Ann reported on The Winter People by Jennifer McMahon (Anchor 2015)
West Hall, Vermont, has always been a town of strange disappearances and old legends. The
most mysterious is that of Sara Harrison Shea, who, in 1908, was found dead in the field behind
her house just months after the tragic death of her daughter.
Now, in present day, nineteen-year-old Ruthie lives in Sara’s farmhouse with her mother, Alice,
and her younger sister. Alice has always insisted that they live off the grid, a decision that has
weighty consequences when Ruthie wakes up one morning to find that Alice has vanished. In
her search for clues, she is startled to find a copy of Sara Harrison Shea's diary hidden beneath
the floorboards of her mother's bedroom. As Ruthie gets sucked into the historical mystery, she
discovers that she’s not the only person looking for someone that they’ve lost. But she may be
the only one who can stop history from repeating itself.
Creepy, goosebumpy, scary ghost stories aren't only for cool fall evenings. It turns out that the
middle of January in remote Vermont when it's buried in snow is also the perfect setting for a
psychological thriller filled with ghosts.
Written by Jennifer McMahon, this is two stories in one with the common factor the setting of an
old farmhouse on a secluded road in the very small town of West Hall, Vermont. The stories
alternate: One takes place in January 1908, including flashbacks about 20 years earlier. The
other takes place in the present day, also in January. This thickly-wooded homestead includes
an outcropping of giant boulders that looks so much like a hand, the area has always been
called Devil's Hand. Wander too far into the woods, and you might not make it out alive.
Something is going on here, and those who have seen it believe there are ghosts in this spooky
forest.
It's January 1908. Sara Harrison Shea and her husband Martin Shea live in the farmhouse with
their little girl, Gertie, who is 8 years old. One day she is found dead, having fallen 50 feet down
a well. Sara collapses in grief, but writes her fears, anguish, and hopes into a secret diary. Sara
comes to an untimely and gruesome death, which remains the stuff of legend in West Hall a
hundred years later. She hid her diary in one of the hidey-holes in the old farmhouse, and many
people want to find it because in it she supposedly left instructions on how to raise the dead to
life.
Meanwhile in the present-day, Alice Washburne lives in the same farmhouse with her two
daughters, Ruthie, 19, and Fawn, 6. Alice, who is widowed, has lived off the grid for about 20
years. No computer. No cell phone. No links to anyone in the world. Even in this small town, not
everyone knows who she is. On New Year's Day, Alice disappears. More than anything, Alice
dislikes the police, so Ruthie knows she shouldn't call the cops. (This is one of several plot
points—some small, some big—that make the mystery work. If Ruthie did call the cops or
someone didn't lock her cell phone in the car so she didn't have it when she really needed it,
things would have worked out quite differently. A little cheesy, perhaps.) The two stories—past
and present—converge as Ruthie discovers dark secrets about her own past and those
surrounding this strange house.
This is one of the creepiest stories I have ever read, and while the plots from both time periods
are rather farfetched, the book is a page-turner. It will keep you up past your bedtime, and if you
read it then, you may very well have nightmares.
Tracey's book was A Dark and Snowy Night by Sally Goldenbaum, #5 in the Seaside Knitters
Mystery Series (Kensington 2022)
It’s holiday season in the picturesque, coastal town of Sea Harbor, Massachusetts! But in USA
Today bestselling author...