This wonderful little novel by Shirley Jackson is magic. The basic tenet of magic is transformation. Here one moment, somewhere else the next or one thing becomes another—simple mechanics. The art of magic, as with any story, is disguising the path traveled so that there are no explanations. When David Copperfield made the Statue of Liberty disappear, his showmanship disguised that he slowly rotated the stage so that when the curtain was dropped the audience was suddenly looking where the statue never was. In much the same way, our attentions are drawn away from but constantly brought back to the main character Eleanor. When the novel begins, she is described as the simplest of characters. Nothing much to see beyond the obvious—as if she were lit by a hundred candles, enough light to reveal if anything of interest was there. The creepy house and the other characters are much more vivid and draw us away. Yet the author keeps coming back to Eleanor, and each time she does Jackson snuffs out a candle or two so that Eleanor appears just a little different—maybe a shade darker, or maybe just a little more human. The change each time is as subtle as that and mostly only noticed in retrospect. Neither the reader nor the other characters pick up on this right away—though you could argue that Hill House sees it all. Hill House pulls off its own magic trick. The tropes of traditional haunted house stories are brought out—loud noises, disappearing rooms, mysterious messages—as if the house is distracting everyone from what is really going on. Meanwhile, a few more candles are snuffed out by the author and Eleanor strikes a different shade. The greatest trick of all here may be that Shirley Jackson is such a beautiful writer that her language mesmerizes. So, by the end, when the last candle has been snuffed out, both Eleanor and the reader are equally shocked to find themselves where they are. The other characters look on in dumb shock. Hill House looks on as it always has. Magic.