Customer Reviews

The Grotesque

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

McGrath's popular works (Spider, Asylum, Dr. Haggard's Disease) are known for being compact, psychological dramas with a paranormal twist. These novels exhibit not only intriguing stories but also show the effectiveness of writing in the first person. The Grotesque is McGrath's first novel. Although it shows the promise of his capabilities as an author, the book does not compare to his later works.

The Grotesque is a relatively light-hearted "gothic comedy". It contains the requisite spooky house, sinister butler, a murder, and some strange happenings. But it is all rather tongue-in-cheek. This comedy aspect disarms the scary elements, which all seems to trivialize the novel. It comes off as a good made-for-TV movie script, and not a serious novel. In fact the characterizations in The Grotesque are surprisingly weak.

So The Grotesque is a "McGrath-light" sort of novel. I recommend seeing the film version of it, which is probably available on video, and invest your time on his other novels.

This is McGrath's first book, and it's a good one. A goof on the familiar Gothic novel, it tells the story of the hostile take-over of a creepy old estate by the owner's butler. However, since the narrator is in a state of complete paralysis, and quite possibly insane, his story is suspect. Is the butler really doing the nasty with Sir Hugo's wife? Who murdered the insipid fiance of Sir Hugo's daughter and fed him to the estate's pigs? What REALLY happened in Sir Hugo's barn workshop the day he became paralyzed?

A black comedy of murder and manners, THE GROTESQUE provides us with the requsite gloomy mansion, a dismal swamp, a suspicious servant, bad plumbing, and a possible inspiration for Thomas Harris's HANNIBAL. I recommend it.

Having picked up this book rather randomly, I was pleasantly surprised to find a well written modern gothic tale. Narrated by an aristocrat who is confined to a wheelchair, the reader is never sure if his opinions are the ramblings of a man with an overactive imagination or an accurate account of the hostile takeover of his estate by a devious butler. Sir Hugo's observations and insights are always suspect but very entertaining. A masterpiece of black humor. McGrath is a great storyteller.

I was pretty impressed with this book, as it is from early on in the writer's career. McGrath has gone on to become probably the greatest gothicist of his generation (admittedly, a title which is *not* oft contested), but, in my opinion, there are wickedly funny elements in this book that I find lacking in his later, "greater" works. I was surprised that such a diabolical sense of humor lurked within the author of utterly disturbing books such as "Spider" and "Asylum". The cataleptic narrator's (Sir Hugo) observation are always at least worthy of a smirk, sometimes a snort, often an out-loud laugh. Like all of McGrath's works, it will occupy your mind long after you've finished it... trying to fingure out exactly what's going on. I suppose it is not as expertly crafted as his later books, but it is certainly a good start to a stellar career. Also, a good intro to McGrath, as it's not quite as harrowing as his later work.

This is my first McGrath novel, so I'm not comparing it to his other work, which may explain partly why my perspective differs a little from the other reviewers here. I think they do McGrath an injustice in writing this book off as "Gothic comedy" or relatively lightweight.

Yes, it does have a macabre dark humor, and there is a sense in which we never fully engage with the peculiar self-justifications of the narrator, Sir Hugo Coal. But that "failing" goes to the heart of the book's point. We are left wondering at the end which character is truly "the grotesque." Is it the paralyzed, but strangely vigorous narrator whose claims on morality are potentially as tenuous as his grip on reality? Or the Satanic, red-haired, polymorphously virile butler Fledge with his pseudo-Oedipal designs on his master's place and property.

Beneath the undeniable charm of McGrath's prose as he inhabits his narrator lie numerous unanswerable questions about right and wrong, identity and duplicity. A tour de force.

I've now read Asylum, Spider, Dr. Haggards Disease and The Grotesque and I would definitely put this one in at #3, behind Asylum and Spider.
This story got me thinking about how awful life would be if you were a vegetable and noone knew you were able to understand everything around you. McGrath's narrators are always "one sandwich short of a pincic" and you have to think about what's really happening/happened vs. what the narrator said happened. I enjoyed the story quite a bit, and still have many unanswered questions!

I LOVED this book. McGrath is the modern master of neo-gothic stories. It's all here: the spooky old house, the bad weather, the seriously disturbed people. Even though McGrath deals with content that can easily fall into stereotype, he pulls it off; I giggled with pure pleasure at his creepy descriptions. Read anything and everything by McGrath.

An exciting tale of murder betrayal and the shift of power within a manor. After the owner of the estate Hugo Cole is paralysized by a stroke he is forced to watch as his butler steals his wife and his daughters' fiancee is murdered. Combines the suspensful elements of a mystery with an undertone that could be described as comic. It has an eerie quality as we watch characters walk into horrible situations, that they themselves can't realize. After readin this book i'll think twice before getting a butler.

This is a prime example of an Author having fun. McGrath has taken every Gothic cliche and turned them upside down. Is the narrator a raving paranoid, or is something really going on here? Not quite Asylum, but better than Dr. Haggard's Disease. You've got to admit that McGrath loves his work - and here is where it really shows.

All the features of a classic Gothic novel are here - the old mansion, the possibility of a crime, the questionable emotional and psychological stability of the characters. Days after finishing the book, I am still discovering new aspects of relationships between the characters