Death Watch (review)

After his father goes missing, Silas and his alcoholic mother lose their home and are forced to move to his uncle's sprawling estate in his parents' childhood town of Lichport. Gray and gloomy, standing at the edge of swampy marshes, Lichport has an air of decay and rot, and its residents are oddly focused on death and its surrounding ceremony. As the son of a mortician, Silas isn't as bothered by this as others might be; more disturbing, however, is his uncle's increasingly erratic behavior, particularly in regards to one shadowy room in the mansion, and the locals' constant references to Silas' father as "the Undertaker." After finding an antique watch among his father's belongings, Silas is finally able to see what they mean: the watch allows him to see dead people, and Silas realizes that Lichport is a necropolis filled with restless souls—souls to which his father, as the Undertaker, would have brought peace. Convinced his father met foul play among the lost spirits, Silas embarks on a journey to save his dad; what he finds instead is a horror show among his own kin and a town filled with deadly secrets. Darkly atmospheric, Lichport is a town populated with villains and tropes from familiar and lesser-known folktales, a place where nightmares come alive in the form of zombies, ghosts, and power-hungry relatives. Berk, a folklorist and mythology professor, keeps most of the stories focused on loss and grief, providing a very human face to the horror. At 500-plus pages, however, and with its somber and often lengthy ruminations on death and the afterlife, this is a dense read whose slow pace has the potential to seriously disappoint the average horror fan. Readers should be prepared to spend a fair amount of time with Silas' story, but those who like complexity in their scary tales will find their patience rewarded by the satisfying conclusion.