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Legacy
DARK MYSTERYIt begins in the haunting loveliness of Stone Mill Hollow, amid the tumult and passion of the Civil War, where two lovers meet in ecstasy, then vanish into the brooding night, victims of an unspeakable horror. Now something terrible, quenchless, and unappeased moves like dark water in the white mists that cloak the somber, many-roomed Covington mansion. It is a figure of passionate vengeance, a lover of irresistible power, a lover defiant of the grave.Five generations of women are drawn into his awesome world between shadow and substance, until they wish to God they had never come to Stone Mill Hollow!
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First published July 1, 1977
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
May 1, 2015
Better-than-average gothic mystery with a romantic thread that kept me turning the pages. A brooding town of secrets and ghosts, a gloomy old house, and a cast of quirky and troubled characters from the Civil War era through the "present" day (1976). Surprisingly good.
November 19, 2018
Those troubled by the Legacy of Stone Mill Hollow; a Stephen King-like Castle Rock rendition of ageless custom and timeless tradition could not be described better than afflicted & cursed. Everything. The town. The houses. The community as a whole, and especially the people; above all things, the damn people. A Legacy founded on Moonshine Empires & Midwifery. Of One Horses & Gossips who could even hold the town's darkest secrets for hundreds of years; the Legacy they inherit to keep.
This monstrous bit to chew of a novel spans five generations of not just heroine escapades and her adventures, but a whole fucking town! So clung to their roots and heritage that each generation just seems to be a mockup of the last; caricatures of their forefathers, and this could be ideally where Appalachian stereotypes derive from, concerning a straight branch of the tree of ancestry. A great deal of Appalachians are right proud of the consistent inbreeding overtime and outsiders are just that: outsiders, alien; something foreign to be disdained & ridiculed as lesser than. Your new ways of thinking and living don't co-exist with their bible-belted lash of smalltown politics that refuse to outlast its timeloop. These are the types of people that would refuse to progress or prosper, in-order NOT to surpass their neighbors, because it's stagnant way of thinking that to live beyond the means of those less fortunate, or who refuse to succeed, is far more of a sin than to not reach your truest potential. It's mountain dystopian-like societies, I've always thought. The shared misery is a must. But that's only the deeper hollows & regions though. The townsfolk of nearby towns are more advanced in their industry; whereas the deep, deep hillscapes are basically one bad crop & diseased cattle away from utter starvation; and they're proud of that. Absolutely. Florence Hurd embraced this so very keenly, that I was believing it. One of the great powers of Hurd, to me, is that she'll take a story, no matter the setting, and relocates you to that place and time. I felt like I was going back home, so it was disturbingly accurate in her execution!
Florence Hurd, or better known to me as Fiona Harrowe is a masterful, magnificent mother-heifer who I am forever fascinated by. Everything she touches seems to propel me into a newer dimension of that genre, whether it's Historical Romance; Medieval times, or Southern Gothic. In my reading experience it's very rare that Southern Gothics constructed in the backwoods of the VA Appalachia; riddled with muddy, Medieval-like peasantry; bleak impoverishment, but still yet comfortably condemned & accepting that sort of shared misery. Stone Mill Hollow and its inhabitants didn't take much to grasp onto a superstition that transpired from one injustice during the Civil War, that surprisingly didn't concern any slaves. Needless to say, the entire town and its leadership were some exceedingly racist bastagery and they unapologetically passed that vile bloodline tendency onto their kin as the years progressed.
There's this underlined "fuck you" avoidance of jumpscare maneuvering she reels out; a slowburn that's so deeply satisfying, but barely advances you in plot reveals up till the last damn pages. This reminds me greatly of indie horror, and the very reason I watch it primarily; it requires some thinking. It doesn't carry you through a slasher-like frenzy, but settles you deep into the bones of a story. During highlights of haunting and spookdom, it's written in a manner that isn't ready to carry the incident into hysteria for side-characters to doubt the heroine's sanity, or build tension; hauntings are happening like everyday occurrences, and they're not loud, boisterous - an earsplitting foghorn of HEY..LOOK AT ME, I'M HAUNTIN' YOU BISH! It illuminates hauntings and those kinds of scenes in a way that belongs to a setting or an energy that cannot shake a memory from its recesses. Somehow like memories no longer tied to a mind or body; now without anchor, it sort of dragnets the lives of everyday people, but not in a flamboyant way.
I really fucking love that. Just some ghosts, doing ghostly things. Hi. *waves*
I am not going to give a critical analysis of each heroine in this generational saga. I don't think the story deserves that sort of nitpicking BS, but I will say that most of the heroines were smart, levelheaded and likable, save for one who maintained an insta-love with a married riding instructor. One of the heroines I liked a bit more, because she literally came off of the mountains in terms of terrain. They were even more rural than Stone Mill Hollow folks & her barefoot hoyden ways really warmed me over because I know that girl. I am that girl. When a hillbilly-goat free-ranges from that mountain, I always imagine it evolutionary in my mind; she begins to walk upright, speaking fuller sentences, instead of grunting; becoming very self-aware; this filth-faced Eve, of her inadequacies & shortcomings and sheds them to be less noticeable to others.
My only quarrel was that one of the mountain witch folklore characters didn't have an ultimate plotline or heavy-hand in the shifting of the story itself. Well, boo... BooOooOo.
There are a few violent scenes involving potential suitors, husbands and grabby step-fathers, but aside from that, the love scenes are pretty tame and nondescript. The fact that they're actually described at all, makes this novel just as rare as generational legacies & long-winded Gothic, to boot. The story itself was not overly complex or OOT unbelievable, and I wasn't far from guessing the exact plotline, but the telling of the story feels like even old stories, somewhat heard already and recycled, are brand fucking new, and that to me is the genius behind it.
