The Loney - SPOILERS

[Hygge]

I've just finished it, and I know I was chatting to someone about it on a thread I now can't find.

And we said we'd start a thread about it when we'd finished, but I can't see one so I've started one.

I have no idea what to say about it though. It was very odd. I liked most of it, but I felt it lacked a proper explanation to a lot of things.

It had a sort of Woman In Black feel to it, with all the mudflats and tides and being stranded by then or drowned if you were unlucky enough to misjudge the timing of them.

It was set (mostly) in the mid-to-late seventies though, but didn't feel quite that modern to me.

And although something weird was going on in that cellar, I'm not sure what it was.

Obviously they cured him in some way, but how, and why? Did I miss that?

And then it just finished, with no real ending.

I was hoping for a bit more, but then I don't think I was in quite the right mood to read it, so perhaps I'm being harsh.

I enjoyed it but found bits rather odd.

I think the Hanny was cured due to the baby. Remember how it looked awful? It had taken on the illnesses of others, I don't know whether they personally inflicted upon it as part of their 'witchcraft' (if that's what it really was) or whether it just occurred as part of the 'magic'. I assume they killed the baby at the end once they had finished with it,hence the gun.

I don't know why they done it but there's obviously some kinda ritual going on.

It could've done with more explanation on things,couldn't it. It left you guessing a little.

Interesting though as it there was talk of witches and there was the vandalism to the church, they were a creepy lot and people lost faith there (like Father Wilfred,was it?)

Yet the baby was born to a young girl with the purpose of taking on the ills of others,sacrificed to give them life and freedom...

Unusual eh.

I knew the baby was involved, I was expecting a different kind of sacrifice rather than a passing on of ills and injuries before killing the baby.

I'd have liked to know a bit about the ritual or whatever they did, and who did it? Leonard? Was he the one, like a kind of travelling satanist calling by once a year with a pregnant girl and a sack for the money?

Or were the villagers all in on it and part of the group? We they all really witches or satanists or something? And what was the shrine really? Was it just used as an excuse to explain the 'miracle' cures taking place?

And if so, just how long had that group been going, and how many babies had previously been used?

I would have liked more explanation into that, and also possibly a revelation of more bodies.

There was a comment Else made about it being easy when you'd done it before, so I wondered if they were using her to provide babies and this wasn't the first one she had given birth to, or the first one ever to be used.

And I want to know what Father Wilfred was searching for in the photographs he was examining.

And more about the quarantine room, and what really happened to the children sent there to recover.

And, just more really.

I liked it though, the atmosphere was unsettling right the way through the book.

Yeah,there are loads of questions that need answering aren't there.

Hadn't thought about the quarantine room and the shrine like that. The shrine was meant to be false wasn't it so was it connected to what was really happening or just there to show the enduring faith of the few who didn't lose it there?! And the quarantine room, it held the jar with something to keep 'witches' out didn't it? The dad broke it and was told by the old guy (can't remember his name) that they would now come?

I'm not sure on the Father Wilfred thing. Maybe he was looking for the people who were involved in the photos or people who had previously been cured?

He lost his faith there, but if you can believe in darkness than surely you can believe in light?

I guess he maybe discovered that the faith they had in the place and the cures that took place there were actually darkness rather than light? But then...

Hmm lots of things spring up when you think about it.

I wonder why Hanny needed protecting at the end too, did he really think they'd go after him? Why? Surely not just because something had been discovered and they thought he would speak out?!

I don't know what Hanny needed protecting from. I wondered if the discovery might somehow reverse the cure.

But that wouldn't mean he needed protection so much as help. Suddenly reverting to not being able to talk and perhaps having mental issues again.

And the men involved would be old men now, and if the cure was reversed for all of them they would be suddenly ill or injured again, and perhaps not in any state to hurt Hanny.

I suppose if you discovered you had been praying at a shrine that was false, or worse, used by witches, and you were religious you might feel distressed, but I don't know why he would lose his faith over it.

Surely it would be more distressing if the shrine water had cured Hanny and then Father Wilfred had discovered that it wasn't god but something more evil that had provided the cure?

And the witches were about before the bottle was broken, leaving that sheep skull body hanging in the woods. I can't remember if they came to perform the play before or after the bottle broke. But the boys went to the witches rather than the witches coming to them anyway.

I think we'll always have more questions about this one than answers.