The unfortunately named Johnny Johnson is a UK bank manager in Ranpur India. But he’s had enough and decides to hang himself in the master bedroom of the appropriately named, Bank House; The house owned by the bank where their bank managers live while in India. He left the bank in total disarray and now it’s up to Bob Roberts (is this author fucking with us or what?!) to move in and put everything back in order. So, Bob brings his wife Dierdre and his nineteen-year-old daughter Monica to India into the cursed old Bank House for bad juju shenanigans.
While getting ready for a party at local rich businessman Choti Lal’s house Dierdre spots some spooky ghost eyes in the mirror. She tells Bob. Bob is like whatever, we’re late for this stupid party I don’t even want to go to so get your ass in the car.
At the party Bob meets Choti Lal who literally holds Bob’s hand and immediately shows him his framed picture of Swami Ramesh, an evil guru that Choti follows. Cool, says Bob. Up comes beautiful Indian babe Kama, Choti’s daughter. Bob is handed a fruity drink. He drinks it, starts to feel funny and walks to the back of the house. He finds a room with sex scenes painted on the wall. In come two scantily clad ladies to seduce him. One happens to be Kama, Choti’s daughter. Oopsy! Oh well, shit happens, thinks Bob.
Back at the house Dierdre gets Bob to move them out of their master bedroom into a smaller less haunted bedroom. Bob, for what it’s worth, isn’t really bothered by any of this and is just like, sure. He’s aloof but never really makes her feel stupid for believing in ghosts.
The Indian caste system is in full display for the reader. The rich are very rich, and the poor are very poor. It paints a bleak setting, along with the hot uncomfortable atmosphere. The Roberts boss around Abbas, the butler/caretaker. Abbas, make me a drink. Abbas, move my closet. Abbas, take my mattress to the roof. They have no difficulties moving into the Indian caste system and taking full advantage. I mean it is his job and all but a please and thank you would be nice from time to time.
Their daughter, Monica, is bored and looking for friends. She meets a shaved headed hippie her own age who takes her to the local European-pretending-to-be-poor dirty hangout in the hood. They smoke weed, talk spirituality and do nothing all day. Sometimes they head over to the local ashram of Swami Ramesh to hear him speak.
From then on out we have the three members of the family being infiltrated by the supernatural demon entity that is Swami Ramesh in different ways. The mom with ghosts, the dad hypnotized, and the daughter tricked into a cult.
The feeling of isolation is prominent with the family being in a foreign country surrounded by strangers in a society much different from their own with nowhere to turn for help. The atmosphere is hot, sweaty, poor and infected. The whole story feels like a fever dream. There are some freaky ghost moments that genuinely gave me the creeps. There were a lot of sex scenes in this and not one involved incest like so many other 80’s horror books. What I really loved about this is every time I thought it was going somewhere it didn’t. It wasn’t cliché. The author could have easily just rewritten the Shining in India but he didn’t. There was absolutely no filler. No plot dead ends. No pointlessness. It was short and sweet at 222 pages- short for the era and genre. My only complaint was I thought the ending was kind of abrupt.
St. Martins Press 1985
Review by Nick Anderson
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