This monstrous bit to chew of a novel spans five generations of not just heroine escapades and her adventures, but a whole fucking town! So clung to their roots and heritage that each generation just seems to be a mockup of the last; caricatures of their forefathers, and this could be ideally where Appalachian stereotypes derive from, concerning a straight branch of the tree of ancestry. A great deal of Appalachians are right proud of the consistent inbreeding overtime and outsiders are just that: outsiders, alien; something foreign to be disdained & ridiculed as lesser than. Your new ways of thinking and living don't co-exist with their bible-belted lash of smalltown politics that refuse to outlast its timeloop. These are the types of people that would refuse to progress or prosper, in-order NOT to surpass their neighbors, because it's stagnant way of thinking that to live beyond the means of those less fortunate, or who refuse to succeed, is far more of a sin than to not reach your truest potential. It's mountain dystopian-like societies, I've always thought. The shared misery is a must. But that's only the deeper hollows & regions though. The townsfolk of nearby towns are more advanced in their industry; whereas the deep, deep hillscapes are basically one bad crop & diseased cattle away from utter starvation; and they're proud of that. Absolutely. Florence Hurd embraced this so very keenly, that I was believing it. One of the great powers of Hurd, to me, is that she'll take a story, no matter the setting, and relocates you to that place and time. I felt like I was going back home, so it was disturbingly accurate in her execution!
Florence Hurd, or better known to me as Fiona Harrowe is a masterful, magnificent mother-heifer who I am forever fascinated by. Everything she touches seems to propel me into a newer dimension of that genre, whether it's Historical Romance; Medieval times, or Southern Gothic. In my reading experience it's very rare that Southern Gothics constructed in the backwoods of the VA Appalachia; riddled with muddy, Medieval-like peasantry; bleak impoverishment, but still yet comfortably condemned & accepting that sort of shared misery. Stone Mill Hollow and its inhabitants didn't take much to grasp onto a superstition that transpired from one injustice during the Civil War, that surprisingly didn't concern any slaves. Needless to say, the entire town and its leadership were some exceedingly racist bastagery and they unapologetically passed that vile bloodline tendency onto their kin as the years progressed.
There's this underlined "fuck you" avoidance of jumpscare maneuvering she reels out; a slowburn that's so deeply satisfying, but barely advances you in plot reveals up till the last damn pages. This reminds me greatly of indie horror, and the very reason I watch it primarily; it requires some thinking. It doesn't carry you through a slasher-like frenzy, but settles you deep into the bones of a story. During highlights of haunting and spookdom, it's written in a manner that isn't ready to carry the incident into hysteria for side-characters to doubt the heroine's sanity, or build tension; hauntings are happening like everyday occurrences, and they're not loud, boisterous - an earsplitting foghorn of HEY..LOOK AT ME, I'M HAUNTIN' YOU BISH! It illuminates hauntings and those kinds of scenes in a way that belongs to a setting or an energy that cannot shake a memory from its recesses. Somehow like memories no longer tied to a mind or body; now without anchor, it sort of dragnets the lives of everyday people, but not in a flamboyant way.
I really fucking love that. Just some ghosts, doing ghostly things. Hi. *waves*
I am not going to give a critical analysis of each heroine in this generational saga. I don't think the story deserves that sort of nitpicking BS, but I will say that most of the heroines were smart, levelheaded and likable, save for one who maintained an insta-love with a married riding instructor. One of the heroines I liked a bit more, because she literally came off of the mountains in terms of terrain. They were even more rural than Stone Mill Hollow folks & her barefoot hoyden ways really warmed me over because I know that girl. I am that girl. When a hillbilly-goat free-ranges from that mountain, I always imagine it evolutionary in my mind; she begins to walk upright, speaking fuller sentences, instead of grunting; becoming very self-aware; this filth-faced Eve, of her inadequacies & shortcomings and sheds them to be less noticeable to others.
My only quarrel was that one of the mountain witch folklore characters didn't have an ultimate plotline or heavy-hand in the shifting of the story itself. Well, boo... BooOooOo.
There are a few violent scenes involving potential suitors, husbands and grabby step-fathers, but aside from that, the love scenes are pretty tame and nondescript. The fact that they're actually described at all, makes this novel just as rare as generational legacies & long-winded Gothic, to boot. The story itself was not overly complex or OOT unbelievable, and I wasn't far from guessing the exact plotline, but the telling of the story feels like even old stories, somewhat heard already and recycled, are brand fucking new, and that to me is the genius behind it.
September 1, 2011
Another rare find. This is a 1976 copyright, gothic mystery/horror novel. Absorbing saga, part mystery, part ghost story, spanning several generations, beginning with the civil war era. I was a little disappointed with the explanation of events, but, overall not too bad. Nice tidy ending, giving everyone peace at last.
September 21, 2009
Gothic spooky following the lives of 5 different women from the 1860's through the 1970's, and how all their lives were connected by the strong presence of a Civil War soldier named Gil. Very creepy and atmospheric.
December 13, 2015
FOUND! I've been looking for this book for ages! First read it as a young teen so it was probably my first experience with "adult" paranormal/romance. I remember this as being loaded with creepy fun. Actually, based on the other reviews, my memories are clearer than I gave credit so I'm not sure why it took so long to find. But Yay! Now I need to track down a copy. ;-)
October 5, 2019
I thoroughly enjoyed this one. It started out slow, but as I got further into it, it grabbed my interest. I kept trying to figure out what it all meant. I had an idea, but wasn't sure until the end of the book. Chilling, ideal for Halloween. Nothing gorey, just a good ghost story.
August 14, 2021
Pleasently surprised by this gothic romance. A classic ghost but well written and the mystery keeps you reading.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews