Customer Reviews

Grange House: A Novel

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is an exciting and beautifully written story. I came to this book as a fortysomething businessman who knows nothing of Victorian fiction but who vacations each summer on the Maine coast. Grange House is a mystery story seen through the eyes of a likable young woman struggling to find her place as she reaches adulthood in 1896. The characters, whether rustic Maine natives filled with humor and irony or more pretentious summer visitors from Boston and New York, are engaging and perfectly drawn. Yet, while summer parties and jokes and romances are pleasant diversions, the core of this book is a complex mystery that builds suspense and excitement as it is carefully constructed and then swiftly and perfectly unwound - I had no idea how this story was going to end. With much of the Maine coast little changed since 1896, I'd love to see a movie version of Grange House.

A beautifully written, Victorian-style novel set in turn-of-the-century Maine, Sarah Blake's "Grange House" is a very evocative coming of age novel with a nod to the great women writers of the 19th century. Maisie, a well-born and intelligent seventeen-year old girl, finds tragedy, intrigue and love on the craggy coast of Maine while summering with her family. The Victorian sensibilities, language and details will ring true to any Austen or Bronte fan, yet Blake finds her own voice, and it is an eloquent one. I would highly recommend this first novel to lovers of the classics. It will be time well spent.

I have loved reading this book, which was recommended to me by the staff of an excellent, erudite and selective bookstore in DC. The story is intriguing without being overdone (a concern with gothic fiction) and is extraordinarily well written. There's a touch of Henry James to the story.

Something not mentioned by other readers: Grange House is one of the few books I've read in years that have given me such vivid imagery that I truly savored reading each passage slowly. This isn't just a Victorian-style thriller; there are several social and interpersonal issues brought out concerning women, marriage, social status, tradition, and family as well. You care what decisions the narrator makes.

"Grange House" is a good, solid gothic novel, worthy of comparison to "Wuthering Heights", "Jane Eyre", etc.

The author, Sarah Blake, deals with identity of the individual. What makes us who we really are? Are we defined by the history we inherit or by the history we choose and create? Perhaps it is our environment? The central character, Maisie Thomas, is a young, intelligent and independent thinker somewhat hedged in by Victorian mores. But is she who she thinks she is? Is anyone who they appear to be?

The famous line by Emily Dickinson -- "Tell all the truth, but tell it slant" popped into my head and stayed as I read this book. In "Grange House" the truth is "slant", subjective and unique to each individual.

A novel of power, manipulation and guilt, it is classically gothic, offering chilling apparitions, deep forests, a cold, unrelenting ocean, madness and ill-fated love. Truth and reality are entangled with deceit and illusion. Past, present and future bleed into each other for a truly wild, entertaining tale.

The author's ear for the spoken language of that era and how it was informed by propriety, decorum, subtlety and delicacy is a delight to read. I did not buy this book as a mystery per se, but the story is so compelling that I read it all in one sitting, staying up until 3AM to finish it. The mounting dread in the laudanum-stupefied last section of the book is truly gripping.

I came away from this book thinking about how people's perceptions of events - and the stories they devise to make sense of their perceptions - affect and dictate their subsequent actions.

Is there any end to the number of pitfalls in writing? I just finished Sarah Blake's "Grange House," and she has aggrevated me on various levels.

The book needs editing. Although the writing is good, I kept thinking, "Where is the ending?"

Ms. Blake loves the word "cupped." She must have used it fifty times in 360 pages. I began looking for "cupped" the way you listen for a tic in the speech of someone who bores you. Someone should have repaired this.

The author held me prisoner, then pulled the oldest trick in the book (pun intended), as I expected: reversed identities.

The story takes place circa 1900, and the author's attempt at Victorian speech is jarring. I noticed she holds a doctorate in Victorian lit.; no doubt she wanted to demonstrate how very much Victorian literature she's had to read.

The art of storytelling seems to me like the art of teaching. Many are called, but damned few are chosen.

This book was recommended to me by Amazon. I read Kate Morton's books, House at Riverton and Forgotten Garden, and was looking for something similar. I read these reviews and thought that "Grange House" would be perfect. Ghosts, an Inn on the Maine Coast, 1896...How could it go wrong? Well, it's tedious. The conversations between the characters are exhausting. I found myself constantly rereading phrases to see if there was some kind of double meaning....some information I was going to need to solve the mystery of "the story", which solved pretty quickly. I hoped there would be a twist and I would be wrong. In the end I felt let down. I've never written an Amazon Review before but I found these reviews to be unbalanced and that this book received too many rave reviews. I will probably read the author's next book, The Postmistress. Again, the plot sounds great. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

I read this on a friend's recommendation, and the first chapter came across as so contrived and precious, that it was difficult to get into. Sentences like: "Rather, you must take the night steamer from Boston, which deposits you at the Grange House pier before teatime." Or: "And though I watch for it, I am never prepared for the first sight of Grange House on its point, though I know the approach, and early learned to read where the slick black shale ledges of the shoreline turn to the white granite boulders marking the entrance to Middle Haven's harbor."

Having read the whole novel, I now think that if only she'd just left off the first 3 paragraphs, the whole book could have gone a lot better. Oh well. The fact is, because of the strength of this friend's recommendation I gave the book another chance and by the third chapter was totally wrapped up in the gentle yet mysterious world of Grange House. So much, in fact, that I resented getting to my subway stop each morning and having to come back to the real world! I finally got so frustrated that I just took a few hours off and finished the darn thing!

About all I feel safe telling you without giving away the story, is that the author weaves a gentle and mysterious story following a teenage girl who finds herself on an investigation of the lives lived in Grange House. It has elements of each of the Bronte novels, with a sprinkling of E.M. Forster. The author drew me in so far that as she lets us in on delightfully intimate Victorian letters and diaries of the characters, I felt guilty for infringing on their privacy! If you can ride out the precious language for a bit, and forgive the attempts to be original that produce a sentence like: "...for Mama's fear of the fog would dampen the spirit of the voyage, and Papa's cheery dismissal of that fear would only clamp shut her lips," the sensual and mysterious atmosphere will seduce you. If this is your kind of thing I highly recommend this book.

this is an awesome novel. i am not normally a reader of books in the gothic style (i usually stick to mysteries and hard boiled fiction), but this book clearly hooked me. it was evocative, powerful, totally gripping. the story was compelling and the writing was both sharp and beautiful. i know it's a cliche, but i think i would recognize grange house immediately if i happened upon it. very highly recommended - enjoy!

When I first started reading Grange House, I must admit, it irritated me. The narrative was all caught up in this eerie, mystical mood thing that seemed very, very forced. Then, about halfway through the novel, things picked up. The ghost story aspect of it all was more natural and the story itself became engrossing. The mystery of Miss Grange, or who the mother of the young heroine is actually got to be quite compelling. I am not certain the ending compensated for the silliness of the first part of the novel, so I would advise to proceed with caution.