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Summary: Very interesting novel. Eerie, like "The Lottery".
Review: I have read this book twice in the past several years. It is one of those books from the 70s that my parents had as a harcover, and it just stayed with me, after I took it to college and beyond. One of the key reasons this book is interesting is that it evokes an ominous sense throughout the story. Many of the details border on supernatural, yet the horror is firmly rooted in a small bucolic town's obsolete traditions involving human sacrifice and a female hegemony. If you can find it, read it. It's a fun, summer read.
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Summary: Keep The Lights On
Review: I know that my title is a cliche about reading modern horror stories but its actually true about Harvest Home. The book is well written with descriptive prose that flow rather than block the story, the characters are well defined and believable and the story itself flows with unexpected twists and turns. Harvest Home will keep you turning the pages and you may never see the countryside in the same light. Unfortunately, this is currently out of print, but it's worth the trouble of tracking down a used copy!
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Summary: Tryon is an OUTSTANDING writer,and this is a CHILLING story!
Review: I read this book a few years ago, and have not been able to forget its impact. This is truly a horror story at its best. I loved the New England setting, and the characters were great. HARVEST HOME should be read by everyone, you will not regret or forget it. This a great time to read this wonderful book, Halloween is just around the corner!
Rating: 
Summary: Harvest Home
Review: I read this book in 1976. It was given to me by a friend. It only took me a few hours as I could not put it down. After completing the book I was in total shock and threw it across the room hitting the wall and breaking the spine. The entire book fell apart. I've been looking for another copy for my daughter who is 17 years old. Can't find one anywhere. I hear of many strange events happening in small towns, but this took the cake! I really enjoyed it and need another copy soon.
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Summary: Killer Farm People a Must Read
Review: I read this book in the winter of 99 it was a great book. I love the way it keeps u in suspense the whole way through. They should really bring this book back into print, i know alot of people who want to read it.
Rating:
Summary: ranks right up there with the exorcist
Review: I read this book wayyy back in the 70s, and it's still giving me the creeps, even though I usually chomp through horror books like a little kid eats a box of cheerios. Been thinking of reading it again, but in 30 more years when I'm a little old lady will my heart be strong enough to take it?
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Summary: enduring horror classic
Review: I thought nothing would happen for the longest time. The description wasn't great, the characters were not compelling. Bizzare cult behavior just so-so disturbing. Personally I did not firgure it out because I just was not interested enough to try. Figured there would be some human sacrifice involved, but didn't see who it would be until near the end. Is there some serious allegory here about masculine v. feminine or primitive v. civilized? Maybe but not well developed. Actually the book was mostly dull with a pretty silly ending and an over-the-top, fairly annoying style. Sorry fans, "but I just can't go for that, no-o, no can do."
Rating: 
Summary: Pretty dull if you ask me
Review: I thought nothing would happen for the longest time. The description wasn't great, the characters were not compelling. Bizzare cult behavior just so-so disturbing. Personally I did not firgure it out because I just was not interested enough to try. Figured there would be some human sacrifice involved, but didn't see who it would be until near the end. Is there some serious allegory here about masculine v. feminine or primitive v. civilized? Maybe but not well developed. Actually the book was mostly dull with a pretty silly ending and an over-the-top, fairly annoying style. Sorry fans, "but I just can't go for that, no-o, no can do."
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Summary: Amish Death Cult
Review: I was surprised by this book. It was written by an actor and was made into a TV Movie starring an aging Bette Davis. Strike one and two! The premise is a common theme in horror: a group of people (a writer and his family), are stuck in an isolated rural community with apparently friendly townsfolk who harbor a grisly secret. But wait! The book is actually populated with a number of interesting characters and moves swiftly through various twists and turns. The suspense builds nicely to an unpredictable climax. I enjoyed it. A good book for a rainy day.
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Summary: Oedipus, Meet Sir James George Frazier......
Review: Like a lot of reviewers, I read this book around the time it was first published. I read it again after almost thirty years. I found it a powerful and suspenseful tale back then, I think the level of writing--popular suspense thriller--holds up well but the underpinnings are a little creaky, though I think the primal nature of his allusions helps to impart a power to the story that, in some ways, the writing doesn't always provide.For example, the Oedipal nature of Ned's story--Greek son who despoils his mother (Mother Earth, in this case) and suffers gruesome disfigurement (not dissimilar to that suffered by Oedipus himself.) The Corn rites which seem to come directly from Frazier's "The Golden Bough." These are cultural details which infuse the story with their power. Which doesn't mean there aren't issues. Cornish descendants might be expected to practice Celtic or Druidic fertility rites rather than ones more resemblant to (and, late in the book, are described as arising from) Ancient Greek ones. (Hint: much less in the way of violence in the former and little, if any, sex) And, speaking of sex, the proximate situation with Justin Hooke at the, pardon the pun, penultimate climax, leaves one wondering...hands securely bound behind his back? Seems like rather difficult physical situation.... As for the writing. The plotting is effective though one feels that Tryon moves the downhill slide of Ned a little quickly, perhaps in anticipation of the twists at the end. Ned and the Widow Fortune are relatively well-realized but the rest of the characters rarely rise above types: the town tramp, the town golden boy. Where this lack of secondary characterization hurts the book most is in the character of Ned's wife, Beth, who remains something of a cypher through much of the book. Tryon appears to be going for a subtle shift in her as she comes under the sway of the widow and the town, and yet he feels he has to stage these melodramatic scenes--Kate's "death" and Tamar's "rape" in order to drive her motivations in distancing herself from Ned and in participating in Harvest Home. As for Kate, the daughter, she is little more than a plot device. Where I think that Tryon succeeds is in his avoidance of the standard American Gothic horror novel, a la Stephen King. He has respect for the cultural and spiritual significance of the type of society he is writing about and their rituals--unlike a lot of creative types back then (this era was bookended by stuff like "Easy Rider" and "Deliverance" which embodied the Urban Coastals paranoia about "country folk.") We can shudder in horror at the fate of those, like Ned, who cross the residents of Cornwall Coombe, and we can intellectualize their bloody acts, but the primal nature of their beliefs can't be so easily discounted--Beth's condition at the end of the novel seems to indicate that, perhaps, they may be right.
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