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Aug. 9th, 2021 11:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsI am currently at genarti's family lake cottage in New York, one of the best features of which is a bookshelf crammed full of her grandmother's old yellowing waterstained paperbacks. Obviously as soon as I arrived I went spelunking for Gothics and emerged, to my delight, with Victoria Holt's The Shivering Sands, an INCREDIBLE example of the form, which features:
- a mysteriously disappeared sister
- a dead husband, a dead brother, AND a dead wife
- ghostly lights in the chapel
- tragically separated young lovers
- no less than THREE young lady wards of ambiguous parentage
- a great deal of romantic dialogue along the lines of "have you ever known anyone else who killed his brother?" / "no" / "doesn't that make me UNIQUE?"
- a lot of vaguely thematic archaeology
The heroine of the book is Caroline Verlaine, whose selfish but charismatic concert-pianist husband has just tragically died of a heart attack after entirely absorbing her own musical career into his own. This has left her heartbroken and relatively penniless but did give her the opportunity to reconnect with her pragmatic archaeologist sister Roma --
(-- Caroline's pre-widowhood tragic backstory, for the record, is that the rest of her family is all archaeologists and considered archaeology the ONLY career worth pursuing --)
-- until Roma mysteriously vanishes on a dig near the big ominous Stacy house! This is why every family needs an archaeologist heir and a spare; someone needs to investigate when the first one disappears.
Coincidentally, Caroline is soon offered the opportunity to teach music at the big ominous Stacy house, so she decides to go Undercover as Definitely Not The Sister Of The Missing Archaeologist to Investigate while also attempting to make brilliant pianists out of the three aforementioned young lady wards:
- the Eldest Ward, a sweet and timid heiress whose parents were family friends of the house or something (I kept expecting her parents to be relevant and they never were); Sad And Talented At Piano
- the Loudest Ward, an illegitimate granddaughter of the lord of the manor; Does Not Care To Practice The Piano
- the Littlest Ward, the quiet and imaginative preteen daughter of the mysteriously widowed housekeeper, who's being raised with the upper-class young ladies For Some Mysterious Reason; Dutiful But Ungifted At Piano
It also contains Napier Stacy, the younger son and heir of the master of the house, who was Banished after an unfortunate incident in which he and his universally beloved elder brother were playing with guns thirteen years ago and he shot his brother! and then his mom went into the woods and shot herself with the same gun!!
Every conversation between Napier and Caroline goes like this:
NAPIER: You and I are alike ... we are both haunted by our pasts ... yours in which you are hung up on your bad dead husband .... and mine in which I MURDERED my PERFECT BROTHER and CAUSED my MOTHER'S DEATH ....
CAROLINE: ummm leaving aside your rude personal remarks about the husband I am grieving, I'm pretty sure you shot your brother by accident?
NAPIER: EVERYONE WILL TELL YOU I MURDERED HIM AND I ALSO AM TELLING YOU I MURDERED HIM
CAROLINE: accidents could happen to anyone?? please stop being so dramatic???
Napier is also rude, unpleasant, unattractive, a bad father to his daughter the Loudest Ward, and prone to doing things like deliberately scheduling Caroline to play the music that her dead husband played on his last concert before his fatal heart attack in an attempt to help her get over him psychologically. Obviously, Caroline finds him strangely compelling.
Caroline, vaguely aware of her own bad taste: What sort of future would any woman have with such a man? Some might be able to deal with it. Some might find it exhilarating, in a repellent sort of way.
Alas, Napier is already in an arranged marriage -- to the Eldest Ward, who is terrified of him and in love with the tiny frail curate down the road!
In addition to all these scions, the household also contains Napier's dying elderly father, the aforementioned mysteriously widowed housekeeper, and Napier's creepy elderly artist aunt who claims she can paint pictures of people's futures.
CREEPY AUNT: I hate my murderous nephew Napier and the ghost of his Perfect Brother haunts this place to this day!!
LITTLEST WARD: Yeah! I see lights in the far-off chapel at night and it is DEFINITELY ghosts.
CAROLINE: Perhaps my sister was killed for investigating the ghost lights ...
CAROLINE: But ghosts! As if she would worry about them! "What," I could hear her voice demanding, "have lights in chapels to do with archaeology!"
