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The House on the Strand
The classic time travel novel from the legendary writer behind Rebecca and "The Birds." "The House on the Strand is prime du Maurier." --New York Times Dick Young is lent a house in Cornwall by his friend Professor Magnus Lane. During his stay he agrees to serve as a guinea pig for a new drug that Magnus has discovered in his scientific research. When Dick samples Magnus's potion, he finds himself doing the traveling through time while staying in place, thrown all the way back into Medieval Cornwall. The concoction wear off after several hours, but its effects are intoxicating and Dick cannot resist his newfound powers. As his journeys increase, Dick begins to resent the days he must spend in the modern world, longing ever more fervently to get back into his world of centuries before, and the home of the beautiful Lady Isolda...
316 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1969
952 people are currently reading
20726 people want to read
About the author
Daphne du Maurier
472 books9,845 followersDaphne du Maurier was born on 13 May 1907 at 24 Cumberland Terrace, Regent's Park, London, the middle of three daughters of prominent actor-manager Sir Gerald du Maurier and actress Muriel, née Beaumont. In many ways her life resembles a fairy tale. Born into a family with a rich artistic and historical background, her paternal grandfather was author and Punch cartoonist George du Maurier, who created the character of Svengali in the 1894 novel Trilby, and her mother was a maternal niece of journalist, author, and lecturer Comyns Beaumont. She and her sisters were indulged as a children and grew up enjoying enormous freedom from financial and parental restraint. Her elder sister, Angela du Maurier, also became a writer, and her younger sister Jeanne was a painter.
She spent her youth sailing boats, travelling on the Continent with friends, and writing stories. Her family connections helped her establish her literary career, and she published some of her early work in Beaumont's Bystander magazine. A prestigious publishing house accepted her first novel when she was in her early twenties, and its publication brought her not only fame but the attentions of a handsome soldier, Major (later Lieutenant-General Sir) Frederick Browning, whom she married.
She continued writing under her maiden name, and her subsequent novels became bestsellers, earning her enormous wealth and fame. Many have been successfully adapted into films, including the novels Rebecca, Frenchman's Creek, My Cousin Rachel, and Jamaica Inn, and the short stories The Birds and Don't Look Now/Not After Midnight. While Alfred Hitchcock's films based upon her novels proceeded to make her one of the best-known authors in the world, she enjoyed the life of a fairy princess in a mansion in Cornwall called Menabilly, which served as the model for Manderley in Rebecca.
Daphne du Maurier was obsessed with the past. She intensively researched the lives of Francis and Anthony Bacon, the history of Cornwall, the Regency period, and nineteenth-century France and England. Above all, however, she was obsessed with her own family history, which she chronicled in Gerald: A Portrait, a biography of her father; The du Mauriers, a study of her family which focused on her grandfather, George du Maurier, the novelist and illustrator for Punch; The Glassblowers, a novel based upon the lives of her du Maurier ancestors; and Growing Pains, an autobiography that ignores nearly 50 years of her life in favour of the joyful and more romantic period of her youth. Daphne du Maurier can best be understood in terms of her remarkable and paradoxical family, the ghosts which haunted her life and fiction.
While contemporary writers were dealing critically with such subjects as the war, alienation, religion, poverty, Marxism, psychology and art, and experimenting with new techniques such as the stream of consciousness, du Maurier produced 'old-fashioned' novels with straightforward narratives that appealed to a popular audience's love of fantasy, adventure, sexuality and mystery. At an early age, she recognised that her readership was comprised principally of women, and she cultivated their loyal following through several decades by embodying their desires and dreams in her novels and short stories.
In some of her novels, however, she went beyond the technique of the formulaic romance to achieve a powerful psychological realism reflecting her intense feelings about her father, and to a lesser degree, her mother. This vision, which underlies Julius, Rebecca and The Parasites, is that of an author overwhelmed by the memory of her father's commanding presence. In Julius and The Parasites, for example, she introduces the image of a domineering but deadly father and the daring subject of incest.
In Rebecca, on the other hand, du Maurier fuses psychological realism with a sophisticated version of the Cinderella story.
She spent her youth sailing boats, travelling on the Continent with friends, and writing stories. Her family connections helped her establish her literary career, and she published some of her early work in Beaumont's Bystander magazine. A prestigious publishing house accepted her first novel when she was in her early twenties, and its publication brought her not only fame but the attentions of a handsome soldier, Major (later Lieutenant-General Sir) Frederick Browning, whom she married.
She continued writing under her maiden name, and her subsequent novels became bestsellers, earning her enormous wealth and fame. Many have been successfully adapted into films, including the novels Rebecca, Frenchman's Creek, My Cousin Rachel, and Jamaica Inn, and the short stories The Birds and Don't Look Now/Not After Midnight. While Alfred Hitchcock's films based upon her novels proceeded to make her one of the best-known authors in the world, she enjoyed the life of a fairy princess in a mansion in Cornwall called Menabilly, which served as the model for Manderley in Rebecca.
Daphne du Maurier was obsessed with the past. She intensively researched the lives of Francis and Anthony Bacon, the history of Cornwall, the Regency period, and nineteenth-century France and England. Above all, however, she was obsessed with her own family history, which she chronicled in Gerald: A Portrait, a biography of her father; The du Mauriers, a study of her family which focused on her grandfather, George du Maurier, the novelist and illustrator for Punch; The Glassblowers, a novel based upon the lives of her du Maurier ancestors; and Growing Pains, an autobiography that ignores nearly 50 years of her life in favour of the joyful and more romantic period of her youth. Daphne du Maurier can best be understood in terms of her remarkable and paradoxical family, the ghosts which haunted her life and fiction.
While contemporary writers were dealing critically with such subjects as the war, alienation, religion, poverty, Marxism, psychology and art, and experimenting with new techniques such as the stream of consciousness, du Maurier produced 'old-fashioned' novels with straightforward narratives that appealed to a popular audience's love of fantasy, adventure, sexuality and mystery. At an early age, she recognised that her readership was comprised principally of women, and she cultivated their loyal following through several decades by embodying their desires and dreams in her novels and short stories.
In some of her novels, however, she went beyond the technique of the formulaic romance to achieve a powerful psychological realism reflecting her intense feelings about her father, and to a lesser degree, her mother. This vision, which underlies Julius, Rebecca and The Parasites, is that of an author overwhelmed by the memory of her father's commanding presence. In Julius and The Parasites, for example, she introduces the image of a domineering but deadly father and the daring subject of incest.
In Rebecca, on the other hand, du Maurier fuses psychological realism with a sophisticated version of the Cinderella story.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,656 reviews
July 2, 2025
Quite a few of Daphne du Maurier's novels and short stories have been made into films, and this is how many people have come to discover her work. The House on the Strand is one of her lesser-known novels; the penultimate novel by Daphne du Maurier from 1969. It is an unusual work about time travel and mind-expanding drugs; themes which could be thought of as apposite for the time.
The author thrusts us straight into the action with a beautifully written and vividly descriptive episode. The viewpoint character, Dick, is in the middle of a "trip" (to use the popular vernacular of that period.) After a few pages it becomes evident that Dick has been transported back to 14th Century Cornwall, where the people and events are far more exciting than Dick's life in the present. The reader quickly perceives that this novel is going to alternate between these two contrasting scenarios.
A nice touch in this novel is that for most of the time it is not clear whether this is due to artificially heightened perception - mental time travel - or an actual dislocation in time. Neither Dick nor his friend Professor Magnus Lane, who has formulated the drug, are sure. And the reader has an extra level of doubt because Dick feels trapped in his life. He has recently resigned from a stressful job, he feels he is being pushed to accept another similar job, and his marriage is turning sour. Naturally this colourful fantasy life seems far more attractive than his real one, which is humdrum and stressful by turns. So which is more "real"?
It is typical of Daphne du Maurier to make the more sympathetic main character male. She famously claimed that she wished she were a man, and certainly her portrayals of male characters are almost always more fully rounded. His wife, Vita, comes across as a rather unpleasant and very brittle upper-class American; a shallow depiction of a shallow character. Her friends who visit are equally unlikeable through Dick's eyes, although they and the children are not nearly so well fleshed out.
By contrast we get a strong sense of the earlier historical characters, and du Mauriers's love of history, and of her beloved Cornwall, is given full rein here. We follow a swashbuckling tale of intrigues, feuds and dastardly deeds through Dick's eyes with his experimental drug-taking. The locations are unpredictable, as is the duration of each episode; there are jumps in time although they do occur chronologically. There is a family tree and a map, for readers who want to become equally involved. Each episode described is quite lengthy, so that these historical chronicles take up quite a large proportion of the novel.
As Dick becomes more enmeshed in the events of the 14th Century, and more fixated on knowing what will happen, he begins to
At this point, towards the end of the story, du Maurier brings forward a minor character whom we have already briefly met;
The stage is clearly set for three alternative endings.
Daphne du Maurier has always excelled at story-telling. One of her biographers has indicated that her early efforts were appallingly misspelt and amateurish, necessitating a lot of assistance by editors. Some of the descriptive passages in the early novels are certainly rather hackneyed, and the dialogue clunky. Nevertheless she was driven to write, and dedicated herself to writing page-turners, often with a great element of suspense. She incorporated some marvellously sinister characters and often included aspects of the paranormal. The author resented her rather unfair reputation as a "romantic novelist", a reputation which perhaps was due in part to Hollywood, considering herself to be far more than that.
In "The House on the Strand" the author has incorporated her deep love of Cornwall, of its history, of its sea-faring - even down to details such as making the children in the story enjoy the sailing pursuits she herself excelled at and loved so much. We feel involved with the characters and there is a great sense of place, an especial challenge since this has to define both of the worlds the main character inhabits. She is at the height of her game. It is a well-structured piece where the tension mounts nicely throughout in both aspects of the story. The mystery of what will happen next in the world of the past, where the facts learned from ancient records are invariably discovered after Dick's experience, is cleverly mirrored by the mystery of what the various forms of the drug will do next, and how much of Dick's experience is due to imagination, wish-fulfillment or some latent common memory in the human brain.
