"the successful villainy of Montoni"

He made her sign away her property!!! Oh no!!

Montoni promised if she signed she could leave the castle. Of course he lied and keeps her a prisoner. Not surprising since he promised her to one of the bandits to settle his gambling debts.

Fainting fit count: 10

"(*See the Abbe Berthelon on Electricity. [A.R.])"

That is a footnote. A freaking footnote! On science!

In the story there have been some things that look like flames on the weapons of the guards and bandits that everyone thinks this is an Omen of Death.

So right now Emily is being dragged through the woods in a lightning storm by two murderers and the pike of one starts with the blue flame thing. One murderer and Emily freak out about the omen and the other guy says he's not superstitious and that the seeming blue flame actually has to do with the storm and the lightning and the metal of the weapon. Which Radcliffe then backs up with said footnote!*

Which is so amazingly awesome to me that I had to tell. Never expected this. Wow.

Okay. Enough. I need to get back to reading because there are storms and murderers dragging Emily away from the castle and any help and darkness coming on fast.

*See title of post

"It was the devil, and this is not the first time I have seen him!"

The guards on duty at night now have a tendency to fall senseless as well now, usually in droves. Emily, however, has managed to keep her feet on seeing the dark stranger who glides rather than steps and plays eerie music. She thinks it might be Valencourt and that he is now a prisoner. The guards think it the devil. They are all wrong. It's this guy.

And I really need to sleep. My usual habit of reading before bed is becoming a problem when the book is good.

"was the corpse of a man..."

.....that Emily mistook to be her aunt.

Yeah. Somehow young man and middle-aged woman are easy to mix up. (Didn't the clothing give it away?)

Ghosts, vampires, convenient inheritances, all these I can suspend disbelief for. But a heroine who can't figure out male from female?!

"crimsoned with human blood..."

Emily has been trapped in a torture chamber with a bloody corpse (we don't know whose), Annette is somewhere unknown and can't help, and the Aunt (who I quite forgive now) is either a prisoner or dead! And I stayed up until 3:30 reading it. Very tired now.

Oh, and I almost forgot to add Fainting Fit Count is now up to 8! And that half. Also the Count has fainted (a man! equal opportunity fainting! Though he had just been nearly fatally stabbed, so I'll give him that.) And the lady's maid, Annette, fainted--out of fear like a proper girl.

"a thin dusky vapour, that rose from the valley...and kindled into a crimson tint"

We have reached Udolpho at last.

And I'm still up at 1:45 in the morning. Why am I up at 1:45 in the morning?

The Aunt! Montoni! Count Morano! Ugh!

It has been a few days since I wrote last and I have done so much reading since then.

Sainted St. Aubert finally died after doing a lot of obnoxious death bed lecturing to Emily. We finally meet the Aunt and Ohmygod is she horrible! I was really glad to see her get a comeuppance when Valencourt shows up at that party.

Montoni is a complete rat bastard. I am at the part where they are leaving Venice to see M. Quesnel and wife (the other horrible aunt and uncle) and they talk in the boat. I got so angry I wanted to throw things!


I would be far more feverishly angry at the treatment of Emily if I liked her just a little more. She keeps writing that God-Awful Poetry and falling into tears every page until I am provoked beyond measure.


I feel I might start taking up with the Aunt as to censuring the constant depression of the girl. The Aunt might be evil, but she's not wholly wrong.

Also Fainting fit count is now at 5.5. Why the .5? Because one is supposedly technically not fainting. She "sunk almost lifeless on his bosom," which does say faint to me, but then it says she sighed "now and then [that] proved she had not fainted." Yeah. Sure. She still needs carried by Valencourt and eventually she "recovered her consciousness." Sounds like fainting to me, how about you?

"I would not pass one night in the chateau, for the value of the whole domain."

So says La Voisin, the peasant who has taken in a dying and weary St. Aubert. By chance it turns out La Voisin and St. Aubert share an acquaintance. A marchioness who lived in the chateau, was a "most beautiful and excellent lady," and "deserved a better fate." And there is mysterious music that has played after midnight for the past 18 years... is it related to the mysterious player Emily heard back at her own home?Yes, I am getting hooked.

I would also say that, as a firm lover of nature myself, and as someone who has traveled far in order to see wonderfully sublime prospects, I have yet to have the raptures over those prospects that seem to befall St. Aubert, Emily, and Valencourt at every other turning of the road. Maybe it is because I have yet to see the Pyrenees.

The Hero Is Shot! ......and the Heroine Faints

Believe me when I tell you, Dear Reader, I spoil nothing when I tell you this, though it is more funny than horrid.  Valencourt is shot (I won't tell you the whys and what-fors of that occurrence) and M. St. Aubert is frantically trying to stop the bleeding. There is no one else about so he calls to Emily for assistance only to find that she has "sunk on the seat in a fainting fit." How useful of her!

St. Aubert, now even more frantic, leaves poor Valencourt to help his helpless, dainty daughter. Then "the subject of his alarm changed again" as Valencourt, still bleeding, has run up to help Emily and thereby made himself worse! So St. Aubert is running between the injured man and the unconscious woman so that "he scarcely knew what he did."


Fainting Fit Count: 1

"A well-informed mind is the best security against the contagion of folly and vice."

So says M. St. Aubert.

I like that line. Alas! I haven't gotten much further than that yet. Yesterday was the last day of tax season and I met myself coming and going. So far, it's a slow start, with a little tension.
Who is mysteriously playing Emily's lute and writing sonnets to her on the walls?
Why will Madame St. Aubert never walk those hills again?
How many times can Radcliffe use the word 'gloom' in one chapter?

M. St. Aubert and family are so good and virtuous I want to smack them, and clearly the aunt and uncle are frivolous, stupid, and maybe even evil, so we know there will be trouble.

So I will read on to find out why, "Alas! Madame St. Aubert knew not that she left [those hills] forever." But right now the story is kind of moving like this:

Mysteries of the Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe-- Starting Today!

Mysteries of the Udolpho is a roller coaster tale of poor, orphaned Emily St. Aubert who is sent to live with her aunt after her father's tragic death. Her aunt is married to an evil count (of course!), named Montoni, who is bent upon stealing Emily's inheritance and forcing her to marry his pawn, Count Morano, against her will. Alas! She is in love with another, a virtuous and handsome young man named Valancourt, from whom she is ripped away and held prisoner in the Castle of Udolpho. Castles, deaths, inheritances, abductions, imprisonments, ghosts, and escapes, it is by all accounts a heart-pounding, unput-downable read, with a slow start that heightens into a frenzy of suspense and excitement.

It is also quite long, though many (if you read comments on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Goodreads) have said that they were so mesmerized they could not put it down and finished it within days. Hope it lives up to the centuries of hype it has garnered. We'll see. Enjoy!!

You can find Mysteries of the Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe:

For Kindle-- Free!-- Here!
For Kindle as part of the Northanger Abbey Horrid Novel Collection-- $0.99-- Here!
For Nook-- $0.99-- Here!
On Project Gutenberg-- Free!-- Here!
On YorkU.ca-- Free!-- Here!
On Classicly-- Free!-- Here!

Requiem for The Literary Gothic

All right, I admit, it is a bit early for a requiem considering the website is still around, but it will not be around for long and posting this after it goes down means that you, Dear Reader, would not have time to go there and look about it some.

It is now a sad ruin of a website. Walls that are crumbling and links that lead to nowhere. And yet, so many authors and novels to explore!


Okay. It is a tad academic for me, and I have no intentions of keeping my list of horrid books confined to one ancient genre. (I'd get bored of bats in belfries, skeletons, and heroines who faint dead away or catch fevers from being out in a bit of rain, wouldn't you?) Still, gothic and other popular page turners of centuries past that I could never get my hands on until now, were what inspired this site and I have to love anything that promoted those sorts of books.

So go look.

I am not by nature endowed with patience

Hello, Dear Reader.

I am returned to work in time for the busy time. (I do taxes.) But I'm still sick and really want to be curled up with Udolpho. I've also recently found that Lady Molly of Scotland Yard is available along with the original woman mystery writer, works by Anna Katherine Green. If only I could give up all profession and simply read I would be the happiest woman in the world.

But enough. Back to people's taxes.

Next book on my list

Well, Dear Reader, did you guess?

Of course you did! (Though, because after a few days of blogging I surmise I have no dear readers who have been waiting and guessing the answer, I feel sure that you have come later, are reading this post prior to the earlier post, and are guessing at the question rather than the answer. Well, guess away and we'll call this my version of Gothic Jeopardy.) Where else to begin but where Catherine herself began! The Mysteries of Udolpho by Mrs. Ann Radcliffe!

I wish to start straight away, but, alas! I have no time to do so and therefore am beginning on the 15th of April when tax season ends. And though our hero and Catherine's love, Henry Tilney, declared that he read the work from end to end in a matter of 2 days, I believe, Dear Reader, I do not have the leisure of a gentleman. So as much as I might be engrossed and wish to think of nothing but Udolpho until I have have read every last word, I must go a bit slower than Mr. Tilney. Though if it really is so exciting...

I shall be reporting my progress and every shudder and shock as I read right here, and gossip about the characters. I shall, however, attempt to discuss no true spoilers, and only give such hints as to parts to titillate you, but not destroy your own nerve wracking pace in the book if you decide to read it sometime.

If you have no copy of your own already in your library, then I have a few suggestions as where to find it.

First off, it is available for free on Kindle if you look here.

It is also available for $0.99 as part of the Complete Horrid Novel Collection, also for Kindle, available here. I think this of good value, since it has all 9 of the novels I intend to be reading for much of the next year, and therefore gives you all the works at your immediate disposal.

If instead of a Kindle you have a Nook, do not despair. Though I cannot find the free edition, nor the Complete Horrid Novel Collection, there is a copy of Mysteries of the Udolpho available for $0.99 (still a paltry sum) available here.

If you have neither of such devises, you may still read it on your computer by accessing either pdf or html files at Project Gutenberg, YorkU.ca, and Classicly.com. All of these resources are free.

If you wish to find hard copy, I always recommend the local library or you may attempt to find it at the bookstore or website of your choosing.