About halfway through the book, the Eldest Ward falls pregnant and then mysteriously disappears! just like Caroline's sister!! Everyone assumes she's run off with her true love, the tiny frail curate down the road, but then the heartbroken curate turns up at a missionary in Africa exactly where he was supposed to be and so everyone assumes Napier murdered her instead because he thought she was annoying.
Meanwhile, a new curate turns up to be a rival love interest and recognize Caroline as Roma's sister In Disguise. In contrast to Napier, he's pleasant social and Interested in Archaeology, but it turns out he was just a red herring here to lay other red herrings.
NEW CURATE: Perhaps Roma was murdered by a JEALOUS ARCHAEOLOGIST!
CAROLINE: Now I understand my family believes archaeology to be the most important thing on God's green Earth, but even to me this seems far-fetched
However, enough people notice Caroline and the New Curate conspiring together that someone manages to put his name on a note to lure Caroline to an empty cottage! which is then set on FIRE!! Fortunately, she is then rescued by ... the Littlest Ward!
ME: wow WILD for a Gothic that she was rescued by the little kid rather than a love interest tbh. But sweet!
LITTLEST WARD: Since I have saved your life, I will trust you with the information that I'm the illegitimate daughter of the lord of the manor
ME: This does not seem to be much of a secret --
CAROLINE: I AM SHOCKED! AND YET THIS EXPLAINS SO MUCH!
ME: I stand corrected.
At this point, Caroline, the housekeeper, and the remaining wards all go on a field trip to the British Museum, where they see some ominous archaeological remnants and the housekeeper is startled by a newspaper that reports the escape of a homicidal maniac.
ME, SPECULATING: the homicidal maniac has to be relevant somehow ... is he the Perfect Brother who somehow survived and is going to be revealed to be evil to clear Napier's character?
Meanwhile, the Loudest Ward's long-gone mother shows up with her traveling camp and some unfortunate 1960s racism around Romani people to drop the reveal that the father of her child was not Napier, as everyone believed, but his long-dead Perfect Brother! also, that the reason that Napier's mother killed himself was only HALF because she was grieving her dead Superior Son, and half because she was sad about her husband's affair that produced the Littlest Ward.
CAROLINE: Well, I guess Napier isn't a bad and neglectful dad, just a bad and neglectful uncle! also, only, like, 50% responsible for his mom's death which is way better than we thought yesterday!
CREEPY AUNT: Now, I hate Napier for murdering his Perfect Brother and always will, but honey, I have to tell you, I painted some portraits of your future, and Portrait A says that if you marry the new curate you will go on to be extremely boring, and Portrait B says that if you marry Napier and stay in this big ominous house, you will go on to be passionate and hot
CAROLINE: hmm
Also, Napier helps to weed an old man's garden, which proves that he's a softy deep down.
Now, Napier's character has been at least very mildly redeemed ... but what about disappeared Roma and Edith?
At this point, ten pages from the end, the Littlest Ward tugs charmingly on Caroline's hand and demands she come with her to see some cave paintings she found way down deep in the cliff ...
ME: oh no
LITTLEST WARD: no, deeper into the caves
ME: OH NO
LITTLEST WARD: HO HO, I HAVE LURED YOU INTO MY SLOW QUICKSAND! YOU SHALL DIE A DELICIOUSLY SLOW AND TORTUROUS DEATH!
CAROLINE, SLOWLY SINKING IN CAVE QUICKSANDS: but ... you saved my life before .....
LITTLEST WARD: the fire was my first murder attempt! I had to change course rapidly to avoid discovery!
CAROLINE, SLOWLY SINKING IN CAVE QUICKSANDS: but you're like twelve?
LITTLEST WARD: I AM AS A GODDESS WITH THE POWER OF LIFE AND DEATH!
CAROLINE, SLOWLY SINKING IN CAVE QUICKSANDS: but what about the mysterious ghost lights? you couldn't have set them, you were always in the house with me pointing them out!
LITTLEST WARD: HO HO! I organized all the wards in a ghost-light conspiracy to try to chase Napier away so I would inherit the house! When the Eldest Ward rebelled against me, she had to die!!!
CAROLINE, SLOWLY SINKING IN CAVE QUICKSANDS: okay, so that's the death of the Eldest Ward explained ... but why did you also murder my beloved archaeologist sister who was completely uninterested in ghosts and fancy house inheritances?
LITTLEST WARD: she was on the verge of discovering the cave paintings I had already discovered in this cave! it is MY cave and she had to DIE!
ME: holy shit, Roma was murdered by a jealous rival archaeologist!
Fortunately for Caroline, at this point both love interests turn up to save her from the Littlest Ward and haul her out of the quicksand, and all that's left is to break the sad news to the housekeeper.
HOUSEKEEPER: alas! this is my fault!
CAROLINE: I don't see how, you've really done your best --
HOUSEKEEPER: alas! I lied to everyone! the Littlest Ward's father isn't really the lord of the manor --
CAROLINE: what
HOUSEKEEPER: -- but that random homicidal maniac I accidentally dated for two weeks after the lord of the manor's wife committed suicide and we broke up! Determined to protect my daughter from the stigma of being a homicidal maniac's daughter, I lied and wrote to the lord of the manor and claimed she was his! alas that homicidal mania turns out to be genetic!!
CAROLINE AND ME ALSO: WHAT
genarti's family lake cottage in New York, one of the best features of which is a bookshelf crammed full of her grandmother's old yellowing waterstained paperbacks. Obviously as soon as I arrived I went spelunking for Gothics and emerged, to my delight, with Victoria Holt's The Shivering Sands, an INCREDIBLE example of the form, which features:- a mysteriously disappeared sister
- a dead husband, a dead brother, AND a dead wife
- ghostly lights in the chapel
- tragically separated young lovers
- no less than THREE young lady wards of ambiguous parentage
- a great deal of romantic dialogue along the lines of "have you ever known anyone else who killed his brother?" / "no" / "doesn't that make me UNIQUE?"
- a lot of vaguely thematic archaeology
The heroine of the book is Caroline Verlaine, whose selfish but charismatic concert-pianist husband has just tragically died of a heart attack after entirely absorbing her own musical career into his own. This has left her heartbroken and relatively penniless but did give her the opportunity to reconnect with her pragmatic archaeologist sister Roma --
(-- Caroline's pre-widowhood tragic backstory, for the record, is that the rest of her family is all archaeologists and considered archaeology the ONLY career worth pursuing --)
-- until Roma mysteriously vanishes on a dig near the big ominous Stacy house! This is why every family needs an archaeologist heir and a spare; someone needs to investigate when the first one disappears.
Coincidentally, Caroline is soon offered the opportunity to teach music at the big ominous Stacy house, so she decides to go Undercover as Definitely Not The Sister Of The Missing Archaeologist to Investigate while also attempting to make brilliant pianists out of the three aforementioned young lady wards:
- the Eldest Ward, a sweet and timid heiress whose parents were family friends of the house or something (I kept expecting her parents to be relevant and they never were); Sad And Talented At Piano
- the Loudest Ward, an illegitimate granddaughter of the lord of the manor; Does Not Care To Practice The Piano
- the Littlest Ward, the quiet and imaginative preteen daughter of the mysteriously widowed housekeeper, who's being raised with the upper-class young ladies For Some Mysterious Reason; Dutiful But Ungifted At Piano
It also contains Napier Stacy, the younger son and heir of the master of the house, who was Banished after an unfortunate incident in which he and his universally beloved elder brother were playing with guns thirteen years ago and he shot his brother! and then his mom went into the woods and shot herself with the same gun!!
Every conversation between Napier and Caroline goes like this:
NAPIER: You and I are alike ... we are both haunted by our pasts ... yours in which you are hung up on your bad dead husband .... and mine in which I MURDERED my PERFECT BROTHER and CAUSED my MOTHER'S DEATH ....
CAROLINE: ummm leaving aside your rude personal remarks about the husband I am grieving, I'm pretty sure you shot your brother by accident?
NAPIER: EVERYONE WILL TELL YOU I MURDERED HIM AND I ALSO AM TELLING YOU I MURDERED HIM
CAROLINE: accidents could happen to anyone?? please stop being so dramatic???
Napier is also rude, unpleasant, unattractive, a bad father to his daughter the Loudest Ward, and prone to doing things like deliberately scheduling Caroline to play the music that her dead husband played on his last concert before his fatal heart attack in an attempt to help her get over him psychologically. Obviously, Caroline finds him strangely compelling.
Caroline, vaguely aware of her own bad taste: What sort of future would any woman have with such a man? Some might be able to deal with it. Some might find it exhilarating, in a repellent sort of way.
Alas, Napier is already in an arranged marriage -- to the Eldest Ward, who is terrified of him and in love with the tiny frail curate down the road!
In addition to all these scions, the household also contains Napier's dying elderly father, the aforementioned mysteriously widowed housekeeper, and Napier's creepy elderly artist aunt who claims she can paint pictures of people's futures.
CREEPY AUNT: I hate my murderous nephew Napier and the ghost of his Perfect Brother haunts this place to this day!!
LITTLEST WARD: Yeah! I see lights in the far-off chapel at night and it is DEFINITELY ghosts.
CAROLINE: Perhaps my sister was killed for investigating the ghost lights ...
CAROLINE: But ghosts! As if she would worry about them! "What," I could hear her voice demanding, "have lights in chapels to do with archaeology!"
About halfway through the book, the Eldest Ward falls pregnant and then mysteriously disappears! just like Caroline's sister!! Everyone assumes she's run off with her true love, the tiny frail curate down the road, but then the heartbroken curate turns up at a missionary in Africa exactly where he was supposed to be and so everyone assumes Napier murdered her instead because he thought she was annoying.
Meanwhile, a new curate turns up to be a rival love interest and recognize Caroline as Roma's sister In Disguise. In contrast to Napier, he's pleasant social and Interested in Archaeology, but it turns out he was just a red herring here to lay other red herrings.
NEW CURATE: Perhaps Roma was murdered by a JEALOUS ARCHAEOLOGIST!
CAROLINE: Now I understand my family believes archaeology to be the most important thing on God's green Earth, but even to me this seems far-fetched
However, enough people notice Caroline and the New Curate conspiring together that someone manages to put his name on a note to lure Caroline to an empty cottage! which is then set on FIRE!! Fortunately, she is then rescued by ... the Littlest Ward!
ME: wow WILD for a Gothic that she was rescued by the little kid rather than a love interest tbh. But sweet!
LITTLEST WARD: Since I have saved your life, I will trust you with the information that I'm the illegitimate daughter of the lord of the manor
ME: This does not seem to be much of a secret --
CAROLINE: I AM SHOCKED! AND YET THIS EXPLAINS SO MUCH!
ME: I stand corrected.
At this point, Caroline, the housekeeper, and the remaining wards all go on a field trip to the British Museum, where they see some ominous archaeological remnants and the housekeeper is startled by a newspaper that reports the escape of a homicidal maniac.
ME, SPECULATING: the homicidal maniac has to be relevant somehow ... is he the Perfect Brother who somehow survived and is going to be revealed to be evil to clear Napier's character?
Meanwhile, the Loudest Ward's long-gone mother shows up with her traveling camp and some unfortunate 1960s racism around Romani people to drop the reveal that the father of her child was not Napier, as everyone believed, but his long-dead Perfect Brother! also, that the reason that Napier's mother killed himself was only HALF because she was grieving her dead Superior Son, and half because she was sad about her husband's affair that produced the Littlest Ward.
CAROLINE: Well, I guess Napier isn't a bad and neglectful dad, just a bad and neglectful uncle! also, only, like, 50% responsible for his mom's death which is way better than we thought yesterday!
CREEPY AUNT: Now, I hate Napier for murdering his Perfect Brother and always will, but honey, I have to tell you, I painted some portraits of your future, and Portrait A says that if you marry the new curate you will go on to be extremely boring, and Portrait B says that if you marry Napier and stay in this big ominous house, you will go on to be passionate and hot
CAROLINE: hmm
Also, Napier helps to weed an old man's garden, which proves that he's a softy deep down.
Now, Napier's character has been at least very mildly redeemed ... but what about disappeared Roma and Edith?
At this point, ten pages from the end, the Littlest Ward tugs charmingly on Caroline's hand and demands she come with her to see some cave paintings she found way down deep in the cliff ...
ME: oh no
LITTLEST WARD: no, deeper into the caves
ME: OH NO
LITTLEST WARD: HO HO, I HAVE LURED YOU INTO MY SLOW QUICKSAND! YOU SHALL DIE A DELICIOUSLY SLOW AND TORTUROUS DEATH!
CAROLINE, SLOWLY SINKING IN CAVE QUICKSANDS: but ... you saved my life before .....