To have developed and honed her skills to this mastery from such a dubious start is indeed quite an achievement. It makes for a riveting read.
Addition 25/02/14:
The House on the Strand is called "Kilmarth", and this is heavily based on the house where Daphne du Maurier spent the final years of her life, after having been forced to leave her beloved "Menabilly" in 1967. She has even given it the same name. In her imagination she filled the old basement with embryos in jars and other strange objects, and made the house rise above the foundations of Roger Kylmerth's fourteenth century dwelling.
Here's an extract from an interview in 1977. She always maintained that for the period of the book she "got into" the viewpoint character. Many of her novels have finished with an unanswered question. Perhaps many of her ambiguities result from that. It is Daphne du Maurier's own view of the ending,
The author thrusts us straight into the action with a beautifully written and vividly descriptive episode. The viewpoint character, Dick, is in the middle of a "trip" (to use the popular vernacular of that period.) After a few pages it becomes evident that Dick has been transported back to 14th Century Cornwall, where the people and events are far more exciting than Dick's life in the present. The reader quickly perceives that this novel is going to alternate between these two contrasting scenarios.
A nice touch in this novel is that for most of the time it is not clear whether this is due to artificially heightened perception - mental time travel - or an actual dislocation in time. Neither Dick nor his friend Professor Magnus Lane, who has formulated the drug, are sure. And the reader has an extra level of doubt because Dick feels trapped in his life. He has recently resigned from a stressful job, he feels he is being pushed to accept another similar job, and his marriage is turning sour. Naturally this colourful fantasy life seems far more attractive than his real one, which is humdrum and stressful by turns. So which is more "real"?
It is typical of Daphne du Maurier to make the more sympathetic main character male. She famously claimed that she wished she were a man, and certainly her portrayals of male characters are almost always more fully rounded. His wife, Vita, comes across as a rather unpleasant and very brittle upper-class American; a shallow depiction of a shallow character. Her friends who visit are equally unlikeable through Dick's eyes, although they and the children are not nearly so well fleshed out.
By contrast we get a strong sense of the earlier historical characters, and du Mauriers's love of history, and of her beloved Cornwall, is given full rein here. We follow a swashbuckling tale of intrigues, feuds and dastardly deeds through Dick's eyes with his experimental drug-taking. The locations are unpredictable, as is the duration of each episode; there are jumps in time although they do occur chronologically. There is a family tree and a map, for readers who want to become equally involved. Each episode described is quite lengthy, so that these historical chronicles take up quite a large proportion of the novel.
As Dick becomes more enmeshed in the events of the 14th Century, and more fixated on knowing what will happen, he begins to
At this point, towards the end of the story, du Maurier brings forward a minor character whom we have already briefly met;
The stage is clearly set for three alternative endings.
Daphne du Maurier has always excelled at story-telling. One of her biographers has indicated that her early efforts were appallingly misspelt and amateurish, necessitating a lot of assistance by editors. Some of the descriptive passages in the early novels are certainly rather hackneyed, and the dialogue clunky. Nevertheless she was driven to write, and dedicated herself to writing page-turners, often with a great element of suspense. She incorporated some marvellously sinister characters and often included aspects of the paranormal. The author resented her rather unfair reputation as a "romantic novelist", a reputation which perhaps was due in part to Hollywood, considering herself to be far more than that.
In "The House on the Strand" the author has incorporated her deep love of Cornwall, of its history, of its sea-faring - even down to details such as making the children in the story enjoy the sailing pursuits she herself excelled at and loved so much. We feel involved with the characters and there is a great sense of place, an especial challenge since this has to define both of the worlds the main character inhabits. She is at the height of her game. It is a well-structured piece where the tension mounts nicely throughout in both aspects of the story. The mystery of what will happen next in the world of the past, where the facts learned from ancient records are invariably discovered after Dick's experience, is cleverly mirrored by the mystery of what the various forms of the drug will do next, and how much of Dick's experience is due to imagination, wish-fulfillment or some latent common memory in the human brain.
To have developed and honed her skills to this mastery from such a dubious start is indeed quite an achievement. It makes for a riveting read.
Addition 25/02/14:
The House on the Strand is called "Kilmarth", and this is heavily based on the house where Daphne du Maurier spent the final years of her life, after having been forced to leave her beloved "Menabilly" in 1967. She has even given it the same name. In her imagination she filled the old basement with embryos in jars and other strange objects, and made the house rise above the foundations of Roger Kylmerth's fourteenth century dwelling.
Here's an extract from an interview in 1977. She always maintained that for the period of the book she "got into" the viewpoint character. Many of her novels have finished with an unanswered question. Perhaps many of her ambiguities result from that. It is Daphne du Maurier's own view of the ending,
September 19, 2022
In 1960s Cornwall, Dick Young is only half heartedly engaging with his family and the world he lives in. Why? Because he is addicted to going back into the past, to the 14th century, where he is consumed with the lives and intrigues of he court there. He has been using a new discovery of a professor friend to time travel, but can't be seen or engage in anyway with the past. He becomes obsessed in trying to change the past, and there's no way that will end well?
This essentially a speculative/historic fiction horror read, but although fairly well written, especially the contemporary story, it just doesn't work, far too many plot holes, seriously du Maurier writing sci-fi! The idea was/is interesting though and the overall theme and message is pretty thought inducing. 6 out of 12.
2022 read
This essentially a speculative/historic fiction horror read, but although fairly well written, especially the contemporary story, it just doesn't work, far too many plot holes, seriously du Maurier writing sci-fi! The idea was/is interesting though and the overall theme and message is pretty thought inducing. 6 out of 12.
2022 read
February 18, 2020
Daphne du Maurier writes very deep books that masquerade as mystery/romances. No two are alike, and in this novel she steps into the world of time travel (or maybe she doesn’t). After all, have you ever read a du Maurier that didn’t pose more questions than it answered?
We are taken into the world of Richard Young, a man who has reached a crossroads in life and is contemplating what his next step is going to be. His best friend, Magnus, a bit of a mad scientist, has loaned Richard his home in Cornwall for vacation. Magnus is experimenting with a drug he has developed, and he is not above using Richard as his guinea pig to test its effects. Just as we have stepped into Richard’s world by opening this book, when Richard takes the drug he steps into another world as well, the world of 14th Century Cornwall and the previous owner of Magnus’ house, a squire named Roger.
To tell of Richard’s or Roger’s adventures would be to ruin the plot surprises, and this book if full of them. But some of the questions posed here are subtle but profound. Are we attached to the past through our genetic material? Do we have stored in our brains every memory of our ancestors, if we knew how to access them? What is the cost of addiction? Of escape into any reality that is not our own? What price does it cost us when we ignore our present lives to live in the past, the future, or just dreams? I find this quite relevant in view of how many people escape into virtual reality these days, but it could be as easy asked of those who bury themselves in books, I suppose.
I had read this book many years ago, but found it was mostly new to me after so many years. It was as good as I remembered and no doubt more meaningful to me this go around. Nice to end the year with an old friend.
We are taken into the world of Richard Young, a man who has reached a crossroads in life and is contemplating what his next step is going to be. His best friend, Magnus, a bit of a mad scientist, has loaned Richard his home in Cornwall for vacation. Magnus is experimenting with a drug he has developed, and he is not above using Richard as his guinea pig to test its effects. Just as we have stepped into Richard’s world by opening this book, when Richard takes the drug he steps into another world as well, the world of 14th Century Cornwall and the previous owner of Magnus’ house, a squire named Roger.
To tell of Richard’s or Roger’s adventures would be to ruin the plot surprises, and this book if full of them. But some of the questions posed here are subtle but profound. Are we attached to the past through our genetic material? Do we have stored in our brains every memory of our ancestors, if we knew how to access them? What is the cost of addiction? Of escape into any reality that is not our own? What price does it cost us when we ignore our present lives to live in the past, the future, or just dreams? I find this quite relevant in view of how many people escape into virtual reality these days, but it could be as easy asked of those who bury themselves in books, I suppose.
I had read this book many years ago, but found it was mostly new to me after so many years. It was as good as I remembered and no doubt more meaningful to me this go around. Nice to end the year with an old friend.
July 20, 2017
I read a CRAZY-GOOD-BOOK years ago called "Blinding Light", by Paul Theroux that "The House on the Strand", reminded me of at times. -CRAZY ....but addicting!!! I
In both books we get drawn into the main characters experience on a hallucinogenic drug. The tension-suspense- fantasy -is...... C R A Z Y!!! -- and GOOD!!!
I 'admit' ---I liked Paul Theroux's book better a little better than Ms. Maurier --- as this book was a sloggy-slow start ... and got confusing in parts -but then got WILD-FUN again-- to the ending!
"Blinding Light" grabbed ya by the balls immediately.....( but it 'did' get repetitive towards the end... so it had some flaws too)
""The House on the Strand" had some very unique time-travel twists - characters that come alive - and interesting medieval history - drug trips!
Richard - the drug user--haha -is no DICK... he just idolizes his scientist friend Magnus....[danger ahead]!!
Worth reading - but not my 1st choice du Maurier novel.
In both books we get drawn into the main characters experience on a hallucinogenic drug. The tension-suspense- fantasy -is...... C R A Z Y!!! -- and GOOD!!!
I 'admit' ---I liked Paul Theroux's book better a little better than Ms. Maurier --- as this book was a sloggy-slow start ... and got confusing in parts -but then got WILD-FUN again-- to the ending!
"Blinding Light" grabbed ya by the balls immediately.....( but it 'did' get repetitive towards the end... so it had some flaws too)
""The House on the Strand" had some very unique time-travel twists - characters that come alive - and interesting medieval history - drug trips!
Richard - the drug user--haha -is no DICK... he just idolizes his scientist friend Magnus....[danger ahead]!!
Worth reading - but not my 1st choice du Maurier novel.
October 24, 2017
Who would have thought that the words 'time travel' and 'Daphne du Maurier' would go together in one sentence? Nevertheless this is exactly what she has written in The House on the Strand and she does it very well indeed!
I loved the Cornish setting, all those places I have been and seen and which Du Maurier loved so much. The main character time travels (or does he?) back to the fourteenth century to a place where he can observe events but cannot participate in any way. His biggest problem is that while he is "away" mentally his body is still in the present time and this presents a whole heap of dangers.
I found the book slow going to start with and in fact the 14th century parts never really become gripping. However the current day story gets better and better and eventually ends in typical Du Maurier fashion.
I enjoyed it very much indeed
I loved the Cornish setting, all those places I have been and seen and which Du Maurier loved so much. The main character time travels (or does he?) back to the fourteenth century to a place where he can observe events but cannot participate in any way. His biggest problem is that while he is "away" mentally his body is still in the present time and this presents a whole heap of dangers.
I found the book slow going to start with and in fact the 14th century parts never really become gripping. However the current day story gets better and better and eventually ends in typical Du Maurier fashion.
I enjoyed it very much indeed
January 10, 2015
Daphne du Maurier and time travel? Sure, let's give it a shot.
That was my entire thought process when I decided to buy this from a secondhand bookstore last summer. Rebecca is terrifying and brilliant, and I figured that if du Maurier applied even a portion of her talent to this story, it wouldn't be half bad. And it wasn't. I still prefer Rebecca, but who doesn't.
Our protagonist is Dick Young, and he's agreed to be part of an experiment done by his college friend, Professor Magnus Lane. Dick will live in Magnus's house in Cornwall and take the prescribed doses of a substance the professor has created, which will enable him to time travel. What is this substance, and how precisely does it work? Shhhhhhh...
Not only does the substance transport Dick into the past, it transports him to a very specific past: when he takes the dose, he witnesses events that happened in the exact location he happens to be - except in the 14th century. We, and Dick, learn that the land around Magnus's house used to be owned by the Carminowe family, a group of nobles who, in addition to their own inter-family drama, were also involved in some skullduggery involving the throne of England. Dick's unknowing guide is Roger, a steward working for the family. For reasons that are, unfortunately, never explained, Dick always ends up near Roger when he travels back in time, and doesn't seem capable of wandering too far away from him when he's in the past. By following Roger, Dick meets the extended Carminowe clan, which includes a very bad man named Oilver Carminowe and his very pretty wife Isolda (the family is all siblings and in-laws and even with the family tree provided at the beginning of the book, I could never quite keep the characters straight in my head). You can probably guess where this is going - Dick becomes more interested in his trips to the past than his life in the present, and this has a disastrous effect on his own family.
The drug has its downsides, obviously - first, when Dick is in the 14th century, touching anyone or anything will instantly send him back to the present (which, at least, means that we don't have to worry about Dick accidentally going Terminator on his own future). Also the aftereffects of the drug include nausea, temporary paralysis, and severe disorientation. While under the influence of the drug, Dick continues to walk around in a kind of stupor, and wakes up having no idea where he is. And on top of all that, the drug is extremely addictive.
So it's a bad time all around. As you can see from my rating, overall I was "meh" on this one, but I'll admit that there were plenty of parts that had me engrossed. Like Dick, who gets only little bits of information at a time while he ping-pongs around in time, I was interested in learning just what Isolda's husband was up to, and what the consequences would be for her. Daphne du Maurier does dramatic tension and shady secrets like nobody's business, so Dick's obsession with the exploits of people who died centuries ago was understandable to me, because she made it fascinating.
But still - three stars only. First, Dick is (wait for it...) a dick (RIMSHOT). He's clearly supposed to be unlikeable - the way he treats his wife and stepsons with either indifference or contempt was particularly charming - but that didn't make it easy to root for him. The trips to the past, while fun and interesting, are serious info-dumps and require the historical characters to keep doing that thing where they'll be talking to someone and say, "Well, as you know..." and then proceed to explain in detail exactly what this other person supposedly knows already. Ugh. But altogether, this ended up being a lot more engrossing and creepy than I expected - the fact that Dick can't touch anything while watching the Carminowe's makes him begin to believe that he's becoming some kind of ghost, and that the people in the 14th century are the ones who are really alive, while Dick and his family are only a kind of memory. At its best, The House on the Strand is a dark, Gothic story of a man slowly losing his grip on reality.
That was my entire thought process when I decided to buy this from a secondhand bookstore last summer. Rebecca is terrifying and brilliant, and I figured that if du Maurier applied even a portion of her talent to this story, it wouldn't be half bad. And it wasn't. I still prefer Rebecca, but who doesn't.
Our protagonist is Dick Young, and he's agreed to be part of an experiment done by his college friend, Professor Magnus Lane. Dick will live in Magnus's house in Cornwall and take the prescribed doses of a substance the professor has created, which will enable him to time travel. What is this substance, and how precisely does it work? Shhhhhhh...
Not only does the substance transport Dick into the past, it transports him to a very specific past: when he takes the dose, he witnesses events that happened in the exact location he happens to be - except in the 14th century. We, and Dick, learn that the land around Magnus's house used to be owned by the Carminowe family, a group of nobles who, in addition to their own inter-family drama, were also involved in some skullduggery involving the throne of England. Dick's unknowing guide is Roger, a steward working for the family. For reasons that are, unfortunately, never explained, Dick always ends up near Roger when he travels back in time, and doesn't seem capable of wandering too far away from him when he's in the past. By following Roger, Dick meets the extended Carminowe clan, which includes a very bad man named Oilver Carminowe and his very pretty wife Isolda (the family is all siblings and in-laws and even with the family tree provided at the beginning of the book, I could never quite keep the characters straight in my head). You can probably guess where this is going - Dick becomes more interested in his trips to the past than his life in the present, and this has a disastrous effect on his own family.
The drug has its downsides, obviously - first, when Dick is in the 14th century, touching anyone or anything will instantly send him back to the present (which, at least, means that we don't have to worry about Dick accidentally going Terminator on his own future). Also the aftereffects of the drug include nausea, temporary paralysis, and severe disorientation. While under the influence of the drug, Dick continues to walk around in a kind of stupor, and wakes up having no idea where he is. And on top of all that, the drug is extremely addictive.
So it's a bad time all around. As you can see from my rating, overall I was "meh" on this one, but I'll admit that there were plenty of parts that had me engrossed. Like Dick, who gets only little bits of information at a time while he ping-pongs around in time, I was interested in learning just what Isolda's husband was up to, and what the consequences would be for her. Daphne du Maurier does dramatic tension and shady secrets like nobody's business, so Dick's obsession with the exploits of people who died centuries ago was understandable to me, because she made it fascinating.
But still - three stars only. First, Dick is (wait for it...) a dick (RIMSHOT). He's clearly supposed to be unlikeable - the way he treats his wife and stepsons with either indifference or contempt was particularly charming - but that didn't make it easy to root for him. The trips to the past, while fun and interesting, are serious info-dumps and require the historical characters to keep doing that thing where they'll be talking to someone and say, "Well, as you know..." and then proceed to explain in detail exactly what this other person supposedly knows already. Ugh. But altogether, this ended up being a lot more engrossing and creepy than I expected - the fact that Dick can't touch anything while watching the Carminowe's makes him begin to believe that he's becoming some kind of ghost, and that the people in the 14th century are the ones who are really alive, while Dick and his family are only a kind of memory. At its best, The House on the Strand is a dark, Gothic story of a man slowly losing his grip on reality.
July 20, 2025
Fill the Gaps
When it takes to time traveling stories I always prefer the ones that lead us into the past...
Why the past and not the future?
Well... the roots of present belong to the past and... sometimes... I just wish... I could go there to sort some things out!...
However, I’m allowing some intrusive wandering thoughts sneak into this text, cos apart from time traveling, this line of thinking has nothing to do with this plot!
So, what’s this book all about?
In vague and general terms, I shall say it’s a visit to a Medieval Cornwall — caused by an hallucinogenic drug — where you’ll be rewarded with Du Maurier’s Holly Trinity: Mystery, Dramatic Tension and an Ambiguous Ending 😉
Now that I gave you the headlines, it’s up to you to fill the gaps 😜
Happy Reading 😉😁👍
When it takes to time traveling stories I always prefer the ones that lead us into the past...
Why the past and not the future?
Well... the roots of present belong to the past and... sometimes... I just wish... I could go there to sort some things out!...
However, I’m allowing some intrusive wandering thoughts sneak into this text, cos apart from time traveling, this line of thinking has nothing to do with this plot!
So, what’s this book all about?
In vague and general terms, I shall say it’s a visit to a Medieval Cornwall — caused by an hallucinogenic drug — where you’ll be rewarded with Du Maurier’s Holly Trinity: Mystery, Dramatic Tension and an Ambiguous Ending 😉
Now that I gave you the headlines, it’s up to you to fill the gaps 😜
Happy Reading 😉😁👍
December 31, 2018
I was one of them, and they did not know it. I belonged amongst them, and they did not know it. This, I think, was the essence of what it meant to me. To be bound, yet free; to be alone, yet in their company; to be born in my own time yet living, unknown, in theirs.du Maurier's tale of morbid obsession is several things: a gloomy treatise on addiction and how it disintegrates the world of the addicted; a romantic paean to Tywardreath in Cornwall, close to where the author herself lived; a surreal story of time travel and remote viewing; and most surprisingly, a sharp smack in the face for any who prefer dreaming to actual life. The novel is both fascinating and off-putting. An experience rich and sour, similar to her collection of short stories, Don't Look Now.
Our protagonist Dick has gained a new love: the past. Or more precisely, he loves a narrative he has discovered in the past. He is fascinated by the players he watches in 14th century Cornwall. Watches. He cannot impact this story of love, murder, deception, and unraveling lives. He watches it as he would a film, views it as he would a book, identifying and not identifying with his audience stand-in, picking favorite characters and loathing the villains, falling in love with a beautiful woman. Sadly, his real-life love can only watch, confused and dismayed, as he descends into apathy, aggravation, and bizarre behavior in his deepening need to enjoy this play at the expense of the reality around him.
