Gargoyle Reads

The Darkling by R.B. Chesterton: A Review

The Darkling is a classic Gothic novel.  Mimi is a modern-day version of the governess protecting her young wards from evil beings.  She is the live-in tutor for the Henderson family, sunny golden Californians who have relocated into the local mansion and brought it back to its previous greatness.  The house, of course, has a mysterious and ominous past. When Mimi's grandmother Cora convinces the Hendersons to take in a teenage girl who is suffering from amnesia, things begin to go horribly wrong.

The novel is creepy and filled with the requisite supernatural forces.  Events keep you turning the pages to see what will happen next.  Description is rich and evocative.  However, there are a few flaws in this work.

Mimi, the protagonist, suffers from being the virginal governess of the classic Gothic novel transferred to a modern setting.  As with many mysteries lately, this is set in the recent past, before cell phones and the Internet made it more difficult to be mysterious.  Mimi vacillates between prudish behavior and naivete to cursing like a sailor and planning cold-blooded murder.  This unevenness in character is jarring.

The writing is also uneven in sports.  The novel flows beautiful until an awkward passage or turn of phrase derails the reader for a time.  In one paragraph Chesterton begins with, "My logical brain denied what could only be described as a transmogrification."  The next paragraph begins with "the inability to explain what I'd seen and the possibility that I was losing it..."  Switching from formal, almost Victorian language, to modern, sometimes vulgar language, destroys the tone of the novel.

Overall, The Darkling is a fun summer read for those who are not too attached to literary quality.