story of a particularly nasty serial killer. His third
novel was the first to use ghosts as its supernatural
menace. In The Night Stone(1986) a family moves
into a new home with a tainted past. The parents
quickly fall under the influence of the evil forces
resident in the building, and their young daughter,
still relatively unaffected, feels menaced on every
side. An otherwise unexceptional plot is enlivened
by a cast of vividly created characters, which
would continue to be characteristic of Hautala’s
subsequent novels.
Little Brothers(1988), based on an actual leg-
end, began to distinguish Hautala from most of his
contemporaries. The title refers to an inhuman race
living secretly on the fringes of human society who
periodically kill and devour humans. It is a particu-
larly suspenseful and well-written novel with signifi-
cantly greater attention paid to developing its major
characters. Moonwalker(1989) places zombies in a
New England rural setting, an unlikely combination
that works surprisingly well. The inhabitants of a
small town are very secretive when outsiders are
present and are unwilling to talk about the quiet,
tireless workers in the nearby fields. Hautala had by
now emerged as one of the most interesting writers
in the horror field and was growing more popular
even as the genre in general began to lose the ap-
peal it had enjoyed during the 1980s.
Winter Wake(1989) is another excellent ghost
story. John Carlson and his family move to a small
island off the coast of Maine seeking peace and
quiet, but their lives are disrupted by the spirit of a
dead woman who is convinced that Carlson was
responsible for the wreckage of her life. Once
again, strong characterization and a clear under-
standing of the intricacies of human psychology
turn a familiar theme into a highly successful
novel. Dead Voices(1990) mixes ghosts, witchcraft,
and the risen dead. Following the accidental death
of her young daughter, Caroline tries to get her life
back in order but instead runs into trouble in the
form of a powerful witch who is introducing de-
monic forces into the bodies of the dead. When
her daughter is chosen as the vessel for one of the
creatures, Caroline calls upon hidden strengths to
battle the witch and save her daughter’s soul.
Cold Whisper(1991) is Hautala’s most original
novel. Sarah is a young child with an imaginary
friend, Tully, who seems at times to be not entirely
imaginary. Bad things happen to anyone Sarah dis-
likes, but fortunately she is not basically an unkind
child and eventually repudiates Tully, although she
never forgets him. Years later Sarah is menaced by
a killer, and she searches within herself and discov-
ers that Tully is still there. There is a virtual crowd
of ghosts in Dark Silence(1992), angry workers at
an abandoned mill who resent their treatment
while alive and who are controlled by the mental
powers of an old woman until she dies, setting
them free to exact revenge on the living. The
ghost is benevolent in Ghost Light(1993), appear-
ing only in dreams and helping to protect fugitive
children from their homicidal father after they are
kidnapped by his sister-in-law, who fears for their
lives. All three of these novels demonstrate Hau-
tala’s now fully matured talent.
Twilight Time(1994) is a nonfantastic suspense
novel, but Shades of Night(1995) is another ghost
story, this one consisting largely of a succession of
dream images, with most of the conflict involving
more mundane dangers. Beyond the Shroud(1996)
is a significant departure from Hautala’s previous
work. The protagonist is, in fact, dead throughout
almost the entire novel, his disembodied personal-
ity alternating between our world and a surrealistic
plane of existence where the ghost of his daughter
helps him to prevent the murder of his widow. The
otherworldly landscape and its bizarre and menac-
ing denizens are vividly realized. The Mountain
King(1996) is reminiscent of the author’s earliest
work. The protagonist investigates when a friend is
carried off by members of an inhuman race living
secretly in the wilderness. Cold River(2003), a
short novel, is the very atmospheric story of a man
threatened by murky shapes that emerge from the
water and that are visible only to him.
Hautala’s two most recent horror novels have
both appeared under the pseudonym A. J.
Matthews. The White Room(2001) is another ghost
story. The spirit of a child begins to manifest itself
after some long-hidden human remains turn up
unexpectedly. Looking Glass(2004), a much more
impressive work, proves that small, subtle hints of
the supernatural can be as effective as more overt
scenes. Residents in their new home begin to catch
glimpses of a scar-faced woman in mirrors and158 Hautala, Rick