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Richard Adams

The Girl in a Swing Hardcover – January 1, 1982

by Richards Adams (Author)

105 ratings

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$907.99

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$5.99

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Publisher

Random House
Publication date

January 1, 1982
ISBN-10

0517391732
ISBN-13

978-0517391730
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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Random House (January 1, 1982)
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0517391732
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0517391730
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 7.2 ounces

Best Sellers Rank: #16,442,609 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #242,760 in Contemporary Literature & Fiction

Customer Reviews:
105 ratings

Customer reviews

5 star		56%
4 star		15%
3 star		17%
2 star		7%
1 star		5%

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Top reviews from the United States

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Laurie

Spellbinding Story

Reviewed in the United States on December 25, 2009

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One of the best ghost stories I've ever read. Still remember clearly the first time I read it. I had taken a battered used copy from a little book exchange and then ended up reading it nearly all night. I simply could not put it down and was cheap at work the next day, counting the hours till I could go back home and finish it.

The book's descriptions of china collection are, by themselves, vivid and interesting. I credit the book with igniting my passion for American Brilliant crystal and antiques in general.

I've reread the book many many times since the first time and I'm glad that it has finally come out as a Kindle book. Now all that is needed is an audio version. Don't bother yourself with the lousy movie starring a stuffed-nose poorly performing Meg Tilly; it's a major letdown. Allow yourself to be carried away by the lyrical, haunting prose of a master writer.

18 people found this helpful

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Kindle Customer

I have loved this book for years

Reviewed in the United States on March 5, 2021

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It was time to read again and revisit the great love of The Girl in the Swing. Timeless and forever.

One person found this helpful

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Gridley

Tales of Poe and James Grown Anew

Reviewed in the United States on November 17, 2014

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This book is a surreal mystery that draws from Poe and Henry James. It has to do with a man and woman who become infatuated with one another, marry, and honeymoon in Florida. The wife sees what seems to be a corpse floating in a river. Hereinafter, the suspense and seeming horror grow. As in classical poetry, Adams kneads sensuality and the fear of death into a horrific whole, and he does it most capably.

8 people found this helpful

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Danae Savitri

An Exquisite Read

Reviewed in the United States on June 10, 2006

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This is a fabulous, exquisitely written book. The ancient classics have fallen out of our common educational parlance, so various motifs and other literary signposts are missed by the average reader.
Adams is a subtle writer, so he won't spell it out for you. Basically, Kathe is a manifestation of the goddess Aphrodite, complete with all the beauty and callousness that implies. Many, many readers missed this, largely because the latin & greek references are not part of our popular consciousness anymore. Very interesting & very well done.

Last nitpicking item I have is with several reviewers who kept referring to one of the two central characters as "Karin". Did they read the book, really, or just see the Meg Tilly movie? The narrator's wife was named "KATHE", *not* Karin!!

20 people found this helpful

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Avid Book Junkie

One of the most horrifying books I've ever read

Reviewed in the United States on August 30, 2008

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I read this book for the first time about twenty-five years ago (wow! time flies!), and STILL I am haunted by the story. When I came across it at the used bookstore last week, I just had to buy it. Mysterious, erotic, terrifying, horrifying -- a story of obsession taken to an extreme. This is the thinking person's horror story. There is no gore, no bloody knife, no bony hand grabbing you in the dark. But yes, there is a monster.

17 people found this helpful

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Anne Britting Oleson

Creepy

Reviewed in the United States on April 9, 2019

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Just seriously creepy.

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JAK

Gods and Ghosts, Christians and Karin

Reviewed in the United States on January 11, 2015

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I'd read Watership Down quite a few years ago and enjoyed it.I'd meant to get around to this book some years ago but couldn't find it.After reading a number of stories by Robert Aickman , I thought of this book again and realized it was now a pretty cheap download.In its way , this book is even stranger and more baffling than Aickman.

