Netherwood

Steeped in folk horror and Gothic atmosphere The I Paper

A wonderfully unnerving, evocative horror in which Hastings looms large as the most uncanny place in England.
-The Guardian

Horror fiction has a new (dark) star.
-SFX

Jake Arnott has always been drawn to Britain’s alternative histories, and Netherwood is him at his most atmospheric, mixing fact and fiction. You might not want to read it alone, though: it’s pretty scary.
-Monocle

With Netherwood, Arnott has created a sublime, shocking bonechiller that doubles as an intriguing potted history of folklore, dark arts and seaside town counterculture.
-Buzz Magazine

Arnott has produced a spine-tingling take on the folk horror genre that makes excellent use of the cultural lore and chalky landscape of a resort synonymous with both faded grandeur and a certain kind of seedy glamour.
– Travis Elborough for Idler Magazine

Arnott’s fictional Hastings is well crafted and fits in neatly with the real town, so you effortlessly step into the dark, parallel world. I am not a fan of Crowley or even folk horror, but Netherwood won me over.
-Hastings Online Times

Jake Arnott returns to the Beast, this time excavating the hidden layers of Hastings - a perfectly ramshackle seaside town - where the shadow of Aleister Crowley and his acolytes loom over this claustrophobic novel about a young arty couple trying to make a new start. Fans of Ramsey Campbell’s stories of deep-rooted British occultism will adore this.
-Ally Wilkes, Bram Stoker award-nominated author of All the White Spaces

A haunting gothic ghost story which, as you peel away the layers, grows like a gathering storm into a masterclass of British horror.
-David Barnett, author of Withered Hill

Netherwood flies at us like a horde of demons eager to drag us into its magical depths. Solidly founded on occult history, it’s a feast for fans of supernatural horror. Jake Arnott shapes uncanny lore to his own seductively diabolical purpose, and ends by shining a disquieting light on the world we live in.
-Ramsey Campbell, author of The Ancestral

This wonderfully haunting tale inspired by the wickedest man in the world’, Aleister Crowley, is filled with subtle shudders and outright shocks, and summons the dark spirits of Don’t Look Now and Nigel Kneale’s The Stone Tape.
-Tim Major, author of Jekyll & Hyde: Winter Retreat

Jake Arnott has proved he can write absolutely any genre he sets his mind to, and do it damn well. Netherwood is folk horror at its most bleakly brilliant; every line seethes with occult menace. Pure dark magic.
-Tom Mead, author of the Joseph Spector mysteries

A book that has you catching your breath as you get further in… the wyrd, the sinister and the ordinary combine to make Netherwood one of the creepiest and most exciting reads of the year.
-David Quantick, Emmy award-winner and author of Ricky’s Hand

Dare I say that Jake Arnott’s Netherwood is a bewitching narrative of magic, mystery, ancient evils and wizards, in which the ghost of Aleister Crowley haunts the seedy seaside town where he died, and a trendy couple become the unwitting accomplices of dark forces? I do and it is.
-Gary Lachman, author of Aleister Crowley: Magick, Rock and Roll, and the Wickedest Man in the World

a classic feeling creepy horror novel… written for those who like a more unsettling and cerebral take on the genre.
-SF Book Review

Jake Arnott was born in 1961 and lives in London. He is the author of The Long Firm, published in 1999 and subsequently made into an acclaimed, BAFTA-winning BBC TV series. His second novel, He Kills Coppers, was also made into a series by Channel 4. He has since published the novels Truecrime, Johnny Come Home, The Devil’s Paintbrush, The House of Rumour, and, most recently, The Fatal Tree (2017). In 2005, Arnott was ranked one of Britain’s 100 most influential LGBT people.

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