Jane Aiken Hodge: Watch the Wall, My Darling

The carriage that was rolling swiftly along the rainy English marsh on the road from London suddenly stopped. A barricade blocked the way. Dark figures surrounded them. Christina had no time to cry out as strong arms caught her from behind. A hand covered her mouth. She bit it as hard as she could.

She looked up at the tall, masked stranger, and a mysterious, frightening sensation swept over her. Those fiery brown eyes gazed at her in a way she had never known before …

In my constant search for a new favorite like Northanger Abbey, I picked up this old gothic Reg Rom classic by Jane Aiken Hodge. Featuring an intrepid heroine raised in the Colonies in a rugged landscape, she seems primed for the dark, dank adventures that wait her in the marshy landscape of Sussex.

There is smuggling! Dark relatives! Ghostly rooms! Crumbling dow manors! Bleak, rainy weather! Super villains!

All in all, great recipe for gothic disaster and some delicious romance that curls your toes in more ways than one.

This book is not the smartest, nor even the gothic-est, but is still likeable. If it drags a bit, the landscape is still dark, sweeping and creepy…a great setting for horror. The heroine presents as an impoverished orphan, on some sort of secret mission to reconnect with her English grandfather. He is ailing, sure to soon die, and being sustained by a lunatic cast of family characters.

A little more Jane Eyre than Northanger, and maybe a bit more Cousin Kate than anything, its a great diversion from the ball rooms and glittering Reg Roms into a more sinister world of smuggling, Napoleanic intrigue, and cloistered disfunction.

Without spoiling the fun, I can recommend that there are a few surprises in store although most will be revealed early on to the careful genre-familiar reader.

Intimacy is light, and this definitely might appeal to fans of YA fiction.

5 Stars 4 out of 6