Welcome to the Historical Fiction Online forums: a friendly place to discuss, review and discover historical fiction.
If this is your first visit, please be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above.
You will have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed.
To start viewing posts, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Mary Stewart

User avatar
Misfit
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 9581
Joined: August 2008
Location: Seattle, WA

Mary Stewart

Post by Misfit » Wed June 10th, 2009, 12:26 am

Misfit, comfort books -- what an appropriate description!!! You are not only my literary doppelganger but an absolute arbiter of the mot juste. First wallbanger, and now comfort book/comfort read.
I just might have to start a thread on this topic. Credit for the comfort book comes from Lee over at Goodreads - she saw my review of Nine Coaches Waiting and noted that it sounded like.....a perfect comfort book.
At home with a good book and the cat...
...is the only place I want to be

User avatar
Misfit
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 9581
Joined: August 2008
Location: Seattle, WA

Post by Misfit » Wed June 10th, 2009, 1:52 am

I'm thinking we need a Mary Stewart thread. What do the rest of you think?
At home with a good book and the cat...
...is the only place I want to be

User avatar
boswellbaxter
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 3066
Joined: August 2008
Location: North Carolina
Contact:

Post by boswellbaxter » Wed June 10th, 2009, 2:47 am

The silent hand moves . . .
Susan Higginbotham
Coming in October: The Woodvilles


http://www.susanhigginbotham.com/
http://www.susanhigginbotham.com/blog/

Chatterbox
Bibliophile
Posts: 1667
Joined: April 2009
Location: New York

Post by Chatterbox » Wed June 10th, 2009, 3:26 am

and having writ, moves on...

Oh wait, I'm garbling my references. I know I am. Sigh. Brain mold.

OK, Mary Stewart.

Loved the Moonspinners. I think the first one I read (it was my mother's) was a 1960s edition of Airs Above the Ground, where the plot involved the cold war and Lippizaner stallions at the Austrian Riding School. When we finally went to Vienna, I insisted on going to see the horses perform! I then moved on to "Madam, Will You Talk" which remains one of my favorites. Although, viewed through the prism of today's sensibilities, the hero's 'stalking' of the heroine would be a bit creepy.

What did people think of her later books -- Stormy Petrel, et. al.? They were slighter, both in plot & character, but I still found them appealing.

User avatar
Lauryn
Reader
Posts: 175
Joined: April 2009
Location: Vancouver, CA

Post by Lauryn » Wed June 10th, 2009, 4:35 am

[quote=""Chatterbox""]I then moved on to "Madam, Will You Talk" which remains one of my favorites. Although, viewed through the prism of today's sensibilities, the hero's 'stalking' of the heroine would be a bit creepy.[/quote]

My mom gave me a garage-sale copy of that book, and I've read it a time or two. I agree, in this day and age, creepy, but on the other hand, I find myself hearing the main character's late race-car-driver husband in the back of my mind when speeding in my own car, and almost invariably pass a cruiser once I'm back under the speed limit. :D

I liked her Merlyn books, but for pure home-coming comfort, Thornyhold. Although someone (perhaps Chatterbox) recommended Rose Cottage as a similar comfort book.
Even the mighty oak was once just a nut that held its ground.

User avatar
Leyland
Bibliophile
Posts: 1042
Joined: August 2008
Location: Travelers Rest SC

Post by Leyland » Wed June 10th, 2009, 4:43 am

I have always wanted to visit and explore Crete, Corfu and Delphi solely because of The Moonspinners, This Rough Magic and My Brother Michael. They are my favorite Stewarts. Then it's Madam, Will You Talk. I really want to race my MGB all through Les Baux the way Charity drove her Vauxhall sedan (I think that's what her car was). OK - dream on ...

Touch Not the Cat is a really big fave, too. The next favorite is The Gabriel Hounds. Airs Above the Ground is a top fave. Then The Ivy Tree.

