Book Review: THE DUNNIE

Title: The Dunnie
Author: Keith Thomas
Publisher: Night Platform Book Company
Pages: 145
My GoodReads Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

The Dunnie, a horrible and beastly creature, supposedly based on English-Scottish folklore, is a creature that personifies our worst habits. While the book makes for good reading as a tale of horror, it misses out on a deeper characterisation of Asher, his days at school, and his grief and rebelliousness.

Mary Schwob Arceneaux wakes up in the middle of one night in 2008 to discover that Frank, her husband, a man who has abused and belittled her for 24 years, is not in bed. When she goes looking for him in his favourite room, the library, she finds him engaged in a bizarre ritual with Terry ‘Goat’ Pratt, a man she detests as much as she detests Frank.

Fourteen years later, Frank has dementia and is losing control. His daughters, Zoe, with partner Faith, and Beth, with her 12-year-old son Asher, have returned home to help put his affairs in order.

Asher’s school has threatened to expel him over various infractions. Beth hopes that spending time with his grandfather and playing in the woods around their home will help calm him, and save him from inheriting the rage of his grandfather, once an abusive brute who mysteriously turned benevolent around the time of Asher’s birth.

Lonely and despised by his family, Frank underwent an occult practice to rid himself of his anger. The anger was expelled from his body and took the shape of an evil creature, the Dunnie, that needed to feed on small animals to stay alive.

Now the Dunnie has grown and her anger has increased and Asher's grandfather can no longer control the creature. Will Asher succeed in keeping his family safe?

 

Speaking of the curiosities in his grandfather’s collection, Asher says, “They’re not so bad,” to which Beth responds, “In the daytime, they’re not.”

Another time, when Asher says, “Pa never really seemed to care much about money,” Beth says, “When you’ve got enough of it, you don’t.”

 

In the best traditions of the horror genre, we are moved to care for Asher, who is hurting and misunderstood. In the same vein, Beth disregards Asher when he sounds the voice of alarm

 

Asher gets into trouble at school. He is unable to process his grief in the wake of his father’s death. We are not told who his father is, or how he died, which is a big omission in the family’s back story. Clearly it’s important, since Asher is unable to cope at school.

 

Since so much of the story hinges on Frank’s anger issues and his belittling of his wife and children, it would have been great to actually see that angry display of rage, set against the vision of the lovely grandfather that Asher knows. Both these significant personality changes are only told to us, never shown.

 

Also, Mary is missing from the present-day events. We learn much later that she has died. Again, an omission. Since she was the one to bear witness to the strange ritual that changes Frank, she should have been around to experience this difficult time.

Mary had the makings of a good character.

 

In fact, after Mary’s death, none of the living female characters are strong enough. It is only the men who make things happen, including Frank, Asher, Goat, the strawman.

 

Apparently Frank attaches as little importance to women. Why else would he burden a 12-year-old boy with information about the Dunnie? Such a serious matter should have been shared with his two adult daughters and yet when Asher asks him why he won’t tell his mom and aunt Zoe and the police, Frank says the police would not believe him. He has nothing to say about Beth and Zoe.

Ironically, the Dunnie, the beast of a monster goes by the pronouns she and her.

 

I liked the writing, especially the bits about the house and Goat’s house and the strawman. In fact, I found the strawman scarier than the DUnnie.

 

The Dunnie was a great horror novel, but I would have liked it to go beyond. The issues relating to anger, grief, domestic abuse, dementia, even the soul and its significance, remain unaddressed.

 

The book also includes an excerpt from the author’s next book in the series, The Mutter.

Stories need to be dangerous, Pa tells Asher. This one certainly is.

(I read this book on NetGalley. Thank you to the author, the publisher and NetGalley.)