Reviews

Hatter's Castle by A.J. Cronin

marina_alkhovik's review against another edition

dark sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

burritapal_1's review

challenging dark informative reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

I read this book called Hatter's Castle by a.j. Cronin. That was really good; I gave it five stars. So sad, about a narcissistic power-tripping, control-freak father that has a hat business, lives in a town not that far from edinburgh. You had to get used to the way the author wrote the accent. I even start making comments on Reddit with that kind of language. Lol. But anyways the father had two daughters and one son. He gave everything of his encouragement and love to his son, and treated his daughters like they were servants under his feet, his wife too. His wife was sick with cancer of the uterus, but he begrudged her even any doctor visit or any medicine for it. Wouldn't let her have a day off to rest in bed. 

The daughter Mary was the star of the book, really, she met this boy from Ireland going out of the library in their little town and they liked each other. So one night, even though she's forbidden from going there, she goes to the fair in town. She's all scared, walking through the mob, is about to leave, when she meets up with him. Then they have a great time; he takes her to all the attractions. Then he walks with her down the street they go by the river and guess what? she doesn't even realize she's doing it, cuz she's so innocent and naive but she does the dirty business with him in among the reeds and plants and grasses waving around. From that one time she gets pregnant. So the time comes when she's about, I don't know, 7 months pregnant and her father has her locked in the house so she can't get out but she's in her room and she starts having labor pains. So she's bent down in pain on the floor her mother comes in and realizes what's happening, starts yelling at the top of the stairs "it's none of my fault!" well the father kicks her when she's down on the floor, probably broke a rib or two, then threw her out into a blowing, thrashing storm. In the book she doesn't even have any kind of a coat. She goes trying to find the path to Darrow, a little town 3 Mi away where her boyfriend's parents live. She gets lost in a wood that's off the path. She starts crawling through the trees and finally sees a light so she goes toward it but she can't make it all the way to the house. She goes into what's a little shelter for the cows. There she gives birth to the poor little premature baby. The farm wife comes out because she thought she heard a sound. She helps her and sends her son for the doctor. Dr renworth comes and carries her in the cart to the county hospital. Mary has pneumonia and the baby dies but Mary gets better. We know Dr renworth is in love with Mary. so her plans were to meet her boyfriend Denis, get on the train together, to go get married. Well in the meantime that this happened with Mary, Denis gets on the train and the train is going over this bridge of the river firth and the bridge breaks in the wild storm. The train goes down and goodbye denis. So meantime nessie, Mary's little sister, is the big brains in school. The father's been pushing her and pushing her and pushing her to take this exam at the college to get a scholarship of 100 sovereigns. He pushes her and pushes her to do her homework; she never gets a moment to play. So Nessie plays a trick on her father and Mary. by the way, this is a few years later that Mary comes back, because her mother has died, her father's mistress Nancy has come to be the housekeeper, but she finally leaves with Brody's son Matt to go to brazil. So nessie's at the point of Despair and writes to her sister telling her she can't hold up under the stress of trying to study all the time. So Brody gradually allows his daughter Mary to come back and be the housekeeper but he won't speak to her except to throw insults at her. So nessie's told them that the results of the exam come in 2 weeks in the mail. Well they actually come in one week and Nessie sends her sister out on a phony errand so she'll be out of the house and she opens the envelope and she sees that her rival has won the exam. So she puts some books on a chair and get some clothesline and jumps off the chair and hangs herself. When Mary comes back she's screaming, crying. At that moment doctor Rennick comes in and takes Mary away, telling her that everything will be all right now. The end. That was a good book five stars. 

So this morning I watched the movie; the movie is from 1942. It had a very young James Mason in it. It's quite different from the book though, because there was no nessie, and Matt the brother was the one who was the big brains in school and was going to win the scholarship. Except his name was Angus. And yeah, that's how it differed. It was quite different. It ended with Brodie setting his house on fire. he was a Madman at that point.

Here's an excerpt from the book towards the beginning that reminds me of my ex-husband:

"at length he bestirred himself. He knocked out the ashes of his pipe, replaced it in the rack and, with a last silent survey of his family, as though to say, 'I am going, but remember what I've said; I'll still have my eye on ye!' he went into the Hall, put on his Square felt hat with the smooth well-brushed nap, took up his heavy ash stick and was out of the house without a word. This was his usual method of departure. He never said goodbye. Let them guess where he was going in his spare time, - to a meeting, to the council or to the club; let them remain uncertain as to his return, as to its time and the nature of his mood; he liked to make them jump at his sudden step in the hall. That was the way to keep them in order and it would do them a deal of good to wonder where he went, he thought, as the front door closed behind him with a slam."

Poor little Mary; she's never been taught anything about her reproductive parts:

".. she could not tell whether she was different, whether her bosom was fuller, the shell pink of her nipples less delicate, the soft curve of her hips more profound. 

A fearful indecision took possession of her. 3 months ago, when she had Lain in Denis' arms in a state of unconscious surrender, her instincts had blindly guided her, and with closed eyes she had abandoned herself utterly to the powerful currents which permeated her being. Neither reason, had she wished it, nor knowledge, had she possessed it, intervened; an effect, while experiencing the rending emotions of a pain intolerably sweet, and a pleasure unbearably intoxicating, she had been so moved out of her own being that she had known nothing of what was actually taking place. Her feelings then had lifted her above consideration, but now she definitely wondered what mysterious chemistry had been inaugurated by the power of their embrace, if, perhaps, her lips against his, in some strange combination, had altered her irrevocably in some profound, and comprehensible manner."

Y así queda embarazada la pobrecita. 😔 

And now Mary goes into premature labor:

"then, suddenly, a second, loathsome suspicion came into his mind, a suspicion which gathered in aversion, becoming more certain the longer he contemplated it. He touched Mary with his huge heavy boot.

'Who was the man?' He hissed at her. 'was it Foyle?' He saw from her look that he was right. For the second time that hateful young upstart had dealt him a crushing blow, this time more deadly than before. He would rather it had been anyone, the basest and most beggarly scoundrel in the town, anyone but Foyle! But it was he, the smooth-faced, blarneying, young Corner boy who had possessed the body of Mary Brodie; and she, his child, had suffered him to do so. A lucid mental picture, revolting in its libidinous detail, rose up and tortured him. His face worked, the skin around his nostrils twitched, a thick, throbbing vessel corded itself up on his temple. His features, which had at first been suffused with a high angry flush, now became White and hard as chisselled granite. His jaw set ruthlessly like a trap, his narrow forehead Lowered with an inhuman barbarity. A cold ferocity, more terrifying than the loud-mouthed abuse which he usually displayed, tempered his rage like an ax blade. He kicked Mary viciously. The hard sole of his boot sank into her soft side. 

'get up you bitch!' He hissed, as he again spurned her brutally with his foot. 'do you hear me? Get up.'

From the staircase the Broken Voice of mamma senselessly repeated, 'I'm not to blame! I'm not to blame!' Over and over came the words, 'I'm not to blame. Don't blame me.' SHe stood there abjectly, cringingly, protesting ceaselessly in a muttering voice her inculpability whilst behind her the terrified figure of Nessie and the old woman were dimly outlined. Brodie gave no heed to the interruption. He had not heard it."

And he kicks her out of the house without a wrapping, without anything, out into a violent storm. The motherfucker.

The eldest child is Matt, for whom his father has secured a job working at the docks in India, in Calcutta. 3 months into his exile there, he comes back. Finally one day his mother gets him to tell her about why he left his job.

" 'Tell me, Matt, all about it.'

he regarded her from beneath his half-closed eyes, and replied abruptly, 'about what?'

'Oh! Just everything, son! YE can't deceive your mother's eyes. Somebody's been hard on you - unjust too. But I know so little. Tell me how you left India and what- what happened on the way back!' 

his eyes opened more fully and, waving his cigar, he immediately grew voluble.

