apparently schizophrenia smells like urine and goats, according to this story. So, there's that. ( )

Newly arrived at Duke University, a psychiatry professor becomes interested in the files of the world-famous parapsychology lab, which was abruptly shut down 40 years ago following a mysterious experiment. She decides to investigate and ends up helping to re-create the experiment in a strange house in the rural North Carolina pine country, which unleashes a ghost or evil spirit or madness or something.

Not enough scares and took too long to get going. The paranormal investigators only just arrive at the haunted house halfway through the house. There is also a romance angle that I felt detracted from the story. We never did find out who Laurel had hot sex with in that kind of disgusting 'it's rape but it's a dream and anyway I like it' scene. The house itself was cool, but the suspense failed to build, and the ending was muddled and anti-climactic. Not a great example of the haunted house genre, although not terrible either -- just forgettable. I mainly kept reading because of the North Carolina angle. ( )

"It is a mistake to think that you know. It will not be known." But that doesn't get Sokoloff off the hook entirely.

The Unseen borrows generously from The Haunting of Hill House, doing little justice to either the heroine (who is feckless and tiresome throughout) or the location (a back story in tatters without respect for the house as either character or basis.) If you skip the first 30 chapters, the end of the book pays off nicely, though without real resolution. ( )

An excellent book marred only by a weak ending. ( )