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    The Keeper
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    The Keeper
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    The Keeper
    Ebook374 pages6 hours

    The Keeper

    By Sarah Langan

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    Some believe Bedford, Maine, is cursed. Its bloody past, endless rain, and the decay of its downtown portend a hopeless future. With the death of its paper mill, Bedford's unemployed residents soon find themselves with far too much time to dwell on thoughts of Susan Marley. Once the local beauty, she's now the local whore. Silently prowling the muddy streets, she watches eerily from the shadows, waiting for . . . something. And haunting the sleep of everyone in town with monstrous visions of violence and horror.

    Those who are able will leave Bedford before the darkness fully ascends. But those who are trapped here—from Susan Marley's long-suffering mother and younger sister to her guilt-ridden, alcoholic ex-lover to the destitute and faithless with nowhere else to go—will soon know the fullest and most terrible meaning of nightmare.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins
    Release dateOct 13, 2009
    ISBN9780061841156
    Unavailable
    The Keeper
    Author

    Sarah Langan

    Sarah Langan, a Columbia MFA graduate and three-time recipient of the Bram Stoker Award, is the author of several novels including A Better World and Good Neighbors. She grew up on Long Island and she currently lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughters. Find out more at SarahLangan.com.

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    Reviews for The Keeper

    3.5/5

    23 ratings20 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Very spooky
    • 4/5
      Bedford was a cursed, doomed and dying town. William Prentice leached the land of its resources and exploited the greed of its citizens for his paper mill. After his death, the town realizes only too late of the dark deeds he's done, but that the sulfur from the paper mill has poisoned everything around it. Before the dark times come, some families leave, others stay. Whether the latter made their choice consciously or against their will is up for speculation. Years later, Susan Marley is born. She at first is like any other child, pretty and nice, but slowly becomes more and more receptive to the darkness of the town's past. It quickly manifests itself to her, then consumes and possesses her. Terrible things then happen to her which only feeds the darkness even more, until she is beyond saving. As the life of the town begins to run out, it is up to her sister, Elizabeth, to unbury the past, recover her own repressed memories, and do what she can to save those who are still alive. The Keeper has more of the Silent Hill elements to it then its sequel, with plenty of gruesome details and an emotional intensity that is also very sad. I liked the characterization of Susan Marley. She is both a pitiable, but a truly evil and vengeful character that you should not cheer for. Other characters are not as strong and brave as the reader is expecting them to be, but then again not all humans are. It's very conflicting for the reader, as there is no "hero" in this story. Some may feel that the story is incomplete as they have no one to "root for" but then again, not every story has to have a happy ending.
    • 5/5
      Now before I bought this book - I did my research and I heard a lot of great things about Ms. Langan's books! So I - the lover of all horror - decided to give it a go. So here is my review:We meet poor Liz who is just trying to get by in life - but of course, with the entire town looking down on her because of her sister, Susan. She always knew that Susan was different, perhaps she was an alien. But Liz tries to make the best of it, with her future looking bright with her new boyfriend, Bobby. As the story progresses, the plot unfolds of the terror that everyone in Bedford knows is coming. Do they admit that they see Susan in their dreams or that they can hear voices? Of course not. Then they would be just as crazy as Susan was. But they all know that something is going to happen, but they don't know when. In Bedford, the rains come and it rains, rains, rains. But there is something different about this rain. It pretty much floods the valley and then by the end it is too late. Those who were lucky enough to get out did - and the others ... well, let's just say they should have tried harder. Sarah Langan's writing is pretty close to Stephen King and Bentley Little - who give you the heebie jeebies when you read the stories. Her characters are strong and flawed, which I liked. I felt really sorry for Liz as the tale spread. I could see all of the death and smell the rank air. Wonderful descriptions of the buildings, people and landscape! I can't wait to read her next novel - The Missing. If you love true horror - then I suggest not taking my word for it - go out and buy it and read it!! This book has it all from voices to ghosts to large insects! This one is definately a keeper (no pun intended).
