Black House
Sequel to The Talisman
Stephen King & Peter Straub

Twenty years ago, a boy named Jack Sawyer traveled to a parallel universe called the Territories to save his mother and her Territories "Twinner" from an agonizing death that would have brought cataclysm to the other world. Now Jack is a retired Los Angeles homicide detective living in the nearly nonexistent hamlet of Tamarack, Wisconsin. He has no recollection of his adventures in the Territories, and was compelled to leave the police force when an odd, happenstance event threatened to awaken those memories.
When a series of gruesome murders occur in western Wisconsin that are reminiscent of those committed several decades ago by a madman named Albert Fish, the killer is dubbed "the Fisherman", and Jack's buddy, the local chief of police, begs Jack to help the inexperienced force find him. But are these new killings merely the work of a disturbed individual, or has a mysterious and malignant force been unleashed in this quiet town? What causes Jack's inexplicable waking dreams - if that is what they are - of robins' eggs and red feathers? It's almost as if someone is trying to tell him something. As this cryptic message becomes increasingly impossible to ignore, Jack is drawn back to the Territories and to his own hidden past, where he may find the soul strength to enter a terrifying house at the of of a deserted tract of forest, there to encounter the obscene and ferocious evils sheltered within.

This sequel to The Talisman does not disappoint. I gave that book five stars and it quickly became one of my favorites - and this one will also get five stars and is now one of my personal favorites as well. From the ending, I doubt that there will be another one in the series (and this one even took twenty years to come out), but I'd be very happy if there was one.

It's interesting to see Jack all grown up and find out what's happened to him. While the Talisman did heal his mother of the cancer within her, by the time we catch up with Jack in this book, she has passed away. Though at least Jack's quest did buy her more life than she would have otherwise had.

The characters are well rounded out and while more time is spent in our world than in the Territories, this book is no less fantastical than its previous one. The plot is engaging and the new characters are just as entertaining as the ones from the Talisman. Some of the old characters will also pop up from time to time, so before reading this book, one must first read The Talisman.

Both novels are quite large - the hardcover of Black House being 625 pages long. But they are both well worth the read. I highly recommend both books in this series.

My rating: Five out of five snails.