Review: Staircase in the Woods by Claire Keegan

Buy the Book

Buy on Amazon

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

Claire Keegan’s Staircase in the Woods is a haunting, slow-burning meditation on grief, guilt, and silence in rural Ireland. Known for her exquisite brevity and emotional precision, Keegan crafts a compact narrative that lingers like mist—quiet but impossible to ignore. The novel follows a young boy named Sean whose discovery of a mysterious stone staircase deep in the woods triggers a chain of revelations about his family, his town, and the unspeakable secrets hidden in plain sight.

This isn’t horror in the conventional sense, but rather a psychological ghost story, one where the spirits are embedded in memory, landscape, and generational silence. Keegan’s command of mood and restraint makes every line feel weighty. The atmosphere is thick with damp leaves, quiet grief, and things left unsaid.

Plot & Themes

Sean’s innocent curiosity becomes a lens through which we witness the unraveling of communal complicity. As he traces the staircase’s origins and what lies at its base, what emerges is a reckoning with hidden atrocities and buried trauma. The novel explores themes of inherited guilt, rural complicity, and the corrosive nature of silence. Every interaction is charged with emotional undercurrents, and the setting—fog-drenched forests, creaking houses, and closed church doors—becomes a character in itself.

Writing & Atmosphere

• Spare, lyrical prose that achieves depth through silence and suggestion
• A slow, creeping tension rather than jump scares or overt horror
• Emotionally rich interiority without overt exposition
• Nature as metaphor: woods, rot, and ruins mirror inner decay

Keegan's style is economical yet devastating. Every word carries weight. Readers looking for overt scares might find this too restrained—but for those attuned to the horror of history, repressed trauma, and what isn’t said, the book is deeply unsettling.

Final Verdict

Staircase in the Woods is a short novel that leaves a long echo. It’s not a traditional thriller or ghost story, but something quieter—and in many ways, more powerful. For those drawn to psychological hauntings and literary minimalism, Keegan’s work is essential reading. It’s a story about the cost of silence and the aching need to speak truths, no matter how old or buried they’ve become. Like the moss-covered steps Sean finds in the forest, this novel leads somewhere forgotten—and demands we look.

Further Reading

If you appreciated Staircase in the Woods, you might also enjoy:

• Foster by Claire Keegan — A quiet novella about a child sent to live with distant relatives, brimming with emotional nuance.
• Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan — Another masterful exploration of moral complicity in rural Ireland.
• The Children’s Bible by Lydia Millet — A haunting look at parental neglect and climate dread told through a child's perspective.
• The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters — A postwar Gothic about class, decay, and ghostly inheritance.
• This House is Haunted by John Boyne — A modern homage to classic Victorian ghost stories with emotional depth.

About Jamie Bucuy

Jamie Bucuy is a psychological horror and thriller writer with a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. With a passion for exploring the darker facets of human nature, Jamie brings a keen analytical eye to the genre. His reviews combine literary insight with a deep understanding of the craft, providing readers with thoughtful perspectives on modern and classic horror fiction.