Candles in the Wood

by Anne Rundle, Alexandra Manners (Pseudonym)

Paperback, 252pp, First Berkley Medallion edition, February 1976.

Genres: Gothic, Romance, Mystery, Historical Fiction

252 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1974

About the author

Anne Lamb Rundle
aka Anne Rundle, Joanne Marshall, Marianne Lamont, Alexandra Manners, Jeanne Sanders, Georgianna Bell

Anne Lamb was born on 1920 in Berwick-on-Tweed, Northumberland, England, UK, daughter of Annie Sanderson and George Manners Lamb, a soldier. She was educated at Army Schools, and attended Berwick High School for Girls. She worked as civil servant on Newcastle-upon-Tyne from 1942 to 1950. On 1th October 1949, she married Edwin Charles Rundle, and had one daughter, Anne, and two sons, James and Iain.

When she published her first novel in 1967, she won the Netta Muskett Award for new writers. She won twice the Romantic Novel of the Year Award by the Romantic Novelists' Association for her novels Cat on a Broomstick (1970) and Flower of Silence (1971). In 1974, she was named Daughter of Mark Twain. On 1937, she married Richard Maddocks, who died in 1970. Anne Rundle died on 1989.

Reviews

[Ana Lopes Miura · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a wonderful find, at turns deliciously creepy and hauntingly beautiful. The atmosphere was so well done, not only because of the gorgeous descriptions of the forest, but because of the Scottish lore and a fairytale, dreamlike quality to the whole affair. A classic of the genre. I will reread it again and again for sure.

[Princessjay · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jacket blurb:

"Only in her wildest dreams could Helen Comyn hope to return to Gallowmerry. She had grown up a servant's child on the Grant family's estate, and had savored the memory of its elegance as well as her love for young Lenox Grant for long years after she'd been abandoned by her parents and forced to leave. Now, unexpectedly an heiress, Helen found she could go back to Gallowmerry. She could fulfill her desire to live among the Grants as an equal... But the Gallowmerry to which she returned was not the fond home of her childhood. It had become a house of dark secrets and unspoken hatreds whose poisons had infected the entire Grant family. It had become a house of horror luring Helen herself to the brink of madness."

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Old-fashioned romantic thriller of a certain style, filled with love, jealousy and other such intense emotions, stifling atmosphere, set in relative isolation, and the wild surmises of being in love with someone you didn't quite trust, with envy and murder afoot and family secrets spilling out of the dungeons. Well-written, surprisingly detailed and nuance characters amidst the wild melodrama of setting, and the kind of slowly-building romance that do not involve graphic description of people's genitals.

One of my favourites of this genre. I re-read at least once a year. If you can find a copy, highly recommended.

[Katrina Sutton · Rating 5 out of 5]

I discovered this book when my middle school library was getting rid of some of their books. I took this one home not knowing what kind of story it was going to be. It surprised me. I loved it! I kept hoping that Helen was going to be part of the family she wished to be a part of one day. It is a great read and I wished Alexandra Manners had written more books.

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

An exceptionally good gothic set in rural Scotland in the second half of the 19th Century, "Candles in the Wood" tells the story of Helen Comyn, who as a child is fascinated by Gallowmerry, the Tudor house in which her mother occasionally serves and by the Grants, the gentry who live there. As an adult, years later, that fascination will continue, with potentially deadly results. Anne Rundle/Alexandra Manners definitely emulates then-reigning queen of the genre Victoria Holt, both in terms of the first-person narrative and the decades-spanning story that follows her heroine from childhood through adulthood, from innocence to experience. Yet Manners/Rundle tackles darker, more adult subplots than Holt ever did and seasons the proceedings with a fair amount of evocative ghoulishness. The ending is a little weak, but the reading is a lot of fun and the novel, hard to find and expensive when found, is worth seeking out.

[Stephanie Ricker · Rating 4 out of 5]

Deliciously gothic atmosphere, heavily reminiscent of Victoria Holt. I read this just after getting back from Scotland and loved the Cairngorms setting, which was where we spent our last night in Scotland too. The novel feels older than 1976; I would have imagined something closer to 1940. Some of the tropes don't hold up as well by today's standards, and I honestly felt the romance had a lot of red flags. But I did enjoy the style and would totally read something else by the author, who was very prolific under various pen names. Three and a half stars rounded up to four.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helen Comyn, a heiress, returns to her childhood home of Gallowmerry but she has returned a very different person than she was when she left. She is no longer the child of a servant in the manor, she can hold her own among the elite. But some feelings haven't changed, like those she had for Lennox Grant.

I loved the tension and uncertainty Helen faced when she came back to the manor. Her position was completely reversed from how it was when she left but the past catches up and not everyone could forget what she once was.

[Hafiza · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very similar feel to Victoria Holt.
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