"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?