The book tells the story of Allen , from childhood until he meets Karin.Then it becomes the story of Allen and Karin.It's quite a story.We know from moment one that Karin is too good to be true.To his credit,so does Allen.She is too beautiful , too nice , charming and cultured.What the hell does she see in Allen who is kind of boring,not much to look at and not rich.You 'd assume Karin would be looking for Donald Trump.Karin is very mysterious, to the point of creepiness and perhaps craziness.I assumed the central mystery of the novel was , what is Karin? A lot of hints are dropped about this but Adams doesn't seem to want to flesh this out.instead a rather obvious ghost story is dropped in .Yet to give the book it's due,is it really a ghost story?My guess is it's not.It's ambiguous.I'm pretty sure Karin is crazy and Allen is pretty strange in reality.As a child he showed signs of having ESP.Is the weirdness here some strange interaction between Karin's madness and Allen's ESP? Maybe but Adams isn't telling.I think he overdoes the ambiguity and vagueness to the point that you're occasionally forced to say , what is this ?

Overall this novel is a solid performance.I found it very absorbing until about mid point when my questions and doubts began to take over.What's odd about the book is , you know Adams is up to something but I was never quite sure what it was? There is a lot of Christian and classical subtext that I expected to see developed more clearly.I t never is and that was disappointing. Much as you may enjoy the book(I did) ,I can't imagine that anyone except perhaps the author.really knows what it's about.

8 people found this helpful

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LJezard

... a lover of Adam's Watership Down and a friend recommended this book

Reviewed in the United States on August 9, 2014

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I'm a lover of Adam's Watership Down and a friend recommended this book. Very well written, but I found the day-to-day happenings somewhat tedious. Adam, no doubt, wanted the reader to feel a connection to the female protagonist to better understand and forgive what she did (I won't say more so as not to spoil the story for others), but it didn't work for me. I seldom outright regret reading a book, and I don't regret reading this one. But, I probably wouldn't recommend it to anyone.

5 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Dog in a Flat Cap

Dark and haunting

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 19, 2018

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Oh lordie! What a haunting book. (By the way, the kindle cover image is pretty tacky but never mind.) I couldn’t put this book down after about a third of the way through. Very cleverly put together with so much hinted yet so little spelled out. It’s strangely, almost imperceptibly dark, even while most of the book is taken up with the apparently superficial topics of romance and antique porcelain. My mother read this book years ago and I recall her telling me she’d found it sinister and scary. I must say that while I enjoyed the book nearly all the way through (I say nearly) I did succumb to an overwhelming sense of grimness towards the end! This is no detriment to the book, which is great. But it is darkly haunting.

4 people found this helpful

Mrs. C. H. O'reilly

A Different Read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 21, 2014

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Another book club recommendation. I wasn't sure what to expect from Richard Adams having only ever read Watership Down by the same author. The main character is quite a lonely man, knowledgeable, but it seems his knowledge is restricted to just ceramics. When he travels and meets an unusual, keen woman he is overwhelmed and is quick to include her totally in his life. I am not certain this would have happened then, due to etiquette and his own insular and cautious lifestyle. It is no wonder she is not exactly who she says she is. The dark side is merely hinted at, which is the clever part of the book!

3 people found this helpful

Marcus Woodhouse

A fantastic author

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 1, 2021

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Bought for my wife. I vaguely remember reading it as coursework, I can't imagine it would be used that way now.

Marilyn Nichols

My desert island book

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 27, 2014

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I like a well written book with a good story. This is everything - romance, philosophy, tutorial on ceramics and music, ghost story, tragedy, in short one of my favourite books I have ever read - I am a book worm, always have been, and must have got through entire libraries of authors' work. Richard Adams has written in so many genres, he is a writer I admire greatly.

10 people found this helpful

Amazon Customer

Article was not of the standard described.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 30, 2018

Verified Purchase

The book arrived quickly, but upon reading the pages were yellow with age, had loose pages in the middle and the spine was creased and wrinkled. Not good enough for a charity shop to sell!

One person found this helpful

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