The novel plays an interesting trick on the reader: Dick is at first fairly sympathetic, and his wife Vita is portrayed as shallow and overbearing - especially when compared to his long-dead lady of the distant past. But slowly, as Dick's obsession takes over, the reader sees the reality of the situation: Vita's actions and responses are entirely "normal", rooted in her love of her husband and the life they are supposed to be building together, and it is that dick Dick who is unreasonable, unable to see that no real human can ever compare to a dream love.
du Maurier is a coldblooded author of great skill. I was unnerved by her hallucinatory transitions between present and past. I loved her descriptions of Cornwall. And I was impressed by how she did not let that story of archaic Cornwall overwhelm her plot, and the point of the whole book. It's clear that she loves the setting, and just as clear that much research went into making everything feel real. This is an impressive book of many layers. It gave me a lot to think about, and many of those thoughts were uncomfortable ones regarding my own love of books and films, my frequent disinterest and irritation in engaging with the real world for prolonged periods of time. I was reminded of different comments that friends, lovers, and family have made about this side of me. However I did not particularly enjoy the reminder. The novel scolds. du Maurier certainly gets me, but she doesn't appear to empathize. That's fine. I will just read another book!
The trouble was, some inner core within had been untouched, lain dormant, waiting to be stirred. I could not share with her or anyone the secrets of my dangerous new world.
November 27, 2014
The next stop in my time travel marathon (November being Science Fiction Month) was The House on the Strand, the 1969 novel by Daphne du Maurier. I was delighted to learn that the author of Rebecca and The Birds had attempted to fuse one of her Gothic romances with time travel adventure and I had high expectations for this book. If written by anyone but du Maurier, it's unlikely I would've finished it. The author's depiction of how time travel could become an addiction and dissolve a modern marriage is compelling, but the most incredible thing about the novel is how the scenes set in the distant past are nothing but one big information dump that made the novel a chore to read.
The story takes place along the coastline of Cornwall, where farmhouses and vacation homes stand atop the ruins of manors and churches dating back 600 years. Richard Young, mulling the directorship of a New York publishing house that his American wife Vida has urged him to accept, is spending a week in the second home of his good friend Dr. Magnus Lane, a chemist at the University of London. Richard and Magnus met at Cambridge and in many ways, are closer than Richard is to Vida. While his wife and two stepsons spend the week in New York, Richard has been asked to test a drug Magnus has developed and imbibed, with peculiar results the chemist is desperate to verify with someone he trusts.
Magnus' unnamed hallucinogenic apparently has the ability to send the consciousness of the user through time, where the traveler can observe, but not participate in or alter, the past of wherever their trip is taking place. For reasons the author never sufficiently explains, Richard and Magnus are sent back to Cornwall of the 14th century, where they become attached to a certain Sir Roger Carminowe, a scheming nobleman whose second wife Isolda Ferrers makes a striking impression on Richard. Du Maurier's time travelers retain all of their senses except for one, touch, and touching a living person will immediately eject them from their experience.
One danger of the drug is that while the traveler is galavanting through the past, their body enters a drunken stupor of sorts in the present, making them vulnerable to things like roadways or bodies of water as they stumble about in a sleepwalk. An even more pressing danger are the addictive qualities of the drug, which Richard soon begins to experience. This creates problems when Vida and the boys return from New York and arrive in the village of Kilmarth, where Richard has secluded himself and become obsessed with the soap opera unfolding in the past. The marriage between Richard & Vida quickly hits the rocks as she detects something about her husband seems different.
The House on the Strand isn't a bad novel. Du Maurier's writing is as sharp as a tack. Of her three considerable strengths -- character, dialogue and atmosphere -- two are well represented here. I liked how she contrasted the sort of stoicism between English men and the aggressiveness of American women without making Richard, Magnus or Vida into stock characters. With du Maurier, I'm always rooting for her women to work out their communication problems and expose the dark secrets of their men. The domestic suspense had me flipping pages to reach the end. As for the dialogue, the scenes set in the present all flowed very well.
My problem with the novel is how poorly du Maurier integrated her love for Cornwall of the distant past with a compelling story. The scenes set in the bygone are an information dump, nothing more. The names and intrigue of the 14th century that du Maurier relates are simply a soap opera that her time travelers watch. They do no not participate in, alter the course of or encounter any risks in the 14th century. A time travel novel that ceases to be compelling once its characters travel through time would be considered a failure on any scale. The question is whether The House on the Strand should really be considered a "time travel novel" or not.
The reason to read The House on the Strand are the present day scenes dealing with Richard's drug induced, loosening grip on reality and his slowly dissolving marriage. The material works far better as a "substance abuse" novel than a "time travel" novel. The escalating domestic tension and web of lies recalls Rebecca, where a wife suspects something from the past has taken hold over her husband. But the possibilities of time travel are never touched on at all and the scenes set in the past were ones I had to skim in order to finish the book. Without the vivid atmosphere du Maurier's more successful novels, I have trouble recommending this, but can.
The story takes place along the coastline of Cornwall, where farmhouses and vacation homes stand atop the ruins of manors and churches dating back 600 years. Richard Young, mulling the directorship of a New York publishing house that his American wife Vida has urged him to accept, is spending a week in the second home of his good friend Dr. Magnus Lane, a chemist at the University of London. Richard and Magnus met at Cambridge and in many ways, are closer than Richard is to Vida. While his wife and two stepsons spend the week in New York, Richard has been asked to test a drug Magnus has developed and imbibed, with peculiar results the chemist is desperate to verify with someone he trusts.
Magnus' unnamed hallucinogenic apparently has the ability to send the consciousness of the user through time, where the traveler can observe, but not participate in or alter, the past of wherever their trip is taking place. For reasons the author never sufficiently explains, Richard and Magnus are sent back to Cornwall of the 14th century, where they become attached to a certain Sir Roger Carminowe, a scheming nobleman whose second wife Isolda Ferrers makes a striking impression on Richard. Du Maurier's time travelers retain all of their senses except for one, touch, and touching a living person will immediately eject them from their experience.
One danger of the drug is that while the traveler is galavanting through the past, their body enters a drunken stupor of sorts in the present, making them vulnerable to things like roadways or bodies of water as they stumble about in a sleepwalk. An even more pressing danger are the addictive qualities of the drug, which Richard soon begins to experience. This creates problems when Vida and the boys return from New York and arrive in the village of Kilmarth, where Richard has secluded himself and become obsessed with the soap opera unfolding in the past. The marriage between Richard & Vida quickly hits the rocks as she detects something about her husband seems different.
The House on the Strand isn't a bad novel. Du Maurier's writing is as sharp as a tack. Of her three considerable strengths -- character, dialogue and atmosphere -- two are well represented here. I liked how she contrasted the sort of stoicism between English men and the aggressiveness of American women without making Richard, Magnus or Vida into stock characters. With du Maurier, I'm always rooting for her women to work out their communication problems and expose the dark secrets of their men. The domestic suspense had me flipping pages to reach the end. As for the dialogue, the scenes set in the present all flowed very well.
My problem with the novel is how poorly du Maurier integrated her love for Cornwall of the distant past with a compelling story. The scenes set in the bygone are an information dump, nothing more. The names and intrigue of the 14th century that du Maurier relates are simply a soap opera that her time travelers watch. They do no not participate in, alter the course of or encounter any risks in the 14th century. A time travel novel that ceases to be compelling once its characters travel through time would be considered a failure on any scale. The question is whether The House on the Strand should really be considered a "time travel novel" or not.
The reason to read The House on the Strand are the present day scenes dealing with Richard's drug induced, loosening grip on reality and his slowly dissolving marriage. The material works far better as a "substance abuse" novel than a "time travel" novel. The escalating domestic tension and web of lies recalls Rebecca, where a wife suspects something from the past has taken hold over her husband. But the possibilities of time travel are never touched on at all and the scenes set in the past were ones I had to skim in order to finish the book. Without the vivid atmosphere du Maurier's more successful novels, I have trouble recommending this, but can.
March 14, 2025
3.5 stars rounded up to 4. I didn't expect a storyline that involved the use of an unknown hallucinogenic drug in a du Maurier novel; but that is what we get. Richard is staying at a long-time friend's (Magnus) home in the Cornwall area of England after recently leaving his job in London. He has agreed to participate in an experiment with an unknown drug that Magnus has been testing. After taking the drug, he finds himself in the 14th C & seems to be attached to a steward (Roger) who becomes an unwitting guide. Although Richard can see the people and activity going on, he cannot be seen. He gets invested in lives of these medieval gentry and finds himself compelled to return again and again even after his wife and stepsons arrive for a holiday. As he continues to travel back in time, he begins to understand some of the risks to himself and others in the present that are occurring. Can he stop? There are a couple of twists.
On the back flyleaf, the author says that her home, Kilmarth a house with a 600 year-old past in Cornwall was the inspiration for the novel.
On the back flyleaf, the author says that her home, Kilmarth a house with a 600 year-old past in Cornwall was the inspiration for the novel.
November 11, 2019
Mistério, Tensão e Ambiguidade
No que toca a viagens no tempo, a minha predileção encaminha-se invariavelmente para aquelas que nos levam ao passado. Não que eu cultive qualquer espécie de racismo em relação ao futuro, mas apenas porque as raízes do presente se encontram algures lá para trás, e... confesso que múltiplas vezes sonhei recuar no tempo, só para redirecionar aqueles momentos menos bons😉...
Mas enfim... estou simplesmente a permitir que pensamentos invasores se intrometam neste texto, pois exceptuando a viagem ao passado, nada do que até agora referi, tem a ver com este livro!
“De que trata este livro, afinal?” é, obviamente, a pergunta que legitimamente se segue, e que me proponho aqui responder:
Em termos vagos e genéricos, trata-se duma visita à Cornualha medieval — despoletada por um alucinógeno com perniciosos efeitos secundários — onde seremos presenteados com a já famosa Santíssima Trindade de Daphne du Maurier: Mistério, Tensão Dramática e um Final Ambíguo!... 😉👍
No que toca a viagens no tempo, a minha predileção encaminha-se invariavelmente para aquelas que nos levam ao passado. Não que eu cultive qualquer espécie de racismo em relação ao futuro, mas apenas porque as raízes do presente se encontram algures lá para trás, e... confesso que múltiplas vezes sonhei recuar no tempo, só para redirecionar aqueles momentos menos bons😉...
Mas enfim... estou simplesmente a permitir que pensamentos invasores se intrometam neste texto, pois exceptuando a viagem ao passado, nada do que até agora referi, tem a ver com este livro!
“De que trata este livro, afinal?” é, obviamente, a pergunta que legitimamente se segue, e que me proponho aqui responder:
Em termos vagos e genéricos, trata-se duma visita à Cornualha medieval — despoletada por um alucinógeno com perniciosos efeitos secundários — onde seremos presenteados com a já famosa Santíssima Trindade de Daphne du Maurier: Mistério, Tensão Dramática e um Final Ambíguo!... 😉👍
August 6, 2017
" Nu m-a surprins convingerea lui Magnus că voi continua să-i fiu cobai. Acest lucru caracterizase prietenia noastră de-a lungul anilor, atât la Cambridge cât și mai apoi. Jucasem cum îmi cânta el, nu numai în escapadele compromițătoare din timpul anilor de studenție, ci și mai târziu, când drumurile noastre s-au despărțit, el urmându-și cariera, de biofizician și apoi de profesor la Universitatea din Londra, iar eu intrând în rutina searbădă a vieții de editură."
" Stăteam treaz și mă gândeam ce scandal o să-i fac lui Magnus când o să vină. Grețuri, amețeli, confuzie, un ochi injectat, și acum sudoarea acră, și toate astea pentru ce? Pentru o clipă din trecutul îndepărtat care nu avea nicio legătură cu prezentul, nu ajuta cu nimic vieții lui sau vieții mele și era tot atât de folositoare pentru lumea în care trăiam ca un album cu tăieturi din ziare, aruncat în vreun sertar prăfuit."
" Stăteam treaz și mă gândeam ce scandal o să-i fac lui Magnus când o să vină. Grețuri, amețeli, confuzie, un ochi injectat, și acum sudoarea acră, și toate astea pentru ce? Pentru o clipă din trecutul îndepărtat care nu avea nicio legătură cu prezentul, nu ajuta cu nimic vieții lui sau vieții mele și era tot atât de folositoare pentru lumea în care trăiam ca un album cu tăieturi din ziare, aruncat în vreun sertar prăfuit."
April 29, 2024
Daphne du Maurier's The House on the Strand has become a permanent resident on my shelf of all-time favourites. This complex novel is an exploration of perception, memory, and the very nature of reality.
We follow Dick Young, a man yearning for escape from his mundane existence. Enter Magnus, a friend with a curious proposition: a drug that unlocks the past. Dick's world shatters as he finds himself not just reliving, but inhabiting 14th-century Cornwall through the visions of a steward, Roger. The historical details are vivid, the characters pulse with life, and the intrigue of this bygone era is undeniable.
But is it real? Du Maurier's brilliance lies in the ambiguity. She masterfully crafts a world where reality shimmers and bends, leaving the reader to grapple with the very nature of perception. Is Dick truly experiencing the past, or is it a fantastical escape orchestrated by his own mind? Throughout the book I kept leaning from one side to the other. The book lingers in your mind.
As eavesdropper in time my role was passive, without commitment or responsibility. I could move about in their world unwatched, knowing that whatever happened I could do nothing to prevent it - comedy, tragedy, or farce - whereas in my twentieth-century existence I must take my share in shaping my own future and that of my family.
I seized the telephone once more and dialled Magnus. No answer. No answer, either, to my self-imposed question. That doctor with his intelligent eyes might have given me one. What would he have told me? That a hallucinatory drug could play curious tricks with the unconscious, bringing the suppressions of a lifetime to the surface, so let it alone? A practical answer, but it did not suffice. I had not been moving amongst childhood ghosts. The people I had seen were not shadows from my own past. Roger the steward was not my alter-ego, nor Isolda a dream-fantasy, a might-have-been. Or were they?
This ambiguity extends beyond the time travel itself. The novel deep dives into escapism. Dick's yearning for a life less ordinary is palpable. Du Maurier forces us to confront the attraction and dangers of abandoning reality, however bleak it may seem.
Dick dives headfirst into a vibrant past, a stark contrast to his present. But is it truly escape, or is he merely replacing one set of constraints with another? The vibrancy and danger of medieval Cornwall stand in stark contrast to the sterility of his modern life. But is this escape truly fulfilling, or is it a descent into delusion?
Du Maurier taps into a universal human desire – the yearning to break free from the confines of reality and forge a new identity. However, the allure of escape comes at a cost. Dick's increasing immersion in the past raises questions about his commitment to the present. Du Maurier prompts us to contemplate the delicate balance between chasing dreams and confronting reality.
Nausea, vertigo, confusion, a bloodshot eye, and now acid sweat, and all for what? A moment in time, long past, that had no bearing on the present, that served no purpose in his life or mine, and could as little benefit the world in which we lived as a scrapbook of forgotten memories lying idle in a dusty drawer. So I argued, up to midnight and beyond, but common sense has a habit of vanishing when the demon of insomnia rides us in the small hours, and as I lay there, counting first two, and then three, on the illuminated face of the travelling clock beside the bed, I remembered how I had walked about that other world with a dreamer's freedom but with a waking man's perception. Roger had been no faded snapshot in time's album; and even now, in this fourth dimension into which I had stumbled inadvertently but Magnus with intent, he lived and moved, ate and slept, beneath me in his house Kylmerth, enacting his living Now which ran side by side with my immediate Present, and so the two merged.
While comparisons to Rebecca are inevitable, for me The House on the Strand takes the crown. It's a more complex, philosophically rich story that lingers long after the last page. It feels more personal, more introspective. It delves into the human psyche, the yearning for connection, and the terrifying possibility that our grasp on reality might be flimsier than we think.
The House on the Strand is a haunting and unforgettable literary experience, a masterpiece not to be missed. It's unsettling yet utterly captivating. It's a book that challenges, enthrals, and leaves you yearning, like Dick Young, for a world just out of reach.
We follow Dick Young, a man yearning for escape from his mundane existence. Enter Magnus, a friend with a curious proposition: a drug that unlocks the past. Dick's world shatters as he finds himself not just reliving, but inhabiting 14th-century Cornwall through the visions of a steward, Roger. The historical details are vivid, the characters pulse with life, and the intrigue of this bygone era is undeniable.
But is it real? Du Maurier's brilliance lies in the ambiguity. She masterfully crafts a world where reality shimmers and bends, leaving the reader to grapple with the very nature of perception. Is Dick truly experiencing the past, or is it a fantastical escape orchestrated by his own mind? Throughout the book I kept leaning from one side to the other. The book lingers in your mind.
As eavesdropper in time my role was passive, without commitment or responsibility. I could move about in their world unwatched, knowing that whatever happened I could do nothing to prevent it - comedy, tragedy, or farce - whereas in my twentieth-century existence I must take my share in shaping my own future and that of my family.
I seized the telephone once more and dialled Magnus. No answer. No answer, either, to my self-imposed question. That doctor with his intelligent eyes might have given me one. What would he have told me? That a hallucinatory drug could play curious tricks with the unconscious, bringing the suppressions of a lifetime to the surface, so let it alone? A practical answer, but it did not suffice. I had not been moving amongst childhood ghosts. The people I had seen were not shadows from my own past. Roger the steward was not my alter-ego, nor Isolda a dream-fantasy, a might-have-been. Or were they?
This ambiguity extends beyond the time travel itself. The novel deep dives into escapism. Dick's yearning for a life less ordinary is palpable. Du Maurier forces us to confront the attraction and dangers of abandoning reality, however bleak it may seem.
Dick dives headfirst into a vibrant past, a stark contrast to his present. But is it truly escape, or is he merely replacing one set of constraints with another? The vibrancy and danger of medieval Cornwall stand in stark contrast to the sterility of his modern life. But is this escape truly fulfilling, or is it a descent into delusion?
Du Maurier taps into a universal human desire – the yearning to break free from the confines of reality and forge a new identity. However, the allure of escape comes at a cost. Dick's increasing immersion in the past raises questions about his commitment to the present. Du Maurier prompts us to contemplate the delicate balance between chasing dreams and confronting reality.
Nausea, vertigo, confusion, a bloodshot eye, and now acid sweat, and all for what? A moment in time, long past, that had no bearing on the present, that served no purpose in his life or mine, and could as little benefit the world in which we lived as a scrapbook of forgotten memories lying idle in a dusty drawer. So I argued, up to midnight and beyond, but common sense has a habit of vanishing when the demon of insomnia rides us in the small hours, and as I lay there, counting first two, and then three, on the illuminated face of the travelling clock beside the bed, I remembered how I had walked about that other world with a dreamer's freedom but with a waking man's perception. Roger had been no faded snapshot in time's album; and even now, in this fourth dimension into which I had stumbled inadvertently but Magnus with intent, he lived and moved, ate and slept, beneath me in his house Kylmerth, enacting his living Now which ran side by side with my immediate Present, and so the two merged.
While comparisons to Rebecca are inevitable, for me The House on the Strand takes the crown. It's a more complex, philosophically rich story that lingers long after the last page. It feels more personal, more introspective. It delves into the human psyche, the yearning for connection, and the terrifying possibility that our grasp on reality might be flimsier than we think.
The House on the Strand is a haunting and unforgettable literary experience, a masterpiece not to be missed. It's unsettling yet utterly captivating. It's a book that challenges, enthrals, and leaves you yearning, like Dick Young, for a world just out of reach.