And then rest are all so great - Wildfire at Midnight! Fantastic atmosphere and setting. Nine Coaches Waiting ...

I can't imagine not only missing any of MS's romantic suspense, but not reading them over and over. She has such extraordinary talent for 'painting with words' as other fans have stated. Perhaps it's due to her maiden name being Rainbow.
We are the music makers, And we are the dreamers of dreams ~ Arthur O'Shaughnessy, Ode

User avatar
Misfit
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 9581
Joined: August 2008
Location: Seattle, WA

Post by Misfit » Wed June 10th, 2009, 10:50 am

[quote=""boswellbaxter""]The silent hand moves . . .[/quote]


;) :o :)

See, I can even start a thread whilst sleeping.

I am definitely moving more of her books up to the top of the pile. I've got an Amazon friend who's been working her way through Stewart's old books and I'm definitely interested. I re-read her Arthur series a couple of years ago and enjoyed them just as much. Have to grumble at the publishers issuing new editions and not fixing the typos though. :mad:
Last edited by Misfit on Wed June 10th, 2009, 10:55 am, edited 1 time in total.
At home with a good book and the cat...
...is the only place I want to be

User avatar
EC2
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 3661
Joined: August 2008
Location: Nottingham UK
Contact:

Post by EC2 » Wed June 10th, 2009, 11:42 am

When my mother decided it was time for me to inch into grown up reading, I was allowed to read Mary Stewart. They were exciting women in jeopardy books without too much to frighten the horses! I read The Moonspinners, This Rough Magic, My Brother Michael - all of them. I didn't much go for the Scottish one, can't remember its name. The Greek ones and the South of France were my particular faves. When Mary Stewart was writing these, it was only the most adventurous women who had started to go to way out places like Greece and the South of France, so these locations were still rather exotic.
I still have a Stewart omnibus in my keeper cupboard. Time to get it out again perhaps :-)
Ann Warboys and May Mackintosh used to write in a similar style and I devoured all theirs. The Lion of Delos springs to mind.
Les proz e les vassals
Souvent entre piez de chevals
Kar ja li coard n’I chasront

'The Brave and the valiant
Are always to be found between the hooves of horses
For never will cowards fall down there.'

Histoire de Guillaume le Mareschal

www.elizabethchadwick.com

User avatar
Ludmilla
Bibliophile
Posts: 1346
Joined: September 2008
Location: Georgia USA

Post by Ludmilla » Wed June 10th, 2009, 1:06 pm

My favorite of her romantic suspense is still The Ivy Tree. It may not be her best, but it is the one that has remained the most vivid in my memory, and I loved the archaeology subplot. I think she got the idea for the plot twist from Tey's Brat Farrar (a book I haven't read, but sits in my TBR patiently waiting for me to read one day). The others I can remember really liking a lot, in no particular order, are:

Madam, Will You Talk
Wildfire at Midnight
Nine Coaches Waiting
My Brother Michael (loved the intrigue in Greece in this one)
The Moon-Spinners (Disney probably helped catapult this one to fame)
This Rough Magic (loved all the Shakespearian references, mostly to The Tempest, I believe; in fact, this was probably my introduction to themes from that play.)

I've never been to England, but when I think of England, it's the England Stewart wrote about. Anyway, I like to imagine it that way.

I really need to pick up a copy of Thornyhold. I haven't read that one yet.

User avatar
Leyland
Bibliophile
Posts: 1042
Joined: August 2008
Location: Travelers Rest SC

Post by Leyland » Wed June 10th, 2009, 1:20 pm

I think of Thornyhold, Stormy Petrel and Rose Cottage as all lovely gentle reads. More romance, less suspense. I should read these all again soon.

Maybe these are a bit more like Maeve Binchy or R Pilcher? Just shorter.
We are the music makers, And we are the dreamers of dreams ~ Arthur O'Shaughnessy, Ode

Post Reply

Return to “By Author”