"There is a house ... in New Orleans..."
It is an ancient mansion, completely covered by overgrown trees and garden that now hide what used to be a brilliant palace full of spark, elegance and style. Everything is in ruins, neglected, dark and foreboding, people passing by can only glimpse figure of old woman sitting in front porch, wearing enormous Emerald necklace. The whole town knows Mayfair family, their generations of strong-willed women and only one in each generation inherits this necklace, only one being the chosen one. There is a secret society of psychics, called Talamasca and their members have for centuries quietly and silently, from a careful distance following Mayfair women, from medieval times when they used to get burned as witches, to a present century when they amassed huge wealth and influence. Servants and informers talk about ghost in the house, a ghost that constantly follows, protects and assist Mayfair women trough the centuries. The youngest Mayfair was given to adoption on the day she was born - decision was made that the child must somehow get away from this house and family - but now young doctor Rowan Mayfair finds out that her biological mother has died and since her adoptive parents also passed away, there is nobody to stop her from going back to New Orleans for the funeral and to face the family she never knew, the huge house she inherited. Aware of her own special powers, Rowan knows nothing about the family - its up to the man she had saved from drowning (Michael Curry) to get in touch with Talamasca and finds out who Mayfairs actually are and what dangers might wait for Rowan once she arrives back to the place she was sent away from as a baby.
Along with Stephen King, Anne Rice is the only author that I had ever encountered who have a skill and power to keep me glued to the book from the very first page. With everybody else, I have to work my way trough to get in the mood but these two have special talent to grab my attention immediately. While King constantly keeps me on the age with his horror and general creepiness, Rice is seductive enchantress weaving her web of atmospheric, gothic web and honestly I almost forgot how good she was. Years ago I remember loving her vampire novels but after a while she got caught up in similar style & stories, at least that was my impression - it happens to many successful authors (including Dan Brown) that both audience and publishers expect them to continue in a particular style and inevitably they start to repeat themselves. That is why you can clearly feel the excitement and freshness Anne Rice had when she changed the gears and left vampires behind to start something at least slightly different - its like she took a breath of fresh air and discovered the beauty of writing again.
I had actually read "The Witching hour" long time ago and promptly forgot the details - like with so many other books, I remember only the impression (which was very good and exciting) and that it has two sequels, but somehow I never got around to finish the trilogy so now, after reading three non-fiction history books in a row, I decided it is time for a break and let's enjoy some good fiction. It didn't bother me that I actually read this before - it felt like a completely new book anyway and I was thrilled with it so much for the sheer pleasure of changing the subjects. As much as I loved my history books, now it was time to look the other way and Rice occupied me so much that I found myself reading it long into the night and than again first thing in the morning, even before the work. One thing that I noticed now - the story is exciting and powerful as long as we are in present time, following Rowan, Michael and Talamasca but at certain point Rice makes a mistake: she slips back to the very first Mayfair/Talamasca connection which was centuries ago and somehow gets caught up in description of every and single generation up to now. Perhaps it wasn't her intention but the story suffers because we loose excitement and concentration for the main characters, as she goes on and on about various Mayfair women and at certain point you actually start to fidget and wonder will we ever go back to the main story or is this it, the saga about Mayfar family trough detailed description of each generation? It reminds me on those old relatives who would strangle you with stories about long gone family members and you just feel exhausted afterwards. So right now I am on the second part of the book but I quietly lost the initial enthusiasm because story went completely off the track and in fact I am still in 1920s (long way to go to the present times), probably this is why I never continued with sequels because I was afraid it would be more of the same. Pity, because it starts wonderfully and it might be one of my favourite Anne Rice novels if not for this strange change of focus. I really wish that at certain point the story returns to main characters again because so far I am deep into testimonies from servants, spies, nurses and nuns trough each century and it gets a bit tedious.
---------------------------------
The story finally reaches present time around the page 600.
It considerably slows down, testing reader's patience - at this point, after you have read chapter after chapter about every single generation of Mayfair women, now we are treated with extremely detailed (and quite unnecessary) description of every step Rowan and her lover made once they returned to New Orleans. Rowan and Michael eating. Rowan and Michael re-decorating the old house. Rowan and Michael driving the car. Rowan and Michael opening the window.Rowan and Michael preparing the wedding. And though its nice to see these two so much in love and enjoying each other's company, it does make you question whatever happened to this book? It started exciting, it started dark and dangerous and threatening and full of dark corners, where now we are reading about quite mundane, ordinary daily routine of two people who talk to each other chapter in and chapter out. "Don't worry, everything is going to be OK" "Oh but I feel something bad is going to happen" - this is my description of several chapters full of dialogues exactly like that. At the end, when the novel finishes as it does somewhere in limbo, I was honestly relieved and now I know exactly why I didn't bother with sequels. I really have to be in the mood to continue with other two books.
No comments:
Post a Comment