Sinister Island: A Supernatural Mystery

by Charles Wadsworth Camp

Miller ignores the warning about visiting a haunted island and soon mysterious things begin to occur with his friends! "Captain's Island is not far from civilisation as one measures space. Dealing with the less tangible medium of custom, it is—or was—practically beyond perception. James Miller didn't know this. When he had thought at all of his friend Anderson's new winter home he had pictured the familiar southern resort with hotels and cottages sheltering Hammonds peerage, and a seductive bathing beach to irritate the conservative."

100 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2008

About the author

Charles Wadsworth Camp, whose pen name was Wadsworth Camp, was a journalist, writer and foreign correspondent whose lungs were said to have been damaged by exposure to mustard gas during World War I.

Born in Philadephia, Pennsylvania on the 18th of October 1879 to Charles Henry Camp and Emma Martin, Charles Wadsworth Camp had 1 child, the author Madeleine L'Engle. He passed away on the 31st of October 1936 in Jacksonville Beach, Florida.

Reviews

[Cynthia Maddox · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really loved this book! It is the first time I've ever read this author but if I have my way, I'll read the other five he's written.

Although the book published in 1912, the writing is not overburdened with the overblown use of language that many novels of this period tend to have and it flows smoothly. I was immediately hooked from the opening chapter and only put it down, reluctantly, to go to bed. I finished it in two days while recovering from a cold.

The story opens with the main character, Miller, traveling on his boat, the Dart. He is headed to a southern island to visit his best friends. The opening immediately sets up the "sinister" aspect of the island with it's dark history but Miller is well supplied with common sense and marks it all up to foolish superstition.

After his arrival, Miller is shocked by the changes in his friends and events escalate rapidly. Even Miller begins to feel the pervasive foreboding that seems to wrap this island and is determined to prove that it isn't supernatural, but of human origin.

I was totally charmed by this story. It had all the elements that make a good, traditional ghost story without clinking chains, silly women wandering halls with candles, and things that go bump in the night. Instead, Camp builds suspense by making the island as much a character as the people and he provides an intelligent cast of characters determined to get to the bottom of the mystery, regardless of the cost to themselves.

Read this on a stormy night!

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had great expectations for this book as it started off with an exciting premise and setting. As I read further it became a little too far-fetched with not enough details. It never became a page-turner for me, and while it wasn't a bad book, I found myself not really caring about how it ended.