LITTLEST WARD: the fire was my first murder attempt! I had to change course rapidly to avoid discovery!
CAROLINE, SLOWLY SINKING IN CAVE QUICKSANDS: but you're like twelve?
LITTLEST WARD: I AM AS A GODDESS WITH THE POWER OF LIFE AND DEATH!
CAROLINE, SLOWLY SINKING IN CAVE QUICKSANDS: but what about the mysterious ghost lights? you couldn't have set them, you were always in the house with me pointing them out!
LITTLEST WARD: HO HO! I organized all the wards in a ghost-light conspiracy to try to chase Napier away so I would inherit the house! When the Eldest Ward rebelled against me, she had to die!!!
CAROLINE, SLOWLY SINKING IN CAVE QUICKSANDS: okay, so that's the death of the Eldest Ward explained ... but why did you also murder my beloved archaeologist sister who was completely uninterested in ghosts and fancy house inheritances?
LITTLEST WARD: she was on the verge of discovering the cave paintings I had already discovered in this cave! it is MY cave and she had to DIE!
ME: holy shit, Roma was murdered by a jealous rival archaeologist!
Fortunately for Caroline, at this point both love interests turn up to save her from the Littlest Ward and haul her out of the quicksand, and all that's left is to break the sad news to the housekeeper.
HOUSEKEEPER: alas! this is my fault!
CAROLINE: I don't see how, you've really done your best --
HOUSEKEEPER: alas! I lied to everyone! the Littlest Ward's father isn't really the lord of the manor --
CAROLINE: what
HOUSEKEEPER: -- but that random homicidal maniac I accidentally dated for two weeks after the lord of the manor's wife committed suicide and we broke up! Determined to protect my daughter from the stigma of being a homicidal maniac's daughter, I lied and wrote to the lord of the manor and claimed she was his! alas that homicidal mania turns out to be genetic!!
CAROLINE AND ME ALSO: WHAT
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Date: 2021-08-10 04:57 am (UTC)ME THREE.
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Date: 2021-08-10 05:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-08-10 05:56 am (UTC)"Actually, I'm not sure," said Becca, and presented me with the last few pages of the book so I could see for myself. And I too am not sure! Our heroine definitely thinks they are at first, but that's before Littlest Ward's I AM AS A GODDESS OF LIFE AND DEATH, DEVOUR HER SLOWLY, MY SANDS!!!! revelation, and Caroline is somewhat distracted from the cave paintings after that (understandably, I admit). So we never find out! Who knows!
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Date: 2021-08-10 05:19 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2021-08-10 05:42 am (UTC)*falls over*
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Date: 2021-08-10 12:22 pm (UTC)So do we ever clear up the question of whether Napier murdered his oldest brother on purpose, or do we and the heroine just continue to assume it really was an accident despite the fact that he keeps insisting it was murder?
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Date: 2021-08-11 03:28 am (UTC)CAROLINE: It was an accident! It could have happened to anyone!
NAPIER: that's so sweet but do you literally know anybody else who accidentally shot their brother with a hunting rifle
CAROLINE: AND I THINK IT'S VERY UNFAIR TO YOU THAT EVERYONE KEEPS HARPING ON ABOUT IT
is ... extremely funny tbh!! One gets the sense that Napier is a little annoyed at Caroline for consistently downplaying the thing that makes him special and sexy ...
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Date: 2021-08-11 07:56 am (UTC)I mean, I'd blame the people who let their clumsy and apparently immature children go out with a gun and insufficient supervision.
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Date: 2021-08-10 05:36 pm (UTC)I feel vaguely proud of this young lady and her quicksand pool. Such expediency, such drive!
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Date: 2021-08-11 03:33 am (UTC)I, too, am honestly impressed with the evil scheming of the Littlest Ward. She also has a whole running schtick in which she is shyly like "oh I wrote a story about [x weird theory or mysterious clue related to the particular weird event of the day]," which generally leads Caroline to believe she witnessed something suspicious that triggered her Imagination and fully led me to believe she was the author stand-in for Creative Young Girl until the twist when it was revealed her shy little hints had been machinations to cast doubt on others all along!
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Date: 2021-08-11 02:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-08-11 03:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-08-11 05:34 am (UTC)I've gotten weirdly attached to the idea of this awkward murder family.
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Date: 2021-08-18 08:41 pm (UTC)