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A review by ananya_b
The House on the Strand by Daphne du Maurier
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
I've read a few of her other books before, and I really love the way she writes. As far as this book goes, I wanted to be impressed and I was. That's about it.
It seems to me to be a commentary on drug culture, with elements of sci-fi that I haven't noticed in any of her other works yet. It's a fresh, original premise - exploring the past that Dick travels into with enough depth that we get attached to characters we know are already dead, while also staying in the present enough to let us see how using the drug is affecting his health and his relationship with his family. And du Maurier has certainly executed it brilliantly. I wasn't able to put it down until I'd finished, although there weren't that many developments going on plot-wise.
The writing is beautiful, as in her other works, although this book appears to use slightly more informal and modern language. There's quite a lot more cussing than I've encountered in her other books. I wasn't really expecting to read the line, "Prudence my arse", here, for instance.
There are a couple of questions that seem to go unanswered, though, and I'm not sure if that was intentional. For instance, Dick finds the empty bottle marked 'B' in the pocket of Magnus' s dressing gown. But the effects of B, and its relation to time travel, were never addressed in the novel. So what was the significance of bottle B?
Then again, it was stated that only a person with superhuman strength would've been able to drag themselves to a shelter after such an accident. And yet it was assumed till the very end that Magnus had managed to do it.
Finally, one of the main questions that Dick raised in the beginning was why the drug was taking him back to Roger's time. Why not some later time period? What was the link between Roger and whoever was using the drug? This wasn't really addressed later in the book, like I expected it would be.
The ending is ambiguous, and somehow unexpected, although perfectly natural when you think about it. It raises more questions than answers; for instance, does Dick get paralysed? Or will he eventually recover? How much of what he saw was mere hallucination?
All in all, I wouldn't call this her best work, but it was definitely an enjoyable read.
It seems to me to be a commentary on drug culture, with elements of sci-fi that I haven't noticed in any of her other works yet. It's a fresh, original premise - exploring the past that Dick travels into with enough depth that we get attached to characters we know are already dead, while also staying in the present enough to let us see how using the drug is affecting his health and his relationship with his family. And du Maurier has certainly executed it brilliantly. I wasn't able to put it down until I'd finished, although there weren't that many developments going on plot-wise.
The writing is beautiful, as in her other works, although this book appears to use slightly more informal and modern language. There's quite a lot more cussing than I've encountered in her other books. I wasn't really expecting to read the line, "Prudence my arse", here, for instance.
Then again, it was stated that only a person with superhuman strength would've been able to drag themselves to a shelter after such an accident. And yet it was assumed till the very end that Magnus had managed to do it.
Finally, one of the main questions that Dick raised in the beginning was why the drug was taking him back to Roger's time. Why not some later time period? What was the link between Roger and whoever was using the drug? This wasn't really addressed later in the book, like I expected it would be.
The ending is ambiguous, and somehow unexpected, although perfectly natural when you think about it. It raises more questions than answers; for instance, does Dick get paralysed? Or will he eventually recover? How much of what he saw was mere hallucination?
All in all, I wouldn't call this her best work, but it was definitely an enjoyable read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Infidelity, Murder, Drug use, Addiction, Gore, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Grief, and Death
Moderate: Car accident, Child abuse, Vomit, Adult/minor relationship, Injury/Injury detail, Domestic abuse, Blood, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Pandemic/Epidemic, and Toxic friendship
Minor: Alcohol, Suicide, Violence, War, Pregnancy, Sexual content, Mental illness, Cursing, Medical content, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury