This is a “serial novel,” meaning it is a collection of short books, published separately, each one of which contributes to the global story. Each story could stand on its own but collectively they tell a bigger story. In this case, there are 6 short books in the serial, each about 90 pages long. And they are page turners. I have read pretty much everything John Saul has written and I find him to be an excellent writer. Thriller/horror but close enough to reality for you to think “this could happen.” The Blackstone Chronicles fits that description. Horrible things happen in the village of Blackstone, New Hampshire and it turns out there is an evil force behind all of these happenstances. Unlike many other popular novels that deal with evil, Saul’s books never achieve complete resolution. There’s always something that leaves you hanging. So, there may or may not be happy ending to his novels, but usually not in the way we think of as happy endings. Anyway, I enjoyed reading The Blackstone Chronicles and it reminded me of why I enjoy Saul’s writing. I may get out some of his other books (I have what is likely a near-complete collection) and read some more. Good novel if you like creepy stuff.

Read for my February 2022 Mini-challenge "Short Month, Long Book." I will read books 500+ pages for this challenge.

This story consisted of 6 interlocked short stories originally published in serial form. I enjoyed the tale, and it had a real 1980's horror feel to it, although it was published in 1997. My first thought when reading this story, was "Nobody has a cell phone?" But when I thought about it, in 1997 cell phones were not as common. I, in fact, had an emergency pager used for work. I did not have a cell phone.
I figured out who the antagonist was fairly quickly in the series, but the actual details came as a bit of a disappointing reveal. I was curious how the author was going to work his way out of the predicament he wrote himself in. I'm not sure it was successfully resolved, thus the three vs. four stars for the this book.

Psychologically Insane

Back in the day this started out as a serial novel...one chapter book spread out over six months but now it has entered the ebook format as one entire book.
I guess you could say that the entire town of Blackstone is the main character in the story. The residents have generations of relatives that have lived here ever since the town was founded. One dark figure seems to know what makes each family tick and when he delivers his "cursed"objects to the families, that is when tragic things really start to take place. Will the town overcome it's many tragedies or will the town become one of the many ghost towns that have infiltrated the U.S. ?
Pick this up and enjoy a psychological thriller that will keep you connecting the puzzle pieces all the way to the end, where the full picture is finally revealed!!!

Ugh. I don't read much horror so the tropes felt incredibly clunky to me. That said, there was hardly anything BUT tropes in this read.

Moreover the characters were cardboard, the themes muddy, and the ending soul-suckingly trite.

The only person I'd recommend this book so is someone who unironically enjoys the trash adventure television from the 90's and is looking for something especially vapid.

This is everything you could ever want from great serial horror. I remember my sister-in-law reading 10 pages every night before she went to bed, and having to watch a Disney movie just so she could sleep. This book rules!

A reread and still my one my favs from hom

Have you ever heard of Stephen King, you know, the guy who wrote The Shining, It and Pet Sematary? His novels are world wide and know for being some of the best horror novels, turned movie adaptations, ever written. How about John Saul? He’s really good as well. I didn’t know him either.
The Blackstone Chronicles by John Saul is probably the first novel that had made me feel uneasy as I read it, not scared or frightened, but very unnerved and uneasy. I thought this horror thriller novella series was really trippy and brilliantly written. The plot follows a town called Blackstone in New Hampshire that is about to tear down an old asylum and replace it with a shopping mall. The plans are delayed when financial struggles come into play, but this event unleashed angered spirits from the past. Eventually, unnamed and unknown packages start showing up for people who were involved in the asylum’s destruction. All the items have stories and all are connected into the intertwined chaos of THE BLACKSTONE CHRONICLES.
tI love how Saul structured these novellas. What he did is he had a prologue showing an event that happened from the past in the asylum. During those he put little writing quirks in each of them and repeats this quirk if someone gets possessed and it is done perfectly. It conveys this really missable but really believable showing of insanity and how it is clearly the spirit of whatever happened in the prologue. This is also used as a foreshadowing tactic by making key points that seemed obsolete into the prologue that come up later. When I read what happened, I was thinking “Oh wow! That was part of it, I didn’t realize that was important.” I think the most obvious showing of this writing is in the second part wherein it seems that paranoia was what was trying to be conveyed and the writing quirk is paragraph breaks.
(Saul novella 2, page 38)
Another suspicious glance.
Lorena felt the familiar fear quicken inside her. They were watching her, talking about her. Despite the charade they were playing out-that they had eyes only for each other-they weren’t fooling her at all.
They weren’t just watching her
They were plotting against her.
A plot Lorena wouldn’t-couldn’t-let succeed.
And then later
(Saul novella 2, page 38)
But they weren’t fooling him-he knew they were there!
Just as he knew the rest of the neighbors on Harvard Street were watching him as he made his way down the hill towards Main. How long they had they been watching him? Years, probably. And he knew why.
They were all his enemies.
He understood it all this morning with a clarity he’d never had before
They knew about the problems at the Bank.
They knew about the affair Madeline was having. (Saul novella 2, page 38)
It’s so easy to tell that it is meant to convey a message of hastyness or unnerve that those characters felt. The best part is the fact that beforehand, that character in the second quote, when he was the main focus, he didn’t have those writing quirks. I think that is so cool.
tI also like how he gets people thinking throughout the novellas. Despite being split up into 6 different parts and being about different stories, there is a connected stories that shows itself more and more as the parts progress and become the ending. And that connected story keeps you thinking, you know it’s there but you can’t find the missing link to it all. At the end the book actually takes notice of this near the end and calls out the missing link, that was really cool. Despite this the connected story was very predictable, well, one half of it was predictable. I could guess what the big twist was about half way through the novellas but as it turned out, there were 2 big twists. Both were foreshadowed but I think Saul made one intentionally predictable so the other was clouded and people missed the hints he was dropping about the other one. I can’t tell for sure if this is what Saul intended but if it was then I applaud his amazing writing style.
tNear the end, Saul wrote very self aware writing that was absolutely hilarious. There’s a line that made me turn my stomach laughing because of how self aware it was. “Except that Oliver knew just how rare amnesia really was-far more common, in fact, in romance novels and cheap thrillers than it was in real life.” (Saul Novella 6, page 11). I like that so much because this novella series is thriller and each novella was 3 dollars according the price on the back or a cheap… thriller, it also has a romantic side plot that does come in at end of the novellas as well. This isn’t super common throughout the novellas but there are points where this occurs, mostly near the end and maybe some other places. It also has some really good and relatable humor that didn’t feel forced. I love that so much and really shows Saul’s prowess as a writer.
tYou know how a lot of horror movies and novels paint the main character as a complete idiot unintentionally? Well these novellas fixes that as well by having the monster be invisible to the people. But that wasn’t good enough to make everyone idiots, rather, Saul decided to make some people come up with theories of what is actually happening and make all the main characters brush it off early in the novellas but then start to take note of it slowly and surely throughout the novellas. This novella is at least better than some of the trash that has come out in the last years.
tOverall, this novella series was very very unnerving and I had an absolute joy reading it. I would recommend this novella series to anyone who enjoys horror or thriller novels or wants a twist on the old Stephen king novel, this novella series is definitely for you. I keep calling it a novella series, because that’s what I read, but it has since been combined into one novel. I don’t know if the novel changes anything compared to the original, I wouldn’t be surprised if it was looked over and writing errors were fixed and it’s better formated. The Blackstone Chronicles will leave you stunned, dazed, confused and satisfied with the amazing writing that is consistent and fluent with this novella series. I’m definitely going to be looking out for John Saul’s name in the future.

