The Death House

This is a wonderfully creepy and realistic tale about a group of young people who have been isolated on account of being, “defective.” Each of the residents of the ‘Death House’ were randomly tested at school for an unnamed illness, which can strike the population up to the age of eighteen. The main character of this novel, Toby, was not concerned when he took the test at school – indeed most of his classmates were simply relieved to be missing various class tests. However, on returning home, Toby finds that he is being taken away from his family and isolated with the other ‘defectives’ in a large house, on an unknown island. Contact with the outside is prohibited and, within a short time, the youngsters have almost given up on any hope of visits or letters from home. Instead, life becomes a morning of lessons, given by desultory teachers, who do not seem to see the point of teaching the children, any more than they do of learning; plus a rota of various household tasks and a lot of filling in time.