Oh my god! I am so excited to begin! Until anon, Dear Reader, all of my most sincere love!

Woman In White--Wilkie Collins

Written a bit after Catherine's time, it's not a Gothic novel but the progeny of the Gothic, the Sensation Novel. But those are distinctions that historians and such make, and while interesting to know, completely overlooks the fact that it is indeed HORRID and a lot of fun to read. I think Catherine would approve.


So since you were not here, Dear Reader (is it okay if I call you Dear Reader? It's a bit affected, I know. But it is great fun to go on with something like the language of the novels. So Dear Reader you are),  while I was reading The Woman In White I will give you some excerpts of conversations with friends, who largely had no idea what I was talking of. This is not a specific conversation with a specific friend, but a conglomeration of conversations with different people held over several days as I was reading the novel.


Conversation 1:
ME: OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD!! (--aside, get used to me saying this, Dear Reader. It will come up often.)

FRIEND: What's wrong? Are you okay?

ME: No! Marian is separating Laura from Walter so Laura can marry Sir Glyde and you know he's evil. And why is Walter in love with Laura anyway? I mean, I know he describes Marian as ugly, but still, she's the one who is clever and has sense. Instead they always go for dumb, fair, and pretty.

FRIEND: What are you talking about?

ME: Wilkie Collins. The Woman In White.

FRIEND: Who?

Conversation 2:
ME: OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD!!

FRIEND: What's wrong? Is this that book you were reading again?

ME: Yes! I can't put it down. I want to beat Sir Percival Glyde to a pulp. He's going to kill Laura, I know it and they are setting up Count Fosco to be evil, but right now he's helping Laura and keeping Glyde from bullying her, but something is just not right.

FRIEND: Will you order lunch already? The lady at the counter is getting annoyed.

Conversation 3:
ME: OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD!!

FRIEND: Let me guess. Sir Peony did something or other and Count Fatso did the other thing and poor Laura is now locked away and other things happened.

ME:  No! They killed Laura! Those assholes!

FRIEND: (with a long suffering sigh) Well. Sometimes people are assholes.

Conversation 4:
ME: OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD!!

FRIEND: (who was obviously trying to avoid me and now sighs because I have spotted him and he can't get away) What?

ME: You will never guess what happened!

FRIEND: Just finish the book already and don't talk to me until then.

Conversation 5:
ME: OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD! OHMYGOD!!

FRIEND: Go away. I don't know you, you crazy woman.
____________

So you see why I need people to discuss these books with if I am to retain any friends at all. I need people who will understand my passions and my loves and who have felt the chills run up and down their spines as they turn the page (or click the forward button), desperate to read more.

A Perfectly Horrid Beginning

I am not Catherine, though I think she and I would be great friends if we were to meet. Alas! She is in England, I am in the United States. She is from the 19th Century and I from the 21st. She is fictional, and I, unless we want to go weird and meta, am real. But if it weren't for all those difficulties, Catherine and I should have been great friends because we are both prone to overactive imaginations and flights of fancy. And we both love books.

The beginning of my tale, the tale of this blog, is a that I have a dreadful illness that has prostrated me and left me chilled and near death


....okay, so I have a bad cold.

Anyway, I have a bad cold and a new kindle. But being a broke student at the moment I can't spend a lot of money on books, either paper or electronic. But the Kindle made me realize, I DIDN'T HAVE TO. There are lots of books on there. Books I've wanted to read since forever. Books that I've had difficulty finding in libraries and book stores. And they were there, so many of them, and they were FREE. I about went into a faint.

But since I'm modern and there are no longer fainting couches and I've never even seen smelling salts, I kept my feet and downloaded books. A LOT of books. One was a pack called The Complete Northanger Horrid Novel Collection. It wasn't free, but it had all the books listed from Northanger Abbey and was only 99 cents. I downloaded that and about fifty other things and have been in a binge of reading gluttony ever since.

Under the influence of antihistamines--which always make me sleepy and dizzy--I laid in bed and read. I clicked about my Kindle for the next story to read and decided on Wilkie Collins's The Woman In White. Swoon! From the time Anne Catherick puts her white hand on Walter's shoulder I was hooked.

When I couldn't be stuck to the book, I talked about the book. Evil Count Fosco and poor Anne Catherick. I was so nervous at times it was all I could do not to look up the book on Wikipedia and find out what happens next. (I didn't.) And I talked about the book. But no one else had read it. No one else had heard of it. No one I knew was into these sensational and horrid novels. It made me wish I did know Catherine Morland.

But the internet is far and wide and there are many people here. Some of you must be as imaginative and foolish as Miss Morland and me. Some of you want to be shocked to your toes by old books, dark nights, and evil counts. And so begins this blog. I am not reviewing these books. I am not critiquing or scoring or being intelligent in any way. I am enjoying them. Some are gothics. Some are sensational or mysteries or just unclassifiable. Some are well known and others are not. In all honesty, I'm not sure what I'll be reading or what I'll find. Just going where the stories take me, preferably down darkened roads, wearing a white night dress on a stormy, dark night, running from a terrible specter or evil count.