Book Review: THE STAIRCASE IN THE WOODS by Chuck Wendig

THE STAIRCASE IN THE WOODS by Chuck Wendig (Del Rey, April 29, 2025) Hardcover, 388 pages.  

My Four-Star Review on the Goodreads website . . . . .

A thought-provoking novel with an interesting premise that touches upon several aspects, but primarily on friendship, responsibility, and teamwork. Wendig says as much in the opening, Chapter 0, foreshadowing a much-later scene in the book about friendship. The chapter is even subtitled "The Heart Of It" to let us know what is at the root/core of this novel. 

The last book I read by Chuck Wendig was BLACK RIVER ORCHARD, and by comparison THE STAIRCASE IN THE WOODS just doesn't measure up to that amazing work. I suspect that my expectations were too high and perhaps not fair. Had this been a novel by someone else, and my first experience with that writer, I think I would be rating this much higher than Four Stars.

A quartet of former high-school friends who were misfits and bonded over a "Covenant" meet up twenty years later to search for the fifth member of their group, who they abandoned after he climbed the staircase and vanished during a group camping trip. In a nutshell, they become engaged in figuring out the mystery of an escape-room-from-hell. 

Character development is excellent. My subjective view was that none of these characters were likable. Every single one has flaws and throughout the novel we learn of their background and the events during high school that shaped and molded them into the persons they are now. Then I began to feel empathy for them. I started to worry about them. By the suspenseful conclusion and the changes in their characters I started to like every one of them. While some readers may be disappointed by the ending, I was entirely satisfied with it. I'm even okay that Wendig left the door open for a sequel of sorts. 

End result is that I started out disliking these characters and ended up loving them. That is due to Wendig's skillful depictions of these characters. When a writer can change my opinion that way - - it is powerful. 

The source of their conflict and how it came to be is a different and creative spin on haunted house tropes. You need to read it to find out why. I'm not going to spoil it. 

NOTES, as I'm participating in a group reading with the Horror Aficionados community

February 06
Just started today. It's an easy read - - easy to follow, and easy to get wrapped up in. I really like Wendig's writing style - he knows how to pull you in, and has that friendly/character-driven way of story-telling like Stephen King and others.

I love the analogy in Chapter 0 regarding friendship:

Friendship, like a house, can go bad, too. That air you share? Goes sour. Dry rot here, black mold there, and if you don't remediate, it just grows and grows. Gets bad enough, one or all of you have to move out. And then the place just fucking sits there, abandoned. Empty and gutted. Another ruin left to that force in the world that wants everything to fall apart. You can move back into a place like that, sometimes. But only if you tear it all down and start again. 

'm enjoying some of the word pictures in Chapter Two:

Page 13 - Same way Owen's own father went out. The way most people seemed to go out. In a hospital bed, like a wilting plant in a pot of dry, dead dirt. 

And Chapter 5, Page 25 - Catastrophe lived inside his skull, sharks circling in that dark water.

She said also, "You live in your amygdala." The fear center of his brain. Said he ws like a lizard caught in the shadow of a bird circling overhead. Sometimes he froze, other times he ran.

So he never really did find out how to get out of the place of fear. He built a house in that part of his mind and rarely left its cold comfort.

Now at Page 34, after the introductions of three characters. Can't say I've found anything to like about them so far - but it's early and I may warm up to some of them. I'm curious about the one who seems the most normal - - wondering what he was like when they were part of a group.

February 07
Not sure I like Nick either. Oh well, it doesn't matter because I'm fascinated by the story and the way Wendig is playing it out. 

Ugh, this image on Page 53: 
- - - in the space between his heart and his stomach was a roiling, tightening bundle, like a knot of starving tapeworms looking for egress.

February 19
I agree with others that none of these characters are likable.
Although, after reading the details regarding their various flaws I have some empathy and I'm now rooting for them to figure things out.
The last work I read by Wendig was the amazing BLACK RIVER ORCHARD. This is still good, but kind of a letdown by comparison.