Robert R. McCammon - Usher's Passing

[andydecker]

Robert R. McCammon - Usher's Passing (Ballantine 1985, Original Holt, Rinehart and Winston 1984, 407 p.)

The House of Usher has towered over a century with its apocalyptic warning against the powers of madness and evil. Yet the House of Usher is nor mere tale. And neither did it really ever fall.

Today the House of Usher is a multibillion-dollar corporate empire standing poised on the brink of its most devastating onslaught against an unsuspecting world … crafting fantastic superweapons that can level the planet … summoning demons of destruction from the darkest reaches of the earth.

Unless one young heir to the House of Usher can, at long last, break the unyielding spell of terror. Before it breaks him.


The cover blurb is a bit vague. Basically it is about an American dynasty named Usher which inspired Poe to his story. (Who gets a small cameo in the prologue) All descendants are suffering more or less from the sickness described in Poe's tale. Now the patriarch lies dying in Usherland, the family seat somewhere in North Carolina, while the feuding family comes together. One son is a struggling horror writer who has cut all ties to the family money, the other is a bully, the daughter is a model. The writer, who is the main protagonist, discovers something supernatural about his family, while a monster is prowling the backwoods and the inbred hillbillys living there.

[dem bones]

This was the UK edition. Read - and enjoyed - this, The Night Boat, They Thirst and Blue World in quick succession, but the late novels looked too huge for my woeful attention span.

Robert McCammon - Usher's Passing (Pan, 1986)

David O'Connor

Blurb:
"You can't turn your back on the Usher heritage, no matter how hard you try...."

In Edgar Allan Poe's classic tale of the dark powers of madness and evil, Roderick Usher and his sister Madeline perished. But supposing there had been another brother to carry the hideous legacy into the future....

Walen Usher is slowly dying. Deformed, grotesque, reeking of decay, he summons his three children to the vast North Carolina estate wherein successive generations have concealed a secret so diabolic that it drove Roderick to insanity.

As Rix Usher waits to see who will inherit Usher Armaments, he begins to delve into the family archives, uncovering a horrifying history of madness, murder, and sudden death. At the same time, the insidious evil that for over a century has shaped the Ushers' destiny prepares to unleash its most devastating onslaught against an unsuspecting world.

In the haunted heart of Usherland—in the Devil's sanctuary—Rix Usher must face both who he is—and what he is....

[𝘗rincess 𝘵uvstarr]

ebook site version.




Kindle Edition, 418 pages

Published October 18th 2011 by Open Road Media (first published 1984)

ASIN B005T54GF6

[goathunter]

You can find bunches of covers from around the world in the Book Cover Gallery on RobertMcCammon.com.

Usher's Passing book cover gallery