    • 4/5
      I came across a recommendation for The Keeper here on LibraryThing in one of the groups. It sounded interesting, so I picked it up. The first few chapters were slow going, and I almost put it down. Boy, am I glad I didn't. Things pick up and get pretty creepy about 1/3 of the way through and keep going until literally the last sentence. The Keeper is the story of the death of a town. Not just any town, but an old factory town with a history of abuse and downright evil. And the end isn't easy, by any stretch. The story centers around an inverse sin-eater theme, where the evil that is done in the town builds and builds until it can't be contained anymore. Once it's out, it's not going back into the bottle.The book suffers from a few first-time author flaws. The writing is a bit uneven, and the characters take a bit to get going. The plot needs juicing in a couple of spots. But in general, I recommend it as worth the time spent.
    • 4/5
      Bedford's always been one of those towns that people struggle to get out of, but never quite do. It is a town haunted. Haunted by its past, in the form of a paper mill that has leached toxic elements into the surrounding town, haunted by its present in the person of Susan, the strange woman that wanders the streets. The one that people cross the street to get away from, even her own mother. But once the mill (full of barrels of sulfuric acid, no less) closes, and the yearly rains begin, the town seems even more haunted, more full of death, and much of it seems centered around Susan's sister Liz.Good and pretty creepy, especially when the whole town starts dreaming about Susan.
    • 4/5
      I've always been a fan of small-town apocalypse novels (think Stephen King's "Needful Things" or "Storm of the Century," Phil Rickman's "Crybbe," or Bentley Little's "The Store"). If you are too, you can add another one to your list. "The Keeper" is a real page turner, and Langan has the most crucial quality of a good true horror writer--she never looks away. There's nothing subtle here except perhaps the psychology of the characters. Don't get me wrong. I love a good creeping atmospheric ghost story or a clever, sophisticated mystery, but if you're going to write horror, you can't cheat. Horror should be horrifying, and "The Keeper" is. That's not to say the book is anywhere near perfect. When things really start rolling, Langan loses it a little--as if she can't really keep up with her own pace. Her desperate attempts to explain what's happening when everything is happening at once slow down what would be a breakneck pace if she could follow it herself. But keep in mind, this is a debut novel. The tough stuff, Langan has down pat. She's already better at characterization and psychology than Dean Koontz will ever be; her style and poetry leave Bentley Little in the dust; and she's braver and more disturbing than Peter Straub. If she can get control of her pacing and learn a few things about literary depth, she could be a Stephen King in the making. Definitely one to watch.
    • 4/5
      'I'll start, and you finish', the woman said. 'Once upon a time there was a little girl and she was very unlucky She was born in a haunted place where nothing ever died.'Susan Marley is crazy. Betrayed by her family and friends, she stopped speaking when she was a teenager and wanders mute through the streets of Bedford, Maine. And everyone in town dreams about her, although they don't talk about that, and try not to think about it either. But although Susan is the townspeople's scapegoat, things were badly wrong in Bedford long before she was born. What I really liked abut this book is the way the author casually introduces the horrific and macabre. You are reading along and all of a sudden you read something like "Just then, the closet door opened and a monster stepped out of it." that you hardly notice at first until you are brought up short and have to go back and re-read it. I found it a very effective technique, as it mirrored the way the townspeople skated over the strange things that happened in their town. Later in the book, when the dead stalk the town menacing those townsfolk who didn't sense them coming and flee town, the horror becomes more overt, and that fits too.
    • 2/5
      Not what I expected...guess I'm just not into this genre.
    • 4/5
      Most of the reviews and comments on THE KEEPER make a point about mentioning it as Langan's debut novel. Now that I've done so too, let us ignore that because this is a great novel, period.Susan Marley roams the streets of Bedford, Maine, looking for something or simply trying to connect. Considering that she doesn't speak, is considered the town slut and is ignored by her own mother, that desire for a connection is understood. When she dies one night though, horrible things start happening to the residents in town. The dead rise up and buried secrets come up to reality. While supernatural elements are very much part of the story, they aren't quite as in your face as I expected. The book focuses more on the story and the characters, both of which are very rich and enjoyable. Unfortunately though, I didn't quite get pulled into the characters' lives. They were real and easy to picture but they just weren't quite fascinating to care that much about. Not something to avoid the book over but something to be aware of. Focus on enjoying the multiple plot threads that are nicely weaved together. Those make the novel worthwhile.
