Daughters Unto Devils by Amy Lukavics

I requested this from WHPL a while ago, and decided to take a break from the Nutmeg nominees (first meeting Wednesday, and I still have FIVE books to read!!!!) and read this instead.  It's very short--a quick few hours. 

The tagline on the cover:
"Imagine Stephen King writing Little House on the Prairie"

On the back:
"Basically Little Hell House on the Prairie"

I'd say both are accurate. 

This is pure horror, very reminiscent of King, down to the ants (see Revival).  There's man-eating pigs too.

Amanda is the oldest of 5 children (Emily, Joanna, Charles, and Hannah), living with her parents Susan and Edmund on the mountainside.  Life is rough on the frontier.  Hannah, born during a long illness and even longer winter, is blind and deaf.  There is little work, less food, and loneliness all around.

Amanda finds company in the arms of the postal boy, Henry.  Amanda becomes pregnant by him, and he abandons her. 

Not long after, Edmund announces that the local postal boy (Henry, of course) suggested they move toward the prairie, where work and food are more plentiful.  The family heads out, taking up residence in an empty cabin.  A cabin they find covered in blood.  Nothing strange about that, right?  The family learns a boy, Zeke, and his doctor father have been using the empty cabin's water well, and allow him to continue if the doctor will examine Hannah.

As time passes, stranger and stranger things happen to Amanda and Hannah.  All hell breaks loose (literally and figuratively) when Amanda miscarries.

Definitely not a read before bedtime book.  

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