My Review and Thoughts:

This is another perfect spooky little gem of suspense, tension, hair raising story telling that only a master like John Saul could write. This came out first as six separate small books back in the 90’s but now it is available as one complete book.

Saul loves writing about houses or buildings that contain horrible secrets that stain the walls or objects in the structure. This is a powerful story of many actions all associated with an asylum. The asylum has been closed for many years and is now in the process of being turned into a shopping center, but the objects inside the asylum end up carrying the dark horror of its past out into the world.

This is tour de force of a master story telling. A perfect example of how to write a book and to hold the reader page after page. A true page turner of many solid stories which are woven around one subject the Blackstone Asylum.

The narration or images displayed through the back stories and character development make this an award worthy book. This displays itself in complete harmony for the reader. I have always been a John Saul fan. Some books are less par and other a true gem, this one is of his masterpiece of suspense, mystery, tension and horror reality. This horror is all built up in exciting edge of your seat thrills and ideas and haunting images.

The six parts of this book tell each a story, Part 1 An eye for an Eye: The Doll, Part 2 Twist of Fate: The Locket, Part 3 Ashes to Ashes: The Dragon’s Flame, Part 4 The Shadow of Evil: The Handkerchief, Part 5 Day of Reckoning; The Stereoscope, Part 6 Asylum.

Each part are small spooky little masterpiece type tales of the classic Tales from the Crypt type of setting. All stories are one complete story to the Blackstone Asylum. Nightmares, secrets, lies and murder. The unexplained twists around wonderful characters and horror induced objects stained by History. Evil history.

A small town darkly created for the reader. The sins of the past and the closed doors of the present. The horrors of evil. A stench and feel of a curse come full force in this great fictional horror story that lingers deep into the subconscious.

The Writing is so well done you feel the horror and actions. Your hair raises on your neck, your heart beats a little faster and your reading grows rapid as you can’t stop reading the tension on the page.

A perfect read.

My Rating: 4 out of 5

I read this when I was young and had forgotten so much but I remembered some of it but it was a great book. I listened to the audio book and loved it. Highly recommended to any John Saul fan who has never read this!

I wanted to read this because I remember having the old PC game and watching my mom play it when I was younger. From the first chapter, I was instantly hooked, and I stayed that way throughout the entire novel (or would this be considered an anthology?) I'm an avid horror and thriller fan regarding many forms of entertainment, and this checked all the boxes for me personally. I loved the descriptions, the characters, the way everything felt insanely climactic throughout the plot, and so much more. I give this one 5 stars, and I highly recommend you check this out if you're into thrillers!

Coming into this collection I was a bit hesitant. While Saul does admit that King's "The Green Mile" serial was directly responsible for his giving the same concept a go, this hardly qualifies as derivative.

These stories seemed, on the surface, to be tame, but as I read deeper into the first story, the real horror and disturbing events unfolded nicely. I normally don't get creeped out very easily, having consumed massive amount of horror fiction throughout my life. But Blackstone was indeed creepy. Unsettling. Scary.

As I read on, each story was just as scary and disturbing as the last, and I had to slow down before I voraciously read the whole collection in one go. I read one chapter a day, and found myself thinking about the stories after I'd read them. They stuck in my mind. The doll still does. So messed up!

This was a fully successful and enjoyable attempt at serial publication, and if you read it slowly like I did, you'll get the full effect. It's a good story, it draws you in, and is quite entertaining.

Four stars!

A very take and subdued John Saul

I love a lot of John Saul's works but this one reads a bit like a network tv drama that's likely to get cancelled after the first season. Some of the reveals are forced; some of the motivations are baffling. Unless you're a Saul completist, I'd skip it.