The House at the End of the World

Content Warning: This section of the guide discusses child sexual abuse and murder.

The motif of art and poetry in the novel reflects The Role of Beauty in the Search for Meaning. Although she has a logical, analytical mind, Katie sees the world through art, makes connections to authors, composers, and painters throughout the crises. Koontz describes her daily life as including a few hours of classical music by Beethoven, Mozart, or Liszt and evening reading of Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, or Joseph Conrad. As she discovers more unsettling evidence of a supernatural creature, Katie compares what she’s feeling to horrific paintings by Goya and Fuseli. At the height of her crisis with Hampton Rice, Katie comforts herself with the words of T.S. Eliot, finding in them “profound trust that mercy and meaning are woven through the fabric of the world” (144). She thinks about these words again as she and Libby escape the island for the mainland. It’s clear that she relies on great art of all genres to help her make emotional sense of the world. However, Katie isn’t an art snob, either; near the end of the book, at Gladie’s Place, she stops to appreciate a wall of photos tacked up on the diner’s corkboard, highlighting regulars of the restaurant.