The Darkness of Love - a Gothic novel of romance and terror

This is a book I picked up in a flea market in Kentucky earlier this year.  I had never heard of the author, but for only 50 cents, I figured why not.  As it turns out, this particular book is one of only three books written under the name of Vivian Stuart.  Vivian Stuart, as should not be surprising, is one of many pseudonyms used by British author Charles Roy Stuart-Vernon.  Oddly enough, this is revealed by looking at the copyright page of this book, which give copyright credit to Stuart-Vernon.  A little research reveals Stuart-Vernon wrote historical, romance, and other genre novels under a number of pseudonyms, including Charles MacKinnon, Graham Montrose, Barbara Lynn, Vivian Donald, Iain Torr, and others.  He was actually a hereditary chieftain and laird of Dunakin and of Dunakin Castle, Isle of Sky (Charles Stuart-Vernon); this, the Scottish backdrop to this story makes perfect sense.

The Darkness of Love is the last of three books written under the pen name of Vivian Stuart.  It tells the story of lovely young Kate Penrose who is about to live the dream of every young girl - she is off to Scotland, where she is going to marry the handsome Allan MacAllander, the thirty-third in a line of Scottish chieftans, and live in his stately family home, Gaildhu, set high atop the cliffs overlooking the sea.  Sure, the manor may be set far apart from its nearest neighbor, and sure, it may seem somewhat forlorn and foreboding - but Kate is in love, and she can't imagine anything other than spending the rest of her life with this amazing man.  But this is a gothic tale of romance and suspense, so we all know that perfect dream is about to be shattered...

Like shards of broken glass, Kate's dreams splinter and break apart one by one.  First, there's Allan's cousin who appears at Gaildhu without warning.  He seems happy and carefree, but Allan has questions about his veracity.  Is he really his family's cousin, or is he perpetrating a fraud for unknown reasons?  Then there is Mairi, the MacAllanders' maid.  From the moment Kate arrives, the young woman makes it clear she does not want her there; but when Mairi warns Kate away and tells her she does not belong there, Kate is left to wonder how far the maid will go.  There is also Allan's mother, Julia.  She is always calm and settled, always the voice of reason; however, to what length will she go to keep the family's secrets hidden?  And just who is that mysterious woman that Kate keeps seeing on the grounds, particularly around the charred remains of a gatehouse not far from the cliffs - and why does just mentioning her have such a strange affect on Allan and his mother?

When someone takes shots at Kate, and later, when someone beheads her two small dogs, the danger becomes all too real.  Then Kate is poisoned to the point of making her violently ill.  Someone is targeting Kate, and if she does not figure out who it is, she may wind up as dead as her dogs!  I give Stuart-Vernon credit, he knows how to build up some suspense.  Yet, this book definitely veers from the path of the standard gothic in several ways.  First, the truth about what is happening pretty much gets revealed just a little over half-way through the story - leaving the remainder of the book to deal with Kate's attempts to escape Gaildhu and the terror that lurks on its grounds.  The second is that the story contains some very brutal violence - between the beheading of the two dogs, the horrific way one of the characters is killed right in front of Kate, and the rough manner in which Kate is kidnapped, tied and locked in a pantry closet, and the plans with which she is to die - well, let's just say I have not read a gothic story yet that is quite this violent.

The third manner in which this book deviates from the "normal" gothic of the time is the cover.  Instead of the standard woman in the foreground and the castle with one light lit in an upper window in the background, we get a man and woman running, with the man in front, and a car chasing them along the cliff's edge.  There is a castle in the background, but it is completely dark, no light showing in the upper window.  And, even more surprising is that this scene is taken from the climactic fight scenes near the end of the book, with only a slight variation.  Published in 1977, it could be that the publisher felt breaking away from the norm might boost some of the sales, as this would have been near the time when the gothic paperback craze was starting to wind down, and sales were no longer what they were at the beginning of that decade.  In any event, there is no artist signature on the cover, nor any credit given on the copyright page, so no way to know who painted this car chase scene.

 

A couple of tidbits I took note of while reading -  (1) when Kate is asked to play a game of cards, the game of choice is Canasta (p. 36).  This is the first time I've actually seen this game referenced in any book I've read, that I can recall, and it made me smile, since I love playing Canasta! (2) Later in the story, Kate ends up playing another game, this time it is Scrabble (p. 78).  I'm surprised the author would pick specific games like this, rather than simply saying a "board game."  (3) This is a bit more obscure, but during a conversation between Kate and one of the male characters in the story regarding golf, and the conversation made me think of a certain author of children's series books:

...Kate was a competent golfer who had almost always played with men. She had realised [sic] from the outset that the average man was stronger than the average woman - in the muscular sense, at any rate - and that he therefore hits further, if he's good.  To compensate for this she had cultivated accuracy ... The other thing she had concentrated on was putting; points could be picked up on the green by someone who was otherwise outclassed.  (p. 87)

This description made me immediately think about Mildred Wirt Benson, who was known to be a better than average golfer, and who has been said to have beaten her fair share of male golfers in her time.  While the author was certainly not thinking about Benson when he wrote this scene, I did find it of interest that he clearly established the fact that Kate, as a woman, was skilled enough and crafty enough to figure out a way to beat a man at his own game without having to be a man herself!

Overall, a fairly decent read, although some of the elements are a bit obvious, so the ultimate reveal as to who is behind everything and why does not come as much of a surprise.

RATING:  8 pellets of weed killer out of 10 for giving readers a gothic heroine who is stronger than most, unafraid to speak her mind, even to the point of facing down an insane killer!