April 12, 2009
"We are all bound, one to the other, through time and eternity"
While vacationing at the Cornwall home of old chum Magnus, Richard Young is convinced to act as guinea pig for his friend's latest experiment - a drug that enables the mind to travel into the past - although the body stays in the present. Richard's "trips" take him to the 14C where he is soon so wrapped up in the past that it becomes as addictive to him as a drug - or is it the drug itself that is addictive? Are the lives of those in the past so much more important that his wife and step-sons become a hindrance to his journeys? Did these people really exist or do they only exist in Richard’s mind? Although Richard's mind is in the 14C while on the drug, his body is not and as he walks in the footsteps of those in the past it leads him into some very close calls when his mind returns to the present. He could be standing anywhere - the middle of a road, on private property or in the path of an oncoming.......
Nope, I'm not telling and to say much more gives the whole thing away - half the fun is the guessing and unexpected twists in the story. Although the segments in the 14C were well written they were a bit confusing to me at times, but don't spend too much time trying to sort those relationships out. IMO they were mostly background and the main focus were the parts in the present day. Du Maurier is superb and understated as always, and this one will definitely leave you guessing all the way to the very last page and beyond. 5/5 stars and highly recommended.
While vacationing at the Cornwall home of old chum Magnus, Richard Young is convinced to act as guinea pig for his friend's latest experiment - a drug that enables the mind to travel into the past - although the body stays in the present. Richard's "trips" take him to the 14C where he is soon so wrapped up in the past that it becomes as addictive to him as a drug - or is it the drug itself that is addictive? Are the lives of those in the past so much more important that his wife and step-sons become a hindrance to his journeys? Did these people really exist or do they only exist in Richard’s mind? Although Richard's mind is in the 14C while on the drug, his body is not and as he walks in the footsteps of those in the past it leads him into some very close calls when his mind returns to the present. He could be standing anywhere - the middle of a road, on private property or in the path of an oncoming.......
Nope, I'm not telling and to say much more gives the whole thing away - half the fun is the guessing and unexpected twists in the story. Although the segments in the 14C were well written they were a bit confusing to me at times, but don't spend too much time trying to sort those relationships out. IMO they were mostly background and the main focus were the parts in the present day. Du Maurier is superb and understated as always, and this one will definitely leave you guessing all the way to the very last page and beyond. 5/5 stars and highly recommended.
August 9, 2021
I heartily disliked this novel. I think I read where this was du Maurier’s penultimate novel. I wonder what reception it got. I wonder if I am the only one in the whole wide world who could not stand this novel. 😟 😕 🙁 ☹️
It was long.
It was boring.
It was overly descriptive regarding topography of the Cornwall landscape to the point where when she started to describe the landscape for the umpteenth time I just started skimming…I couldn’t take it anymore. Was she being paid by the word to publish this novel? Fer chrissake! 😐
Du Maurier must have had a bug up her butt about scientists. A professor of bio-physics concocts a hallucinogenic drug in which a person can go back in time. The drug was first given to a monkey and the scientist who concocted it at some point chopped off the monkey’s head and put it in a glass jar for preservation because that is what scientists do you know. So, then he takes the drug a couple of times, and then he convinces a former college schoolmate of his to take the drug.
I could not stand the former college schoolmate who is the central character of the novel, Richard (Dick) Young. Dick Young was apparently recently married and why he got married I have no idea because he was either annoyed or angry at his wife the majority of the time. So why marry her? He apparently was in his late 30s… He seemed like a totally self-centered bastard. He didn’t have a job (I think his job had been eliminated and his wife found him another job but he didn’t want it), doesn’t want a job, doesn’t want his wife…doesn’t like her around or her sons (his step-sons)…he just wants to go back to the 13th century to come into contact with a whole slew of characters (a literal family tree of them…the family tree is in the back of the book). Du Maurier does a terrible, terrible, terrible set-up job of making me understand who those characters were and how they were related to each other. I think that is one of my major complaints.
I don’t want to be griping and complaining. After all, I like several of her books. Who can’t like ‘Rebecca’? But this was just so fricking boring…she spends long chapters on what Dick is doing in the present and almost all of that is boring, and then interspersed are long and equally boring chapters on him going back to the 13th century where I can read about a bunch of characters who I don’t understand and don’t care about machinate against each other mostly….Ugh ugh ugh! 349 pages of tedium. ☹
Reviews
• This reviewer agrees with a lot of what I said but he gave it 3.2 stars out of 5…go figure!: https://efsunland.com/2020/09/15/revi...
• https://medium.com/the-riveting-revie...
• https://changing-pages.com/2017/03/01...
• This reviewer would have done without the verbose description of landscape too! https://shereadsnovels.com/2011/01/09...
• https://www.literaryladiesguide.com/b...
It was long.
It was boring.
It was overly descriptive regarding topography of the Cornwall landscape to the point where when she started to describe the landscape for the umpteenth time I just started skimming…I couldn’t take it anymore. Was she being paid by the word to publish this novel? Fer chrissake! 😐
Du Maurier must have had a bug up her butt about scientists. A professor of bio-physics concocts a hallucinogenic drug in which a person can go back in time. The drug was first given to a monkey and the scientist who concocted it at some point chopped off the monkey’s head and put it in a glass jar for preservation because that is what scientists do you know. So, then he takes the drug a couple of times, and then he convinces a former college schoolmate of his to take the drug.
I could not stand the former college schoolmate who is the central character of the novel, Richard (Dick) Young. Dick Young was apparently recently married and why he got married I have no idea because he was either annoyed or angry at his wife the majority of the time. So why marry her? He apparently was in his late 30s… He seemed like a totally self-centered bastard. He didn’t have a job (I think his job had been eliminated and his wife found him another job but he didn’t want it), doesn’t want a job, doesn’t want his wife…doesn’t like her around or her sons (his step-sons)…he just wants to go back to the 13th century to come into contact with a whole slew of characters (a literal family tree of them…the family tree is in the back of the book). Du Maurier does a terrible, terrible, terrible set-up job of making me understand who those characters were and how they were related to each other. I think that is one of my major complaints.
I don’t want to be griping and complaining. After all, I like several of her books. Who can’t like ‘Rebecca’? But this was just so fricking boring…she spends long chapters on what Dick is doing in the present and almost all of that is boring, and then interspersed are long and equally boring chapters on him going back to the 13th century where I can read about a bunch of characters who I don’t understand and don’t care about machinate against each other mostly….Ugh ugh ugh! 349 pages of tedium. ☹
Reviews
• This reviewer agrees with a lot of what I said but he gave it 3.2 stars out of 5…go figure!: https://efsunland.com/2020/09/15/revi...
• https://medium.com/the-riveting-revie...
• https://changing-pages.com/2017/03/01...
• This reviewer would have done without the verbose description of landscape too! https://shereadsnovels.com/2011/01/09...
• https://www.literaryladiesguide.com/b...
November 8, 2024
I had this three-in-one Three Famous Du Maurier Novels: The King's General / The Flight of the Falcon / The House on the Strand from my library system to read the slightly disappointing The Flight of the Falcon. I thought I would also read this book before returning & I'm very glad I did, as this was a far superior book.
The beginning of this one was a bit turgid though. I didn't like the protagonist Dick very much & I liked his wife Vita even less. A big fault this novel had was that Vita's character appeared to change to fit the storyline, rather than develop as a real person. There is one particular event that shows DDM's discomfort in the sixties. (I've often mentioned that Agatha Christie is the same. It is notable that DDM feels more comfortable in the past!)
But the more Dick travels to the more engrossing the story became & it ends on a somewhat enigmatic note. I really like this & I know I have a slightly different interpretation than other readers.
Not an essential du Maurier, but one worth reading all the same.
The beginning of this one was a bit turgid though. I didn't like the protagonist Dick very much & I liked his wife Vita even less. A big fault this novel had was that Vita's character appeared to change to fit the storyline, rather than develop as a real person. There is one particular event that shows DDM's discomfort in the sixties. (I've often mentioned that Agatha Christie is the same. It is notable that DDM feels more comfortable in the past!)
But the more Dick travels to the more engrossing the story became & it ends on a somewhat enigmatic note. I really like this & I know I have a slightly different interpretation than other readers.
Not an essential du Maurier, but one worth reading all the same.
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April 17, 2018
I am really enjoying reading her books. This mixture of time travel through drugs back to 14th century is memorizing. Dick his torn between his mundane present life and the excitement of medieval Cornwall. Vita his American wife is unlikeable in comparison to Isolde and also boring. Dissatisfaction with his life leads Dick to taking the drug more and more with an ambiguous ending.
March 30, 2022
An interesting novel by Daphne Du Maurier, The House on the Strand was published in 1969. Typically, set in an English manor where Dick Young in somewhat of a funk, he decides to take up his friend’s offer of a stay in Cornwell. Professor Magnus Lane convinces Dick to try his time travel drug, which transports him back to the fourteenth Century. More enamoured with each visit, Dick has numerous adventures but at what cost, given the ambiguity of self is brought into question. So, classic literature at its best with a four-star read rating. A thought-provoking idea may be to see the time travel element as an allegory to our own escape into virtual reality?
March 11, 2019
Another outstanding book by du Maurier. A very engaging story involving dual stories and time travel! Hugely enjoyed :-)
September 21, 2017
I began this on an out of town trip. I have been totally smitten with Daphne lately. Saw this on audible. I had a credit. I figured it would be good listening driving down the road. I wish I had gotten Frenchman's Creek instead. I hate to take anything away from those who love all things Daphne. I myself was thinking to set out and read all of her writings. I did like the initial descriptions of the setting, the Cornish Coast, the time travel. I just could not handle all the experimentation and animal slaughter references. It turned my stomach. So, not a good listen for being on the road heading out of town for funeral.
Will I pick it up again? Maybe. If I come across a print edition...I'd like to know how it ends. But for now I just wanna put this one behind me and pick up something lite and funny.
Marking as a DNF. I am so disappointed.
