From the Bookshelf of Never too Late to Read Classics…

The Collector

John Fowles

Start date: February 1, 2024

Finish date: February 29, 2024

Discussion: The Horror of it All

Find A Copy At

Group Discussions About This Book

Showing 2 of 7 topics — 177 comments total

The Horror of it All

* 2026 Horror Reading Schedule
By Book Nerd , Purple Book Horse · 4 posts · 30 views

last updated Nov 13, 2025 04:43PM

* 2025 Horror Reading Schedule
By Book Nerd , Purple Book Horse · 4 posts · 122 views

last updated Aug 21, 2025 07:16AM

showing 7 of 7 topics view all »

What Members Thought

Mar 18, 2019 Chrissie rated it liked it

Shelves: audible-uk, 2019-read, mystery, philo-psychol, england, fiction, classics, suspense

Frederick Clegg is obsessed with Miranda Grey. He had a nondescript job as a clerk until the day he got lucky and won a heap of money betting on the outcome of football matches. He buys a remote house in Sussex and devotes himself to his hobby, collecting. He collects butterflies and maybe something more. Miranda, she is an art student at the Slade School of Art. Both are somewhere in their twenties. The events take place in the late fifties or early sixties.

Frederick kidnaps Miranda. He install ...more

23 likes · Like · see review

Mar 10, 2013 Laura rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 1001-books-you-must-read-before-you, contemporary-fiction, book-and-movie, read-2013, british-literature, gothic-romance, fiction-20th-century, library-loan, horror

This is the first novel written by John Fowles.

The plot describes the obsessive love of a clerk, Frederick Clegg, by Miranda Grey, an art student. Since this is a psychological thriller, the story has a lot of elements of horror from the captor against his prey. During her captivity, Miranda manages to write her diary with her own version of this brutality against her life and freedom.

An unforgettable movie was made based on this book: The Collector (1965) with a splendid cast such as Terence St ...more

5 likes · Like · see review

Nov 01, 2025 Yair Ben-Zvi rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

"As it so happens, anyway, as soon as I woke up I began to have more sensible ideas, it's just like me to see only the dark side last thing at night and to wake up different."

Fowles, John . The Collector (p. 271). UNKNOWN. Kindle Edition. ...more

4 likes · Like · see review