History Literature / Nathaniel

* TownWithADarkSecret: Being a John Saul novel, Prairie Bend is full of sinister goings-on. [[spoiler: The trope gets subverted somewhat, since the reader is led to believe that Amos, Dr. Potter, and the other townsfolk are doing Nathaniel's bidding. It turns out they don't really know what's going on at all, Amos is the only person who seriously believes in Nathaniel, and the Nathaniel he believes in [[NamesTheSame isn't even the one who is responsible.]]]]

* WeaponOfChoice: Amos Hall always seems to have his rifle or pitchfork within reach. Ben Findley, meanwhile favors his trademark shotgun.

* AdultFear:
** Janet is widowed and must now raise her son alone in an unfamiliar place, and then he begins acting out and claiming to hear voices. On top of that, she soon discovers that she is pregnant by her late husband and will soon be a mother of two.
** As an adult, Janet has nightmares of the house fire that slew her family when she was a child. [[spoiler: At the end she must save Michael from another house fire.]]
** Mark's sister Laura, having experienced a previous miscarriage as well as having been present when her mother had one, is terrified that she will lose her next child as well. [[spoiler: She's right.]]

* YourCheatingHeart: None of this would be happening if [[spoiler:Anna Hall]] hadn't fooled around with [[spoiler:Ben Findley.]]

''Nathaniel'' is a 1984 horror/mystery novel by [[https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/JohnSaul John Saul.]] It tells the story of Janet and Michael Hall, the widow and preteen son of Mark Hall, who died under mysterious circumstances while visiting his home town of Prairie Bend: a place he had not been to since before he and Janet were married.

* InfantImmortality: Since babies dying during childbirth is a major aspect of the plot, expect this trope to be averted with gusto.

* AbusiveParents: Amos Hall
** [[spoiler: Ben Findley, whose mistreatment of Nathaniel and confining him to the farmstead likely led to his warped personality.]]
* AdultFear: Janet is widowed and must now raise her son alone in an unfamiliar place, and then he begins acting out and claiming to hear voices. On top of that, she soon discovers that she is pregnant by her late husband and will soon be a mother of two.
** As an adult, she has nightmares of the house fire that slew her family when she was a child. [[spoiler: At the end she must save Michael from another house fire.]]

* CreepyChild: As Michael falls under [[BigBad Nathaniel's]] influence, the other boys in town become disturbed by him and have to be pressured to socialize with him.
* CreepyMonotone: How Nathaniel communicates.
* [[spoiler:DownerEnding: Nathaniel is defeated, but Janet loses her baby. Michael, whose psychic powers cause him to misunderstand what happened, believes his newborn brother has been murdered and vows to punish those he thinks are responsible.]]

* TheDogBitesBack: Amos doesn't appreciate how Michael's dog, Shadow, reacts to him, but Shadow is not that easy to get rid of.
* EvilDetectingDog: Shadow. He knows that Amos Hall is bad news and won't let him forget it. This leads to [[TheDogBitesBack The Dog Bites Back]], above.

* FaceHeelTurn: [[spoiler:Michael,]] by the end.
* GhostStory: Nathaniel and his mother Abby are Prairie Bend's local one.
* GoMadFromTheIsolation: Nathaniel himself[[spoiler:, both the original and his namesake.]]

** [[spoiler:Except where it is fulfilled with Abby's last child, who went on to found the Hall family line.]]

* NoPartyLikeADonnerParty: Implied to have been what went on in Nathaniel and Abby's cabin during the winter where the rest of their family died.

* YourMindMakesItReal: Confined to a wheelchair, Anna Hall has lived in fear of her abusive husband Amos her whole life. [[spoiler:When she learns that he has died, she is able to rise from her wheelchair and realizes that she had only made herself ''think'' she is crippled out of guilt at playing along with the things Amos has done.]]

* BrokeYourArmPunchingOutCthulhu:[[spoiler: With help from Shadow, Janet defeats Nathaniel once and for all; but as a parting shot he erases her memory of the encounter, making it unlikely she will be convinced of his existence again and that she will be unprepared when her son begins [[HereWeGoAgain acting in the next "Nathaniel's" name.]]]]

* ChekhovsGun:[[spoiler: the smoke that Michael smells when Nathaniel communicates with him is actually a premonition of the future.]]