Savage Bride

by Cornell Woolrich

编辑推荐：
康奈尔·伍里奇是西方悬疑小说的鼻祖，其作品内容多为悬疑、推理、探案、惊悚，充满悬疑色彩。其系列小说出版后，曾被改编成40余部好莱坞大片，风靡欧美、东南亚等国家和地区。催生了希区柯克等著名导演。近年来，又被竞相改编成电视剧、广播剧、音乐剧，在国外青年观众中掀起了新一轮热潮。
现故事会公司邀请国内权威翻译家，会同“人猿泰山系列”图书策划编辑原班人马，倾力打造的国内第一套完整“康奈尔·伍里奇小说系列”小说（全套18册）即将由上海文艺出版社出版。经典翻译，原汁原味，惊悚悬疑，扣人心弦，比电影更有情节，比网剧更有味道，敬请关注。

作者介绍：
作者康奈尔·伍里奇，西方黑色悬疑小说鼻祖，在西方通俗小说史上有重要地位。著有《黑衣新娘》等16部小说，这些小说多次被搬上电影电视屏幕，并被译成几十种文字，畅销世界各地。

内容简介：
公司职员拉里偶然的机会救下异国女郎米蒂，二人因此相识，结为夫妻。新婚旅途中，却发现米蒂举止反常，行为怪异。急于弄清真相的拉里步步惊心，被一步步带入死亡之谷，成为阶下之囚，在那里，他有了惊人的发现……

Genres: Mystery, Thriller, Noir, Horror, Crime, Fiction

178 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1950

About the author

Cornell Woolrich is widely regarded as the twentieth century’s finest writer of pure suspense fiction. The author of numerous classic novels and short stories (many of which were turned into classic films) such as Rear Window, The Bride Wore Black, The Night Has a Thousand Eyes, Waltz Into Darkness, and I Married a Dead Man, Woolrich began his career in the 1920s writing mainstream novels that won him comparisons to F. Scott Fitzgerald. The bulk of his best-known work, however, was written in the field of crime fiction, often appearing serialized in pulp magazines or as paperback novels. Because he was prolific, he found it necessary to publish under multiple pseudonyms, including "William Irish" and "George Hopley" [...] Woolrich lived a life as dark and emotionally tortured as any of his unfortunate characters and died, alone, in a seedy Manhattan hotel room following the amputation of a gangrenous leg. Upon his death, he left a bequest of one million dollars to Columbia University, to fund a scholarship for young writers.

Source: [http://www.hardcasecrime.com/books_bi...]

Reviews

[Andy Weston · Rating 3 out of 5]

This action-packed novel starts with Larry Jones, a naive young hero, eloping with Mitty, a young woman raised in isolation by step-parents who are scientists, bringing her up like an sort of experiment. The honeymooning couple miss their boat and get stuck on s Central American island where Mitty seems strangely drawn to the jungle and the tribes of natives incessantly pounding their drums. Suffice to say the Mitty, who appears to be a heroine at the outset, soon loses the reader’s sympathy.

Woolrich writes with great variety and you never know quite what to expect. This has more in common with H Rider Haggard than with any of his other work. It’s cinematic and entertaining, and as always with Woolrich, easy to read.

[L J Field · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am making a survey of Woolrich’s novels and this book was a complete surprise. It has no crime or mystery themes at all and is, in fact, a lost-race adventure/thriller in the same genre as H Rider Haggard’s classic works. It involves a man smitten with a woman who he has not even verbally communicated with. He helps her escape from a house where she appears to be held captive. They run off together and marry, then take a voyage up the coast of South America. Unexpectedly they are stranded on a seemingly large island. At this point, the woman becomes hopelessly enamored with territory on the other side of a mountain range. This area is known to the population to be uninhabited. We find that it is not. This really is a thrilling book that gradually fills in pieces of a puzzle. I enjoyed it very much.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Cornell Woolrich puts an everyman and a femme fatale into an H. Rider Haggard blender. Beware: These characters don't spit--they expectorate.

[EmBe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vor längerer Zeit als ausgemustertes Bibliotheksexemplar zu mir gelangt, wollte ich es eigentlich ungelesen entsorgem. Der Autor war mir als Autor der Schwarzen Serie bekannt, und auf dem Rücken war ein "Krimi"-Aufkleber. Nach dem Lesen der ersten Seiten war ich angefixt und ich war mir sicher, dass dies kein gewöhnlicher Krimi war. Ein junger Mann (Lawrence Kingsley Jones) verliebt sich spontan in eine schöne Frau, und ermöglicht ihr die Flucht aus dem Haus, in dem sie festgehalten wird. Sie heiraten sofort und begeben sich auf eine (Hochzeits)reise an deren Ende in San Francisco seine neue Arbeitsstelle wartet. Doch in Puerto Santo, einem Hafen irgendwo an der mittelamerikanischen Küste, gerät Mitty, wie die junge Frau heißt, in den Bann des Ortes, sie verlässt das Schiff und da Lawrence sie zu spät findet, stranden sie a diesem Ort. Mitty indes zieht es weiter zu einem Berg in der Ferne. Lawrence hofft, dass sich ihr besorgniserregender Zustand der Fixiertheit als Gast bei einem amerikanischen Kaffeeplantagen-Besitzer in der Nähe des Berges bessert. Mallory, der Besitzer nimmt sie freundlich auf. Er lebt hier mit seiner Teenager-Tochter Christine schon lange, und weiß auch nicht, was sich hinter dem Berg befindet. Die Einheimischen nennen das Land Tierra de los Muertos, und man redet nicht drüber. Doch mit der Ankunft Mittys nimmt das Geschehen einen dramatisch-düsteren Verlauf.
Als Leser weiß man schon, dass Mitty selbst nicht weiß, was mit ihr los ist denn sie weiß nichts mehr, was sie vor ihrer "Schlafkrankheit" war. Die Männer, die sie betreut und eingeschlossen haben, mussten ihr alles neu beibringen. Das alles mutet schon sehr rätselhaft an. Nun erfahren die Leser, wer Mitty wirklich ist
Woolrich erzählt auch vom Schicksal der beiden Männer, die Mitty in Baltimore festgehalten haben, und die dem Paar nachreisen.
Das Buch ist ein spekulativer Abenteuer-Roman, und einer der schwarzen Serie, weil düster. Eine Mischung aus Henry Rider Haggards "She" und einem Hardboiled Krimi. Mit einer typischen Femme Fatale, eben "die wilde Braut".
Sehr atmosphärisch und stilistisch eigenwillig erzählt, Woolrich spielt gekonnt auf der Klaviatur der Gefühle, wobei er natürlich die Moll-Töne bevorzugt. Und er ist auch ein Meister der Spannung. Sein Bild von Mittelamerika und seiner Vergangenheit ist nicht frei von Stereotypen der Zeit und seines Kulturkreises, aber das trübt das Leseerlebnis nicht.

[Fabio Pucci · Rating 3 out of 5]

Difficile commentare il romanzo in questione senza contare le iniziali aspettative che crea nello spettatore che vi si approccia senza sapere nulla della trama. Perché i primi quindici capitoli sono un capolavoro assoluto di poesia e suggestione, uno splendido, stratificato racconto ricchissimo sia nei contenuti che affiorano in superficie, con un'ottima descrizione di una vita di coppia problematica che si interfaccia con una serie di intrigantissimi misteri, sia per una serie di sottotesti di grande profondità (il primis: il fatto che nessun anello nuziale o stanza chiusa a chiave ti permetterà mai di possedere un'altra persona), il tutto con un ritmo narrativo impeccabile e con un'ambientazione messicana memorabile, sempre più rarefatta con lo scorrere delle pagine.
Poi, all'improvviso, le suggestioni prendono forma, e il capolavoro crolla. Ciò in cui il romanzo si trasforma è qualcosa di totalmente differente, di un genere ben definito che, onde evitare la sorpresa a chi sceglierà una lettura alla cieca, eviteremo di citare. Il ritmo rallenta, ma la scrittura mantiene il suo livello altissimo, con momenti di grande poesia e una forte dose di amarezza e, talvolta, di crudeltà. Il voto che diamo è inferiore alla media matematica tra i primi quindici capitoli (***** senza se e senza ma) e i restanti tredici (***), ma pesa il rimpianto di tale enorme promessa mancata, seppur in totale dignità.

***!

Letto in Mondadori, "Magia gialla", 1996, titolo: Frontiera sconosciuta

[Simona Moschini · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sono capaci tutti di scrivere la storia del tizio o tizia che sposa qualcuno d'impulso per poi scoprirne i lati, diciamo così, meno simpatici. Ma solo a Woolrich poteva riuscire, senza perdita di credibilità, un racconto lungo che getta il protagonista nel cuore di tenebra di un passato storico rimosso e dimenticato, che si dimostra invece tenacissimo nel rivendicare la sua esistenza e la sua cultura. Sto già spoilerando, non proseguo oltre per lasciare un po' di curiosità in chi vorrà leggerlo.

[Lotte · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fande ich sehr beeindruckend und wirklich schrecklich schauerlich. Musste es teilweise weglegen, weil es mich so gegruselt hat. Leider aber erst gegen Ende so spannend. Davor zieht es sich in die Länge.

[Casey Abell · Rating 1 out of 5]

Moral of the story: don't fall for an evil princess with a knack for human sacrifice. Also try not to laugh at this ridiculous hunk of bungle-in-the-jungle junk.

[Paul Hollis · Rating 3 out of 5]

First off, this is nothing like the noirish mysteries that Woolrich is famous for, like Rear Widow, I Married a Dead Man, etc.

This is an odd, old-fashioned(even in 1950 when it was published) story straight out of H. Rider Haggard with a touch of supernatural thrown in. I enjoyed it buy wouldn't read it again. If you like Haggard or Burroughs and don't mind some hokey oldfashionedness you'd enjoy it too.