'Oh! That!' He said. Well that's soon explained. There's nothing to tell there. I simply threw up my job because it got on my nerves! To be quite honest, mamma, I couldn't stand the Damned dock Wallah who ran the office. Everything was a fault with him. If a man were a bit late in the morning, after an evening at the club, or if there happened to be a day taken off work - just for a little social engagement you know - he was simply unbearable.' He contemplated her with an injured air as he drew in his cigar, and added indignantly, 'you know how I could never abide being put upon. I was never the one to endure being bossed about by anyone. It's not my nature. So I told him in plain language what I thought and walked out on him.'

'did you not speak to Mr Waldie about it, Matt?' she queried, sharing his resentment. 'he's a Levenford man and a good man. He has a great name for fairness.'

'it's him I mean, the soor!' retorted Matthew bitterly. 'he's the very one that tried to drive me like a coolie. Not a gentleman!' " 

this reminds me of my poor deceased brother danny. Danny, like with Matt, was spoiled rotten and protected by his mother. Danny, along with Matt, could never stand having a boss tell him what to do. I don't know about Matt; we don't really hear about him, but Danny ended up all alone in a nursing home in New Mexico, where he died from covid the day before Thanksgiving 2020. May his soul rest.

Here's a joke part of the book; not really. Mamma falls down on the job with her uterine cancer. Dr Renwick is called and when he comes down from seeing Matt's mother:

" 'is she going to be bad for long, then?' mumbled Matthew.

'For about 6 months at the outside.'

'what a long time!' said Matt slowly. 'she does all the work, how will we manage in the house without her?' 

'you will have to manage,' said the doctor severely, 'and high time it is that you started to learn.'

'What way?' Asked Matthew stupidly.

'Your mother is dying of an incurable, internal cancer. She will never get out of that bed again. In 6 months she will be in her grave.'

Matt collapsed as if the other had struck him; weakly he sat down upon the stairs. Mamma dying! Only 5 hours ago she had been running after him, had served him with a delicate meal cooked by her own hands, but now she lies stricken up on her bed from where she would never arise. With his head bowed upon his hands he did not see the doctor go out or hear the sound of the closing door. Prostrated by grief and remorse he looked, not forward, but backwards; his mind plagued by memory, roamed through the whole period of his life: all those vivid recollections straight through all the pathways of the past. He felt the tender petting of her hands, the caress of her cheek, the touch of her lips upon his brow. He saw her coming to his room as he laid petulantly on his bed, heard her say soothingly, 'here's something nice for you, son.' Her features appeared before him in every expression, coaxing, pleading, weedling, but all bearing the same indefinable stamp of love for him. Then he saw her face finally composed in the calm, complacent rigidity of death, and in its serenity, he still observed upon the pale lips The Smiling tenderness that she had always shown to him."

I don't really feel that sorry for Mamma after she was such a traitor to Mary. She fawns all over her son and then treats her daughter like shit. Fuck this character.

paul_gibson's review against another edition

5.0

Marvellous marvellous marvellous!!! Wonderful novel from a master storyteller. The gripping storyline dragged me on remorselessly, I could not put this book down. First published in 1931, this story has lost none of its impact or messaging. I’m now deciding on which Cronin book to read next.

fionab_16's review

dark emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

yavlkv's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

lunation's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

yanakarmen's review against another edition

dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.5

shafigullin's review against another edition

4.0

Когда человек человеку волк

Психологическая драма. Или семейная драма. В общем, тема психологического насилия и тирании в семье. Несмотря на, может быть, предвзятое к английской литературе отношение, этот роман мне понравился. Первая треть не так интересна, но дальше заинтересовывает и раскручивается. Есть о чём подумать, чем возмутиться.

В центре повествования семья Броуди, во главе с самодуром и деспотом Джеймсом. Забитая жена, запуганные дети (впрочем, уже подросшие) с комплексами прилагаются. Ну понятно, что из того тоталитарного режима, существующего внутри этой ячейки общества, дети свободными и успешными не выйдут. Любовь родителей, отсутствие эмоционального давления на психику важны для нормального развития детей, и это не пустые слова. Дальнейшее развитие сюжета только подтвердит эту истину.

Джеймс, я думаю, противен всем читателям. Вряд ли кто встанет на его сторону. Раздутое самомнение, презрение к окружающим, грубость, гордыня - нехороший человек, в общем. Редиска. Я всегда считал и продолжаю считать, что такие люди чувствуют себя королями только потому, что им просто некому дать хорошенько под зад в нужные моменты. Конечно, это персонаж где-то гиперболизированный, но на самом деле не так уж он и далёк от жизни, встречаются и хуже. У каждого из нас, я думаю, есть пример.

Мэтт по своей мерзотности перещеголял отца. То же тщеславие и другие недостатки, но добавляем сюда двуличие и склонность к воровству.

Мэри, старшая дочь, самый положительный персонаж. Хотя и миссис Броуди человек по сути безгрешный, но зашуганный мужем.

Что интересно, я только к половине книги узнал какой год на дворе. Сначала думал, что первая четверть 20-го века. Оказалось, 1880-ые.

По атмосфере этот роман мне снова напомнил Грозовой перевал и Тринадцатую сказку (которые похуже будут).

В общем, добротная книженция. Могу рекомендовать всем.

[Книгу прослушал в начитке Т. Лузковой - мне её исполнение нравится всё больше и больше]

penguinna's review against another edition

4.0

A very tough, hard, devastating story.

The central figure of the book is James Brodie, the father, the tyrant. It was probably the first time for me to hate a book character so desperately. This person destroys all the people around him and poisons their lives.
The whole family of Brodie was petrified by the father, they had no other emotions but a constant fear.

In some chapters, like the one, where James forces Mary to leave, I could not continue reading, it was too much for me. Extrem emotions and fear for a very few good people described in the story capture a reader completely.

When everything seems to be terrible, it only gets worse.

4 stars because during the whole book the character of James Brodie is described too many times in the very same way. It is clear from the beginning that he is a typical tyrant, and, like all tyrants, weak, vicious, stupid, ignorant and limited. Tyranny, as the only way to survive, is a kind of disease, slowly proceeding, incurable and inevitably ruining. That's it. I was rather annoyed to read about it in every chapter.

At least in the end James got what he deserved, however it breaks my heart that so many people had to sacrifice themselves for it.

A tragic, horrible, violent story that cannot leave anyone emotionless.
I would not recommend this book to very impressionable people.

mary_yankulova's review against another edition

5.0

Първата ми среща с Арчибалд Кронин е абсолютен фурор, фанфари и читателско гурме! Не мога да изразя и на половина въодушевлението си от факта, че се запознах с този уникален автор!. А това, че за пръв път го чета сега дори няма да го коментирам.

Майстор на думите и факир на описанията. Всяка дума е на мястото си, всеки ред, всяко изречение те пренася в Шотландия и мрачната, задушаваща атмосфера в дома на Джеймс Броуди. Злодеят, който намразих от първата секунда и до края на всичките 631 страници не съжалих нито веднъж.

Романът е една епична семейна сага за живота на семейство Броуди, изпълнена с безброй трагични събития. Героите са толкова добре изградени, че плаках с тях, ядосвах им се, идеше ми да се развикам на други - живи и истински ги почувствах, като реално съществуващи хора! Из страниците на книгата изживявах едно от най-травмиращите читателски преживявания покрай любимият ми персонаж - Мери.

Един цитат, който перфектно обрисува демоничната същност на Джеймс Броуди:

“Движещият принцип в живота му беше да насилва, да иска, да наказва, да бичува; той не можеше да съчувства.”

Ако все още не сте чели Арчибалд Кронин, горещо ви препоръчвам да поправите тази грешка!