    • 2/5
      Ugh...two sisters...one is the town "weirdo" and tramp, the other is the good girl, but no one wants to deal with her anyway. A large cast of characters that don't really have too much to do with each. The whole book was very scattered and hard to read. I am not sure if the town was haunted because of the evil mill or if the girl was schizophrenic after being raped by her father...I don't know...just too scattered and too confusing. Plus, it took way too long for anything to even happen...I would skip it.
    • 4/5
      I had heard good things about Sarah Langan, so I was glad to finally read her novel. Overall, I found out it to be pretty creepy with some good horror elements. It's definitely worth checking out. The writing was high quality and story was well plotted. I found it a little hard to get behind some of the characters and the ending of the novel was a bit depressing. All in all, a good read. Give it a try.Carl Alves - author of Two For Eternity
    • 1/5
      VERY depressing! I could easily have been hooked by the tale of a disconnected and disowned young woman wandering her hometown and appearing in people's dreams, but the more I read, the less I understood, the more depressed I felt and come the end I was just glad it was all over. I don't understand how the mill in the town, the owner from generations before and the main characters from the Marley family connect. I don't understand Susan's grievance with either the townsfolk, or in fact her sister who she loved and protected in life. Actually I just don't understand. Not a clue what was going on at the end, none of it made sense, so not only unsatisfying, but left me feeling like an outsider with absolutely no empathy for the characters, so come the end, I really didn't care what happened to them.
    • 3/5
      Oppressive story of a declining town with hidden secrets and a crazy young woman who takes those secrets into a dark place within her. This story was unrelentingly bleak and had no humor or hope to counterbalance the horror. I thought the writing was good, but the story itself didn't leave me rooting for anyone to make it through the crisis in the town. All the characters were so flawed that you kind of hoped that town would be wiped off the map.
    • 3/5
      This was a good old fashioned creepy story that I really enjoyed. The charactor descriptions gave the story a little meat as the plot itself was rather weak and thin. All in all I think this was a good light read if you like a bit of scary and creepy.
    • 2/5
      The Keeper is horror in the vein of Straub, where a community succumbs to a threat from a malevolent entity. The supernatural is well hidden, hinted at more that directly portrayed in an effort to maintain some suspense. Although the approach is fresh, the lack of any likeable characters creates a lacklustre story. There is a score of characters and only the two central protagonists offer any positive attributes, however with so many characters the key players receive little time, except to propel the story. The Keeper is short enough to be a simple time-killer but it's lack of emotional hold means you'll have soon forgotten it.
    • 2/5
      I'm really wondering what this was all about. The storyline was pretty boring, weird things were happening without reason (giant spider ... really) and I couldn't make heads or tails about anything. Than came the "explaining part" which wasn't any better and didn't help explaining much... I wouldn't recommanded it.
    • 5/5
      I raced through this fat book. My advanced reader's copy is 553 pages and I read it in a very short time because I couldn't stand not knowing what would happen next. I was so scared for the victims. You know from the beginning that a man with a psychosis of some sort is keeping two women in cages in a cellar. He seems to be fixated on women who have a similar appearance and he keeps calling the current favorite Sam. When she tries to tell him that isn't her name, he gets enraged and takes it out on the other one. When he takes a woman he is armed with a stun gun and chloroform, so she's aware she is being kidnapped but unable to do anything about it. Can you imagine how terrifying that is?The cop heading the investigation is D.I. Sean Corrigan from the Murder Investigation Unit in South London. His own past history gives him intuitive insight into the motives of psychotic murderers. He is quite a strange investigator as he tries to get into the mind of such people to solve the case and catch the killer. Thankfully he is married to a doctor who loves him enough to bear with him during his cases, keep up with her own job, and care for their three children. His family is what saves him from going off the deep end himself.Ordinarily a story featuring a mentally ill villain is tough for me to read, but I was so caught up in this one that I just couldn't put it aside without finishing it. If you read this one, and I encourage you to do so, brace yourself for a tense time. You might also want to lock your doors.Highly recommendedSource: HarperCollins
