#137 in Horror
Those Across the River
- 352
- Pages
- about 6 h
- Reading time
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Our view
Southern Gothic dread runs through “Those Across the River”, an atmospheric horror novel set in a sleepy Georgia town. Frank Nichols, a failed academic haunted by the Great War, comes to write the history of his family’s plantation, and the period feels convincing. Some readers find the racial slurs, true to the era, hard to take, and the horror thinner than the history. It rewards readers who like their horror rooted in a real past.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
A man must confront a terrifying evil in this captivating horror novel that’s “as much F. Scott Fitzgerald as Dean Koontz.”* Haunted by memories of the Great War, failed academic Frank Nichols and his wife have arrived in the sleepy Georgia town of Whitbrow, where Frank hopes to write a history of his family’s old estate—the Savoyard Plantation—and the horrors that occurred there. At first their new life seems to be everything they wanted. But under the facade of summer socials and small-town charm, there is an unspoken dread that the townsfolk have lived with for generations. A presence that demands sacrifice. It comes from the shadowy woods across the river, where the ruins of the Savoyard Plantation still stand. Where a long-smoldering debt of blood has never been forgotten. Where it has been waiting for Frank Nichols....
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.5 across 92 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 38% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Horror average of 7.5. That is how 7.5 comes out.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 9.3 | 6 | 7% |
| Hardcover | 7.4 | 86 | 94% |
Frequently asked
How long is Those Across the River?
It has 352 pages — shorter than 68% of the ranked books in Horror.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Horror — with scores between 7.4 and 7.9, closest to this book.
