Homeplace, by Beth Massie

There is a short list of writers whose books I never hesitate to read. Bill Pronzini is one. Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child represent another example. Even some of my favorite writers' books stay on the shelf, unread, for weeks, months, and damn it, sometimes even years.

Elizabeth Massie is a writer that I read right away. She has never failed to entertain, disturb and frighten me.

Beth's new book is called Homeplace, and it is a Southern Gothic novel. Now by Gothic I do not mean pale skin, black attire and a Hot Topic discount card. I'm talking about dark familial secrets.


The novel opens with a Forward in which several children are at a birthday party for a Matriarch at a decaying Virginia manor. Bored by the adult activities there, the youths explore and discover an old, hidden well. Even after being harshly warned to stay away from it, they labor in secret to loosen the bricks and board that hide the well, and expose it, unlocking a terrifying presence and an ugly legacy.

Cut to the present, where one of the children is now full-grown and has inherited the manor and property. Charlene Myers is at a desperate point in her life and she elects to move from her urban Norfolk, VA home to the rural estate, where she hopes to rekindle her painting aspirations and begin a new life. Almost immediately she senses there is something amiss in the house. From a neighbor she hears that her ancestor was a self-proclaimed witch that the townfolk still believe has some sort of hold upon the buildings and land.

Homeplace is different than what I have come to expect from Elizabeth Massie. Her fiction generally deals with violent family disfunction and all-too-human horror. It's good to see a talented writer like this stretching out in other directions. Homeplace is a tense, atmospheric, scary story that, like most of Massie's fiction, depicts rural life with intimacy and firsthand knowledge of the country. There is a touch of Manly Wade Wellman here, and a little Robert McCammon, but Homeplace is pure Beth Massie and it is one of her finest books. I don't think it quite replaces Welcome Back to the Night as my favorite, because that novel has such sheer emotional power. Yet Ms. Massie's hand at the craft of writing has never been more assured.

Interestingly, Homeplace is the first book from her that is credited to Beth Massie, instead of Elizabeth Massie. When I searched for Elizabeth Massie at Amazon, Homeplace didn't come up. I hope this small change won't make her fans miss this one.