From the Bookshelf of Never too Late to Read Classics…

We Have Always Lived in the Castle

Shirley Jackson

Start date: January 1, 2025

Finish date: January 31, 2025

Discussion: The Horror of it All

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The Horror of it All

* 2026 Horror Reading Schedule
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* 2025 Horror Reading Schedule
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What Members Thought

Jul 21, 2013 Laura rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: novellas, suspense-thriller, e-books, american-fiction, read-2016, fiction-20th-century, gothic-romance, horror

From BBC Radio 4 Extra - Book at Bedtime:
Merricat Blackwood lives on the family estate with her sister Constance and her uncle Julian. Not long ago there were seven Blackwoods - until a fatal dose of arsenic found its way into the sugar bowl one terrible night. Acquitted of the murders, Constance has returned home, where Merricat protects her from the curiosity and hostility of the villagers.

Episode Two:
The Blackwoods hold a tea party for Helen Clarke and her friend, Mrs Wright. But conversation ...more

10 likes · Like · see review

Jan 01, 2014 Meika rated it it was amazing

I read this in the span of an evening. It reads like a classic Gothic story... wealthy, orphaned children, deranged uncle, meddlesome neighbors, sinister mobs lurking in town, haunted house, murder...
All told through the cracked-lens unreliable narrative of the younger sister, Mary Katherine. The reader has to approach the story cautiously. But like watching a crazy person on the street, you're drawn to the story out of curiosity. The truth about why the girls are orphaned is revealed in a seri ...more

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Oct 24, 2016 Rachel rated it it was amazing

It figures that a book about people who are happy in their isolation would resonate with me. Shirley Jackson's self proclaimed "paean to agoraphobia" gives of a sense of unease even during what should be the most mundane domestic scenes.

Mary Katherine "Merricat" Blackwood, her sister Constance and their ailing uncle Julian are the surviving members of a once prestigious family. The surviving Blackwoods are hated and ridiculed by the surrounding villagers due to an incident which resulted in the ...more

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