    • 5/5
      Brilliant Crime NovelThe Keeper is an excellent crime novel from the pen of Luke Delaney a former Metropolitan Police Detective in London, who has dealt with a wide range of crimes including murders and gangland assassinations. This novel feels like he has brought some of his experiences to bear especially in the descriptions of the victims and their families as well as with how officers approach and live each case. It is as if the hard learnt experience is laid out for the reader, rather than someone doing research into the police procedures then writing about them.Detective Inspector Sean Callaghan is the lead of the Murder Investigation Team for the South London division of the Metropolitan Police, experienced dealing with the human detritus and sorting the wheat from the chaff and achieving a successful conviction and another murderer off the streets. His Superintendent gives Callaghan and his team an unusual missing persons’ case to investigate. Women of a certain height and look are being taken in broad daylight but it is not till the dead bodies’ start turning up that they realise they are racing against the clock.We are introduced Thomas Keller at the beginning of the book as he is looking for someone in particular and knows South London well. He has nobody to call a friend, not at work where he is hated or at home, but he is used to that as his life has always been about being different to others and alone. He knows what he wants knows how and where to get it and has the means and location to suit, but will DI Callaghan be able to find him in time?This crime story is a compelling read as it unfolds as we get the back story to the main characters as well as what they look and how they feel about life. Delaney is good at getting inside the head of the criminal and the chasing detective. We are not bogged down with irrelevant details but feel as if we are part of the investigation team and under the same pressure as the police. You are able to feel the desperation of the hunt and the exhilaration of discovery from both criminal and police.This is a fantastic novel a great read and feels like you are part of an authentic Murder Investigation Team. To use the oldest cliché of the lot it really is a page turner with a chilling dash of reality. The race is on who will achieve their end game Thomas Keller or Sean Callaghan, the only way to find out is to read the book and enjoy the race to the end.
    • 4/5
      The Keeper is one of those novels that is hard to put down although there were a few times when I wanted to set the book aside. Why you ask? Well, it was so well written and certainly had a tremendous creep value. Of course, serial killers are always creepy but this one, to me, was one of the creepiest that I have read in a while. This man abducts women right from their homes, cages them, rapes them and ultimately murders them. He is looking for that elusive woman that he can keep for his own.The case is investigated by DI Sean Corrigan, who is able somehow to step into the killers mind and from the clues he imagines, is able to hunt down and capture the killer. Sean always gets 150% involved in his cases, to the consternation of his wife, who understands that Sean has to do what he needs to do. If that means not being home for the duration of the case, that is what it will take. I highly recommend this read for anyone who loves the thriller genre.I love reading thrillers and I have read his previous novel, Cold Killing and after this one, I have found another author that I will put on my favorite list and eagerly await his next novel.A copy of the book was provided for my honest review and I was not monetarily compensated for said review.
    • 4/5
      I picked up this book because it was one in the genre that I really liked. I did not know that this was book two in a series. Not that it mattered. This book may be the second one featuring D.I. Sean Corrigan but it can be read as a stand alone novel. This book brings me back to why I love this genre. It is dark, the mystery is high, good investigative research work, a menacing serial killer, and a good ending. Even though the identity of the killer was known right in the beginning of the story, what he did to Louise and his motive was what kept my attention. Than there was Corrigan. He is a complex character. What he brings to the story with his abilities is great. The fact that the author has experience with what he is writing helps to really leads to him and gives the author a upper hand. He made the story come alive. I was right with Corrigan and Louise the whole way until the end. This book is a "Keeper".