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Turn of the Screw

Turn of the Screw

List Price: $20.95
Your Price: $20.95
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Races along nicely
Review: The events in the book occur between Thursday 16th May and Sunday 26th May 1940. The book rolls along superbly, with suspense and danger all along the way. The research, and presumably Colin Forbes's own wartime experience, make the novel seem very authentic. Like Jack Higgins, Forbes combines fiction with historical fact seamlessly. This first novel written as Colin Forbes is well worth looking out for.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Were they there?
Review: Were they there? Any ghost story HAS ghosts, that's why I think they WERE actually there. I do not think I am spoiling anyone's reading in stating this, since that is a personal answer to the question. Henry James skillfully plays around the doubt all the way through "The Turn of the Screw", while generations of readers have discoursed about the matter, finding no ultimate answer. This is only one of the novel's many excellencies. With one foot solidly in the old gothic tradition and the other already into psychoanalysis, "Turn of the screw" takes the best from both worlds. And it is worrying rather than scaring, always keeping us captive in a world of inescapable beauty.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: An early Forbes classic!
Review: Written in 1969, this blistering action thriller is set in 1940 in occupied northern France. Stranded behind German enemy lines, a lone British Army tank must do whatever it can to reach the Channel port of Dunkirk and Allied forces. The crew use cunning, force and even help from an RAF pilot whose Spitfire is downed by a Stuka bomber with a few token French farmers thrown in for good measure! The action scenes are first rate and the suspense builds as the German Wehrmacht approach and the tank crew hides wherever they can. The horrors of war are also well described, showing how innocent people suffered under the hands of the Nazi invaders. And Forbes describes the French locations accurately - it is another part of Europe I have visited. If you enjoyed Harold Coyle's tank warfare stories such as SWORD POINT and TEAM YANKEE then don't miss this exciting depiction of WW2 from one tank crew's viewpoint.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Not my James favorite by any means
Review: Great work of psychology (psychosis) and a great work to pyscholoanalyze (research the character names if nothing else). Though not his most powerful work. Short and sweet.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: if there were zero stars, I would've chose that
Review: This book was horrible! It was extremely hard to understand and to follow along. It would put me to sleep at night i was so bored with the book. Now, I'm a pretty constant reader and I read all the time, but this was one of the worst books I have ever read. It had too many sexual references to be on a middle school/junior high reading list. All in all, if you were thinking about reading this book, you really shouldn't.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Bored Beyond Caring
Review: For a century this story has kept literary critics busy trying to extract its meaning and kept readers awake in their beds, but damned if I can say why. The Turn of the Screw is the most boring story I have read in quite a while. I cannot watch scary movies or read scary books because they keep me up and give me nightmares and generally mess with my mind, so I was leary of The Turn of the Screw. But even with my hypersensitivity to horror, I was not remotely frightened, my spine not at all tingled, by any one of James's tortuous sentences. The story is indeed ambiguous, but I was too bored to bother seeking its deeper meaning. Even James didn't care much for Turn of the Screw. If you want to read a good story by James, try "What Maisie Knew." You'll still get all the repressed Victorian allusions to sexuality and children, and you won't hate James when you're through.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: SUPERB
Review: In a contemporary world where people love high tech, fast-moving thrillers, escapist fare of all sorts and celebrity gossip, Henry James provides everyone - with every taste - the perfect introduction to classic literature. Featuring his sometime obtuse but mesmerizing prose, Turn Of The Screw is slim, and ultimately supremely satisfying, even in its refusal to answer questions. If you loved The Sixth Sense, for example, you will be drawn in by the ghost story told here, and wonder over and over who exactly is mad, evil and forever lost. An entertainingly different story, this book will forever be fresh because it is truly a work of lasting art. Do yourself a favor, and spend the few bucks to open up a whole new world; if you are like me, you will be looking for others of James' compelling and infinitely interesting novels, all of which contain moral ambiguities, women who are strong, strange and fascinating, and stories that do far more than provide action and escape - they make you feel, think and wonder.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Read Goddard's Essay
Review: This is another Norton Critical Edition at its finest. Obviously, many of the essays are volleys shot to support one side or the other of the great literary debate: was the governess crazy or are there really ghosts.

The not-to-be-missed essay is the one by Harold Goddard. In my opinion, it settles the debate conclusively. Goddard was an English teacher who first suggested that the story is not a ghost story but an interior monolgue about a crazy governess. His essay was found in a trunk after his death and published later. It's a marvel in logic, rhetoric, style, and clarity. Plus, it's even more interesting given that such a thoughtful and well-written essay was not intended for an audience; it was simply Goddard's own notes to himself, which he sometimes shared with his students. He presumably had no idea how influential or provocative it would become.

Also not to be missed is Leo Marx's witty and thought provoking essay. I think (hope) it was written tongue-in-check because it reads like a parody of so many criticisms of this story. But, at the same time it presents a good argument.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Classic ghost story
Review: This classic book is a ghost story of sorts. It is not the traditional kind, with chains and things, but it is more of a psychological suspence story. A young governess goes to take care of two children- Flora, age 8, and Miles, age 10. She soon learns that their old governess and her lover both mysteriously died. As the story goes on she begins to see apparitions of the two dead people, and she is convinced that the children have something to with it. During the whole story she works to save them from the ghosts. However, you are left to decide the whole time whether what she is seeing is real or if the kids are really guilty or if she is psycho or what.

I liked the way the plot went because I was left to figure out and interpret things for myself the whole way along. James did not just come out and say things but left them to be interpreted by many different ways. This may be frustrating for readers who like the story to be spelt out to them, but if you like suspense and trying to see a story from many different viewpoints, you will like the story too.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Difficult to Interpret, and a very undesirable plot
Review: I had to read this book for a college English class, and I found myself struggling to keep awake. I don't know what Henry James was thinking when he wrote this book, but it is definitely a book to read if you want to go to sleep. Meanwhile, it brought my English grade way down; Thanks alot Henry. The whole situation with the governess doesn't make sense to me at all. In my opinion the other people were trying to deny what the governess was seeing because they were frightened by the sight of the ghost. I don't see all the psychological theories that they many reviewers are interpreting. Maybe if the book explained itself a little better, I would agree, but for now I still think the book was a real snoozer!


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