The Hellbound Heart
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The Hellbound Heart is a horror novella by Clive Barker. It was the basis for the movie Hellraiser. It was originally published in 1986 by Dark Harvest in the third volume of their Night Visions anthology series (the volume also included seven short stories by Ramsey Campbell and three by Lisa Tuttle) but was re-released as a stand-alone title by HarperCollins in 1988 after the success of the movie. It retains the gory, visceral style that Barker introduced in his series of collected short stories The Books of Blood and distorts clichéd narrative devices to depict ordinary people drawn into a confrontation with spiritual terror beyond traditional definitions of morality.
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[edit] Plot introduction
The story, ostensibly about one man's experimentation with the occult in order to satisfy his jaded appetite for sexual pleasure, revolves around a tragic love triangle. Vaguely set on the outskirts of an unnamed English city, it concerns three members of the Cotton family: Frank; his younger brother, Rory; and Rory's wife, Julia, as well as Rory's long time friend Kirsty, who has long pined for him. Frank's pursuit of pleasure has trapped him in an extradimensional hell, and his brother's wife provides him the opportunity for escape. Frank's resurrection provides Julia with the opportunity for escape from the marriage she has quickly grown bored of. Rory, who naively adores his more worldly wife, becomes their innocent victim while Kirsty is drawn into this dangerous realm by her desire to protect him and show him the truth about Julia. Kirsty soon becomes the main character as she tries to save herself and Rory from the consequenses of what Frank has unleashed.
[edit] Plot summary
The Hellbound Heart tells the story of a mystical puzzle box, and the horror it wreaks on a family which is unfortunate enough to come across it.
Frank is a selfish moral degenerate who has participated in every hedonistic pleasure, extreme experience and sexual perversion known to man, each time seeking a greater pleasure high than the last. Jaded, Frank explores a rumor of a mysterious puzzle box that provides the gateway into a realm of unfathomable carnal pleasures. Through great effort, Frank tracks down the box and solves its puzzle while squatting in his grandparents' old house. A gateway does indeed open and out come the Cenobites, a race of distorted creatures who practice an extreme form of sadomasochism centered around agonizing torture and mutilation; they see little difference between extreme pleasure and extreme pain. The beings drag Frank, willingly at first, into their extradimensional realm.
Frank's brother, Rory, moves his family into the house inherited by Frank and Rory after their grandparents' death. Rory is married to Julia, who once had an affair with Frank. Ever since, Julia has been going through the motions of her life, marrying Rory, setting up a life with him. Beneath her calm facade festers self loathing and a barely contained desire for the raw abusive physicality of her affair with Frank; she buries herself in the mundanity of her daily existence with Rory in order to avoid dealing with her pain. An accident that occurs during the remodeling of the old house causes several drops of Rory's blood to land on the spot where Frank was snatched into the Cenobites' realm. This weakens the barrier between the Cenobites' realm and "our" world, and allows Frank some basic level of communication across the boundary. His form is incomplete, manifesting as only a whisper at first, then an emaciated corpse, his consciousness fading in and out of reality. Julia hears Frank's communication, and willingly falls immediately under his control. She begins bringing men home while Rory is at work and sacrifices her guests to Frank. Each sacrifice causes Frank's body to become more substantial, and his consciousness to become more stable. As the bodies pile up, Kirsty (a friend of Rory) starts to investigate Julia on suspicion of infidelity. While trying to catch Julia in the act, Kirsty has an altercation with Frank and escapes the house with the puzzle box. Kirsty is unaware of the true purpose of the box, only knowing that it holds some strange value to Frank. After the flight, she collapses on the street. Upon awakening in the hospital, she solves the puzzle box and the cenobites come. She makes a deal with them, offering to deliver Frank back into their control to spare her. The cenobites reluctantly accept, warning that if Kirsty was trying to trick them they would "tear her soul apart".
Kirsty leads the Cenobites to Frank, now wearing recently slain Rory's skin. Another altercation ensues, where Julia is accidentally (and unremorsefully) killed by Frank. The Cenobites wait until Frank reveals his true identity, then they take him back to their world leaving Kirsty with the puzzle box.
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