Home Before Dark

Maggie’s father, Ewan Holt, is the author of House of Horrors. Throughout most of the novel, he is, if not an antagonistic character, the closest thing to Maggie’s foil other than Baneberry Hall and the Book. One of the challenges in characterizing Ewan is that Maggie—who believes that he’s a liar—is the only perspective on him. Ewan provides a first-person account of their time at Baneberry Hall that has some truth to it, but by his own admission, much of it is a fabrication.

Despite their friction, Maggie describes Ewan as “attentive and kind” (166). She describes him as a good father, other than the fact that he’ll never tell her the truth about the book. In fact, Maggie is more certain about what Ewan isn’t than in what he is: “Ewan Holt was a lot of things. A liar. A charmer. But he wasn’t a creep or a womanizer. I knew that” (141). A generous parent, he gives Maggie books and films to read and watch, hoping that she’ll follow in his footsteps and become a writer. By the end of the novel, Maggie understands that Ewan is a kind, compassionate, self-sacrificing man who made a mistake in order to protect her. What he did for her cost him his marriage and his relationship with Maggie. However, it kept her safe from the authorities and allowed her to pursue her own life without the baggage of Petra’s death on her record.

Maggie’s mother, Jessica Holt, is married to Ewan during their time at Baneberry Hall, although they divorce after the book. Jessica functions as a source of skepticism, at least in how Ewan portrays her in House of Horrors. As an adult, Maggie is exasperated by Jessica, whom she sees as an unserious, borderline alcoholic who left her father and now refuses to bond with her daughter. Jessica’s form of emotional support “means a gin and tonic” (39). It confuses her that Jessica “chose not to seek a share of the profits from the Book when they got divorced” (16), saying that she never wanted anything to do with it.

Like Ewan, Jessica is a difficult character to analyze accurately, because half of her appearance in the book is written by Ewan and the other half is from Maggie’s jaded perspective. Jessica is stuck living a lie for which she has increasingly less stamina. Ewan’s letter reveals that she agreed to Ewan’s plan only because “he didn’t want to see [Maggie] as a monster, which is what everyone else would have thought if word got out” (363) that Maggie was responsible for Petra’s death. Jessica’s truest self is the one that tells Maggie the sacrifice was worth it. When Jessica confesses to Alcott, she receives the chance at actual penance that Ewan never received.

The handsome grandson of Walt Hibbets, Dane serves as the caretaker while Maggie visits the home as an adult. Dane is charismatic, skilled with carpentry and interior design, and open to the supernatural in ways that Maggie isn’t. However, Dane isn’t everything he seems. He has a criminal record, which he hides from Maggie. He doesn’t tell her about it because he doesn’t want to be judged, particularly since he served his time. Nevertheless, Maggie does judge him, despite his being in a similar situation to hers. If she’d known about his history in advance, she might have treated him differently. Late in the novel, Dane admits to being Petra’s boyfriend, although he had nothing to do with her disappearance and mourned her as much as anyone.

The sheriff who responds to Maggie’s call as an adult, Tess Alcott was also the officer who took Ewan’s report during the initial investigation that resulted in House of Horrors. At that point, Ewan writes that she was “so young I at first didn’t believe she was a cop” (160). Tess represents both the difficulties of law enforcement during investigations purporting to have supernatural elements and a Bartleby citizen whose life Ewan’s book disrupted. She hates the reputation that the book has given Bartleby. In addition, Tess represents second chances. She wasn’t able to help the Holt family during their stay at Baneberry Hall, nor was she capable of proving that Ewan was lying, although—like Maggie—she didn’t believe his story. When she returns to answer Maggie’s call, Tess gets a chance to do things the way she wants and brings closure to the Petra Ditmer case in the process.

The reporter who writes the initial article about the Holt case in the Gazette, Brian Prince is important to the plot because without that article, the story wouldn’t have spread to the mass market—and Ewan’s book deal may never have come about. Prince is a sincere truth-seeker but also an ambitious journalist who sees in Maggie an opportunity to further his career and dig into a story he has never concluded satisfactorily. Brian is arrogant and skeptical but also meticulous and committed to journalism. Maggie describes him as “blameless. He heard a juicy story about a haunted house, interviewed my father, and wrote down what he said. He had simply done his job” (138).

At the novel’s conclusion, Marta Carver emerges as Maggie’s final antagonist. Stricken by grief after her husband killed their daughter and then himself, Marta poses as a model citizen of Bartleby. However, she’s the one who sneaks into the armoire and watches Maggie sleep. She originally had a conscience and was on the verge of turning herself in to the police after Petra’s death. After realizing that Maggie’s parents blamed Maggie for the death, however, she decides that she doesn’t want to face the consequences. She poisons Maggie to protect her secret after saying that “God had decided I’d suffered enough for one life” (376). Marta represents the loss that the mothers in the novel feel after losing their daughters. She’s a symbol of corrosive grief that eventually changes her into a person she no longer recognizes. Marta dies when Elsa pushes her down the stairs during the final confrontation.

The housekeeper when the Holt family moved in to Baneberry Hall, Elsa Ditmer is a devout Christian who is open to good-luck superstitions, as she demonstrates by suggesting that Ewan break plates with her, during the initial unpacking, for good luck. Ewan describes her as “a stout woman in her early forties,” with a “soft-spoken demeanor and a wide, friendly face” (73). Petra tells Ewan that Elsa always kisses her crucifix before visiting Baneberry Hall. Once, when Ewan asks Elsa if Petra can babysit, Elsa says that she’s punishing Petra by making her pray. Elsa’s primary function is as a narrative device in helping avenge Petra’s death. In addition, she introduces the most overt example of religious faith into the novel. Elsa eventually succumbs to Alzheimer’s Disease, and Hannah moves her into a health facility.

Elsa’s 16-year-old daughter, Petra is attractive and inquisitive, and she feels smothered by her religious mother, Elsa. For most of the novel, Petra exists only as a character in House of Horrors and in the photos of her in Baneberry Hall during the sleepover and unpacking.

Petra has a sense of moral outrage that manifests in her anger at the lack of urgency on the part of law enforcement. This reinforces an earlier remark that Elsa makes about Petra, when she describes her remorse about Katie Carver’s death. Elsa describes Petra as “protective. Strong, like her father was. I think she thought of Katie as another little sister. And it pains her to know she couldn’t protect her” (75). Petra, who was Dane’s girlfriend as well, represents the oppression that a young person can feel in a suffocating environment with few opportunities, as well as the outrage of anyone who has ever lost a loved one in a case that remains unsolved.