Update: Sept. 21, 2017
I came across a BBC radio theatre adaptaion of this on you tube today. I began listening. It was quite good and I really wanted to know how this book ended. I listened to the whole thing...unable to let it go until another time. I highly recommend it! This is quite a story of time travel and tripping. Goodreads friend, Jean Naylor, has the most incredible review and filled in any gaps I think might have missed skimming the book bc there were parts that I just didn't feel comfortable reading. It's quite an addictive listen. But so is the "drug" than enables the character, Dick, to move back and forth from the past (1400's Cornwall) to the present. Once I finished the you tube listen...I was a bit puzzled by the ending. I went to my phone and still had the audio there and decided to listen to the last chapter on my commute. So glad I did! Just proves to me that sometimes a book is not right for you; but, later.....well, it very well might be.
I imagine this was quite something when it came out originally. I am a very big fan of Daphne du Maurier. I'm so glad to have this resolution. I don't like leaving something unfinished. I sit with a smile on my face because I now know what happened.
Will I pick it up again? Maybe. If I come across a print edition...I'd like to know how it ends. But for now I just wanna put this one behind me and pick up something lite and funny.
Marking as a DNF. I am so disappointed.
Update: Sept. 21, 2017
I came across a BBC radio theatre adaptaion of this on you tube today. I began listening. It was quite good and I really wanted to know how this book ended. I listened to the whole thing...unable to let it go until another time. I highly recommend it! This is quite a story of time travel and tripping. Goodreads friend, Jean Naylor, has the most incredible review and filled in any gaps I think might have missed skimming the book bc there were parts that I just didn't feel comfortable reading. It's quite an addictive listen. But so is the "drug" than enables the character, Dick, to move back and forth from the past (1400's Cornwall) to the present. Once I finished the you tube listen...I was a bit puzzled by the ending. I went to my phone and still had the audio there and decided to listen to the last chapter on my commute. So glad I did! Just proves to me that sometimes a book is not right for you; but, later.....well, it very well might be.
I imagine this was quite something when it came out originally. I am a very big fan of Daphne du Maurier. I'm so glad to have this resolution. I don't like leaving something unfinished. I sit with a smile on my face because I now know what happened.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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May 18, 2008An unusual DuMaurier in that it's a time-travel novel. I found it quite readable, but I could not make myself pay any attention to the complex relationships, housing arrangements and hierarchies of the 13th century characters--very odd, because I got the impression they were supposed to be so much more vivid and intense than the modern day characters. I had not before encountered the idea of time travel as an effect of inherited memory combined with hallucinogenic drugs... I liked the idea, it was believable, and yet something wasn't wholly satisfactory about the book--almost as though she didn't take the premise far enough. and also, perhaps, there were too many loose threads that didn't quite get tied up at the end.
February 5, 2009
Really quite a dreadful novel, though a page turner as Daphne du Maurier books tend to be. Guy called Richard takes a vacation at his friend Magnus's house in Cornwall. Magnus is a biochemist who has created a new drug and convinces Richard to try it: the drug transports Richard back in time 600 years to be an unseen witness of events among the minor nobility in 14th century England.
Two stories unwind side by side, Richard in the present, and Cornwall in the 1300s. Both are a let-down. Richard has a perfectly nice wife, Vita, and stepsons about whom he appears to have no interest or affection whatsoever. Why does Vita put up with this guy? Most interesting part of the present-day story is thinking of its backdrop: The House on the Strand was published in the late 1960s, when people were experimenting with LSD and acid. Vita finds herself with a suddenly unknowable husband, distracted and distrait, who gets self-righteous when accused of drinking too much (he isn't, he's taking drugs, but because he never has before, Vita doesn't think to ask him about this). There have been other women in her same situation, before and since.
Then there is old Cornwall, where we are introduced to a large cast of characters, all of whom are either siblings of, married to or sleeping with each other. They are all very hard to keep track of and trying to do so is like one of those LSAT puzzles: if Otto's sister's husband's cousin is married to Oliver's wife's brother, then who is Joanna? Some of the characters are portrayed as good guys and others as bad guys, but they seemed much of a muchness to me. And the resolution of the Cornwall story is astonishingly anticlimactic.
Wish we could have had more Magnus, the genius inventor who originally discovered this second world. I'll read about a brilliant madman any day.
Two stories unwind side by side, Richard in the present, and Cornwall in the 1300s. Both are a let-down. Richard has a perfectly nice wife, Vita, and stepsons about whom he appears to have no interest or affection whatsoever. Why does Vita put up with this guy? Most interesting part of the present-day story is thinking of its backdrop: The House on the Strand was published in the late 1960s, when people were experimenting with LSD and acid. Vita finds herself with a suddenly unknowable husband, distracted and distrait, who gets self-righteous when accused of drinking too much (he isn't, he's taking drugs, but because he never has before, Vita doesn't think to ask him about this). There have been other women in her same situation, before and since.
Then there is old Cornwall, where we are introduced to a large cast of characters, all of whom are either siblings of, married to or sleeping with each other. They are all very hard to keep track of and trying to do so is like one of those LSAT puzzles: if Otto's sister's husband's cousin is married to Oliver's wife's brother, then who is Joanna? Some of the characters are portrayed as good guys and others as bad guys, but they seemed much of a muchness to me. And the resolution of the Cornwall story is astonishingly anticlimactic.
Wish we could have had more Magnus, the genius inventor who originally discovered this second world. I'll read about a brilliant madman any day.
May 25, 2021
3.5 stars
When you’ve read all the big Du Mauriers – Rebecca, Frenchman’s Creek, My Cousin Rachel, Jamaica Inn, The King’s General, plus “The Birds” and “Don’t Look Know” – it can be hard to know whether to continue or call it a day. With another author I’d probably just leave it. But Du Maurier is interesting. She has her recurring elements – grand houses, history, landscape – but she’s always coming at them from different directions. She’s done pirates, smugglers, mysteries, romances, speculative future, inexplicable natural phenomena. Here she does time travel and hallucinatory drugs. Filtered through grand houses, history and landscape, naturally.
Dick Young is brewing up for a midlife crisis. He seems not to like his American wife Vita much, and has a possibly-unconsummated-homoerotic-friendship (or maybe just one of those British public school things) with Magnus, who has lent him a house in Cornwall for the summer in exchange for using him as a guinea pig for an experimental drug that causes Dick to flash back and observe – without participating in – the 14th century.
Du Maurier’s skill manages to make both these timelines fairly gripping, even though, objectively, neither of them is up to much. The author has done her research, and the historical bits are a bit like seeing a picture of your street 100 years ago, and trying to make it match up with your street now, and getting confused, except with an added meta level of knowing that there must also be inaccuracies in the “accurate” depiction of the past. It was fun though. The modern-day bits fall into two camps: the increasingly dire after-effects of the drugs and Dick’s relationship with Magnus (interesting) and Dick’s interactions with his wife (boring; their relationship is set up as bad from the beginning, so who cares what happens to them).
Meanwhile, Dick proves to be a narrator who, while not totally unreliable, becomes less trustworthy as we go along.
This isn’t peak Du Maurier. She gives into her propensity to romanticism a bit too much in the historical sections, along with a tendency to make easy heroes and villains, and the book is a bit too long. But it does go somewhere different (a bit dated, but thoughtful and unexpected) at the end, and for not being her best, it's still pretty damn readable throughout.
When you’ve read all the big Du Mauriers – Rebecca, Frenchman’s Creek, My Cousin Rachel, Jamaica Inn, The King’s General, plus “The Birds” and “Don’t Look Know” – it can be hard to know whether to continue or call it a day. With another author I’d probably just leave it. But Du Maurier is interesting. She has her recurring elements – grand houses, history, landscape – but she’s always coming at them from different directions. She’s done pirates, smugglers, mysteries, romances, speculative future, inexplicable natural phenomena. Here she does time travel and hallucinatory drugs. Filtered through grand houses, history and landscape, naturally.
Dick Young is brewing up for a midlife crisis. He seems not to like his American wife Vita much, and has a possibly-unconsummated-homoerotic-friendship (or maybe just one of those British public school things) with Magnus, who has lent him a house in Cornwall for the summer in exchange for using him as a guinea pig for an experimental drug that causes Dick to flash back and observe – without participating in – the 14th century.
Du Maurier’s skill manages to make both these timelines fairly gripping, even though, objectively, neither of them is up to much. The author has done her research, and the historical bits are a bit like seeing a picture of your street 100 years ago, and trying to make it match up with your street now, and getting confused, except with an added meta level of knowing that there must also be inaccuracies in the “accurate” depiction of the past. It was fun though. The modern-day bits fall into two camps: the increasingly dire after-effects of the drugs and Dick’s relationship with Magnus (interesting) and Dick’s interactions with his wife (boring; their relationship is set up as bad from the beginning, so who cares what happens to them).
Meanwhile, Dick proves to be a narrator who, while not totally unreliable, becomes less trustworthy as we go along.
This isn’t peak Du Maurier. She gives into her propensity to romanticism a bit too much in the historical sections, along with a tendency to make easy heroes and villains, and the book is a bit too long. But it does go somewhere different (a bit dated, but thoughtful and unexpected) at the end, and for not being her best, it's still pretty damn readable throughout.
April 22, 2018
Another winner by Daphne du Maurier. I must admit that I love reading stories with a gothic tone, romance & of days long ago. Daphne writes this story after having to move to Kilmarth. This book has a historical bend that has fact & fiction to this story. This story has the main character Dick who time travels to the past post Crusades in the year 1335. Daphne having had many members of her family deal with the addictive personalities dealing with alcohol & in 1967 while writing this book the drug culture. The three main characters are Dick an ex London publisher that seems less than stellar; Magnus Dick's college friend & genius professor; & Dick's wife Vita who was a widow with 2 boys. The relationship of the trio is a tense one due to the dislike of Vita & Magnus with Dick in the middle. Magnus invites Dick & family to stay at his house at Kilmarth. Magnus is the superior of mind & ability to persuade Dick to his likings. He entices Dick to take a drug that has one travel in the past. Once Dick gets a taste of Kilmarth & surrounding area he has come attached to the people & especially beautiful Isolda. He quickly becomes addicted to traveling to their time & witnessing all without being seen. His past life interferes with the present & vice versa. I am drawn like Dick into the storyline of the past & become quite curious of inhabitants of the past. He is so enthralled that even the ill side effects won't deter his need to visit the past. He becomes so involved that he losses his lust for life in present day & see the past as the grass is greener scenario, a means to escape his humdrum life.
