Book Review - The Militia House: A Novel by John Milas

 

The Militia House: A Novel by John Milas is about Corporal Loyette and his squad finding a haunted house. In 2010, Alex Loyette was promoted to Corporal and team lead of his squad. He and his unit are working at a new base in Kajaki, Afghanistan and working to finish up their deployment to go to the next location.

Their duties are straightforward but essential to the new base. They unload and load cargo in and out of helicopters.  When there are no deliveries to be made, the unit finds themselves bored and with limited things to do, they are looking for any opportunity to occupy themselves. 

Before their allied British soldiers leave the base for their next assignment, they tell Loyette and his men about a rumor that is circulating the base. Not too far off from base is an old Soviet-era militia house that they claim is haunted. After spending their days being bored, Loyette and his unit don't need much convincing to make the trip outside of the base to explore the haunted barrack.

They decide to take a short excursion during the day when they are not assigned any duties. They thought it was all a joke about the place being haunted, until they enter the militia house and realize that something doesn’t feel right. In the days that follow, they try to forget the house but they have strange and unsettling dreams. Then weird things start to happen around their own base. They thought it was the stress from being in war but, maybe it’s something else that won’t let them go.

The book was an okay read and moved very slowly. It did have some spooky elements but nothing that might cause nightmares. The book was a bit hard to get into in the beginning as the author used a lot of military terminology and didn't really explain what they meant until much later. The pace also didn’t pick up towards the last quarter of the story.  There were quite a few pages where nothing really happened other than reading about their day to day. It was an interesting glimpse into military processes and procedures. The novel was a quick read but I found the ending disappointing. I wish the author told us why the militia house seemed to target Loyette and his men and what was haunting them. Along with the importance of the stick figures and porcupine needles. It was an okay read and I might be open to reading another book by the author if it's not very military focused.