September 8, 2020
"- Os maridos odeiam as esposas que os compreendem. Só gera a monotonia."
"É destino de cada homem, ao que suponho, ver numa altura ou noutra de relance um rosto na multidão e não o esquecer ou talvez, por sorte, vir a encontrá-lo mais tarde num restaurante, numa festa. Tais reencontros quebram muitas vezes o feitiço e levam ao desencanto."
"Reflecti sobre os tempos em que estivera em Kilmarth, quando estudante. A atmosfera era informal, género não-te-rales. Recordava-me de ter perguntado uma vez a Mrs.Lane se a casa não era assombrada. A minha pergunta era estranha, porque na verdade não existia nenhum ar de assombração por ali; fi-la apenas por a casa ser antiga.
- Deus do céu, não! - exclamou ela. - Nós estamos demasiado metidos connosco mesmos para encorajar fantasmas. Pobres deles, seriam capazes de mirrar de tédio por não conseguirem atrair as atenções."
"É destino de cada homem, ao que suponho, ver numa altura ou noutra de relance um rosto na multidão e não o esquecer ou talvez, por sorte, vir a encontrá-lo mais tarde num restaurante, numa festa. Tais reencontros quebram muitas vezes o feitiço e levam ao desencanto."
"Reflecti sobre os tempos em que estivera em Kilmarth, quando estudante. A atmosfera era informal, género não-te-rales. Recordava-me de ter perguntado uma vez a Mrs.Lane se a casa não era assombrada. A minha pergunta era estranha, porque na verdade não existia nenhum ar de assombração por ali; fi-la apenas por a casa ser antiga.
- Deus do céu, não! - exclamou ela. - Nós estamos demasiado metidos connosco mesmos para encorajar fantasmas. Pobres deles, seriam capazes de mirrar de tédio por não conseguirem atrair as atenções."
February 24, 2010
This book is a wonderful time travel story.
When Daphne DuMaurier had to leave her home of 25 years, Menabilly close to Gribbin Head (the model for Manderley in "Rebecca") outside of Fowey, her husband signed a lease for another house close-by owned by the same Rashleigh family who owns Menabilly. So she moved to Kilmerth/Kilmarth shortly after her husband died (BTW her husband was Major Browning whose WW II quote "This was a Bridge too far" became famous and later even a book title).
In the basement of Kilmarth DuMaurier found mysterious glass tubes from a scientist who used to live in Kilmarth before DuMaurier moved there. Legend has it that this is how she got inspired to write "The House on the Strand".
Tywardreath, the small town mentioned in the book "The House on the Strand", does exist in real life...it is not far away from Fowey...and there is a plate inside the church refering to the main character in another great historical novel that DuMaurier wrote, "The King's General".
When Daphne DuMaurier had to leave her home of 25 years, Menabilly close to Gribbin Head (the model for Manderley in "Rebecca") outside of Fowey, her husband signed a lease for another house close-by owned by the same Rashleigh family who owns Menabilly. So she moved to Kilmerth/Kilmarth shortly after her husband died (BTW her husband was Major Browning whose WW II quote "This was a Bridge too far" became famous and later even a book title).
In the basement of Kilmarth DuMaurier found mysterious glass tubes from a scientist who used to live in Kilmarth before DuMaurier moved there. Legend has it that this is how she got inspired to write "The House on the Strand".
Tywardreath, the small town mentioned in the book "The House on the Strand", does exist in real life...it is not far away from Fowey...and there is a plate inside the church refering to the main character in another great historical novel that DuMaurier wrote, "The King's General".
May 24, 2017
Professor Magnus Lane wants his friend, Dick Young, to try a time-travel drug while he spends his summer at Lane's historic Cornwall home. The hallucinogenic drug takes Dick on a "trip" to 14th Century Cornwall where he observes the upper class feuding, committing crimes, brewing sinister potions, and indulging in clandestine romances. Dick finds the drug very addictive, partly because 14th Century life is so much more exciting than his real life. Dick's marriage is rocky, he has recently resigned from his London job, and feels pressured by his wife to take a job in her brother's American company.
Dick has no control over his location when he returns from his "trips" back into the 20th Century. The Cornwall landscape includes roads, railroads, cliffs, and the sea so each "trip" is very dangerous. Dick experiences increasing confusion, exhaustion, numbness, and nausea with each "trip". The professor doesn't know what effect the drug has on the brain. Dick is acting so strange that his wife wonders if he is seeing another woman.
After the initial introduction to a large group of 14th Century characters that drags a bit, the book builds in suspense especially in the 20th Century story. There is a good sense of place, and the author has added some Gothic touches to the atmosphere. While this is not my favorite Daphne du Maurier tale, it's still very imaginative and well worth reading.
Dick has no control over his location when he returns from his "trips" back into the 20th Century. The Cornwall landscape includes roads, railroads, cliffs, and the sea so each "trip" is very dangerous. Dick experiences increasing confusion, exhaustion, numbness, and nausea with each "trip". The professor doesn't know what effect the drug has on the brain. Dick is acting so strange that his wife wonders if he is seeing another woman.
After the initial introduction to a large group of 14th Century characters that drags a bit, the book builds in suspense especially in the 20th Century story. There is a good sense of place, and the author has added some Gothic touches to the atmosphere. While this is not my favorite Daphne du Maurier tale, it's still very imaginative and well worth reading.
December 10, 2007
Wonderfully eerie and entertaining book. I listened to an audio version that was really well produced. The musical interludes between each chapter actually heightened the spookiness.
This is DuMaurier at her best. Set in Cornwall (which, haven't been there, is a really good setting for spooky stories. Lots of craggy coasts, dense fog and and end-of-the-earth feeling) in the early 1960's (maybe the late 50's but I can't look at the title page for a date because this is an audio book), the story is about two old friends experimenting with a psychotropic drug that allows timetravel "trips." The main characters make a clear connection to LSD and the medical, academic and recreational experiments with that drug. The drug in the book is an untested concoction made by one of the characters who is a scientist. Very fun to read about two rather stodgy middle-aged British men experimenting with drugs.
The drug has some side effects that only become clear later in the book and make for a chilling but interesting story. The drug enables users to travel back in time but they always travel back the same place and are always following one particular person. The users are spectators only and cannot be seen or heard. I don't want to give anything away except to say that, of course, all does not end well. Like a lot of drug stories (and time-travel stories) the action seems to straddle the border madness and real life.
A really interesting take on the idea of time travel and not too tech-ey -- I definitely wouldn't call this sci-fi.
This is DuMaurier at her best. Set in Cornwall (which, haven't been there, is a really good setting for spooky stories. Lots of craggy coasts, dense fog and and end-of-the-earth feeling) in the early 1960's (maybe the late 50's but I can't look at the title page for a date because this is an audio book), the story is about two old friends experimenting with a psychotropic drug that allows timetravel "trips." The main characters make a clear connection to LSD and the medical, academic and recreational experiments with that drug. The drug in the book is an untested concoction made by one of the characters who is a scientist. Very fun to read about two rather stodgy middle-aged British men experimenting with drugs.
The drug has some side effects that only become clear later in the book and make for a chilling but interesting story. The drug enables users to travel back in time but they always travel back the same place and are always following one particular person. The users are spectators only and cannot be seen or heard. I don't want to give anything away except to say that, of course, all does not end well. Like a lot of drug stories (and time-travel stories) the action seems to straddle the border madness and real life.
A really interesting take on the idea of time travel and not too tech-ey -- I definitely wouldn't call this sci-fi.
August 20, 2020
Nunca lera Daphne du Maurier e há algum tempo que tenho o "Rebecca". Sugeria-me uma escrita rebuscada, elaborada, repleta de descrições. Maçadora. Com "A Casa na Praia" fui surpreendida com uma escrita clara, objetiva, com descrições vivas que enquadram a ação no tempo e no espaço com facilidade e sem tédio, através de uma narrativa envolvente, intrigante, que apetece desvendar. Os nomes dos lugares/ quintas a começar por Tre é que me confundiu um pouco, mas adorei a recriação de uma época dura, com casamentos marcados entre primos, em que os donos das terras agraciados pelo rei detinham o poder.
Os saltos temporais são espantosamente bem conseguidos e a ligação entre passado e presente é antecipada com expectativa. O retrato da familia de Dick prendeu-me a atenção, mais do que o amigo Marcus.
Cornualha é um destino de encanto, depois de seguir Dick nesta alucinante viagem. O final foi outra surpresa, apesar da suspeição com aquela personagem. Em breve, vou ler os outros romances desta talentosa escritora, agora que sei o que perco. Muito bom!
Os saltos temporais são espantosamente bem conseguidos e a ligação entre passado e presente é antecipada com expectativa. O retrato da familia de Dick prendeu-me a atenção, mais do que o amigo Marcus.
Cornualha é um destino de encanto, depois de seguir Dick nesta alucinante viagem. O final foi outra surpresa, apesar da suspeição com aquela personagem. Em breve, vou ler os outros romances desta talentosa escritora, agora que sei o que perco. Muito bom!
June 16, 2016
Un roman très étrange, angoissant et mystérieux. Je ne l'ai pas vraiment aimé comme je peux aimer d'autres romans, avec mon coeur, puisque je ne me suis pas spécialement attachée aux personnages (la faiblesse du protagoniste m'a beaucoup agacée). Je crois en revanche que je me souviendrai très longtemps de son ambiance étouffante, dans laquelle le lecteur se sent perdu. Une expérience de lecture intéressante et pénétrante !
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