The Dancing Floor

Sir Edward Leithen #3

by John Buchan

After reading The Dancing Floor, John Buchan's friend Greenslet wrote to the author, "I don't know when I have had more pleasure in reading one of your books. The essential fabric is highly romantic and attractive, and the handling and workmanship is, it seems to me, up to the level of the fable." The book's theme is that civilization can be reborn through its younger generation, whose innocence of the horrors of war and confidence in their ability to make a life are our hope for the future. This is also Buchan's first novel with a female protagonist; Kore Arabin is a feisty heroine who experiments with a modern lifestyle before being called to sterner duty.

Genres: Fiction, Adventure, Mystery, Classics, Thriller, British Literature

194 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1926

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.

John Buchan was a Scottish novelist, historian, and Unionist politician who served as Governor General of Canada, the 15th since Canadian Confederation.
As a youth, Buchan began writing poetry and prose, fiction and non-fiction, publishing his first novel in 1895 and ultimately writing over a hundred books of which the best known is The Thirty-Nine Steps. After attending Glasgow and Oxford universities, he practised as a barrister. In 1901, he served as a private secretary to Lord Milner in southern Africa towards the end of the Boer War. He returned to England in 1903, continued as a barrister and journalist. He left the Bar when he joined Thomas Nelson and Sons publishers in 1907. During the First World War, he was, among other activities, Director of Information in 1917 and later Head of Intelligence at the newly-formed Ministry of Information. He was elected Member of Parliament for the Combined Scottish Universities in 1927.
In 1935, King George V, on the advice of Canadian Prime Minister R. B. Bennett, appointed Buchan to succeed the Earl of Bessborough as Governor General of Canada and two months later raised him to the peerage as 1st Baron Tweedsmuir. He occupied the post until his death in 1940. Buchan promoted Canadian unity and helped strengthen the sovereignty of Canada constitutionally and culturally. He received a state funeral in Canada before his ashes were returned to the United Kingdom.

Reviews

[Eleanor · Rating 2 out of 5]

All pretty wildly improbable, but okay as a holiday read.

[Leslie · Rating 3 out of 5]

2023 reread: Yup, the paranormal aspects are just too much for me. There are some paranormal or mystical touches in some of Buchan's other books (in Greenmantle for example) but not as prominent as in this book.

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2018 review:
This is the 3rd book in the Sir Edward Leithen series by John Buchan and the one I liked the least so far. I liked the setting but there was too much 'touch of the mystical' for me about both Vernon & the plot in general.

[Cathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

John Buchan first explored the idea for the novel in a supernatural short story called ‘Basilissa’ published in Blackwood’s Magazine in April 1914. The story was inspired by a cruise John Buchan and his wife, Susan, made in the company of friend Gerard Craig Sellar in 1910. Later Buchan expanded his short story to novel length, adding the character Sir Edward Leithen, who had first appeared in The Power-House. The novel sees Leithen and the young man he befriends, Vernon Milburne, make a similar voyage during which they stop at the (invented) island of Plakos.

Structured in three sections, the first part of the book sees Sir Edward Leithen become acquainted with two young people, Vernon Milburne, and Kore Arabin, both of whom turn to him for help. Initially, Leithen is sceptical about the significance of Vernon’s recurring dream. He also finds himself disinclined to help Kore, finding her aloof and arrogant. (Slim and boyish, she is somewhat of a typical John Buchan heroine.) However, Leithen’s feelings change as he learns more about her situation and the danger she faces – and is determined to confront – on the island of Plakos.

The second part of the book involves Leithen’s arrival on the island and attempts to gain entry to the house where Kore has found herself imprisoned by the superstitious and vengeful locals. The house is the site of unspecified evil, immoral deeds carried out by Kore’s father and grandfather, for which the villagers seek revenge. The final part centres on events from Vernon’s point of view and the book’s dramatic conclusion, coinciding with the Christian festival of Easter and ancient pagan rituals for the arrival of Spring.

In The Dancing Floor, Buchan explores some familiar themes such as the conflict between sacred and pagan, reason and superstition, civilization and anarchy. For example, at one point, Leithen describes feeling himself on ‘the razor-edge of life’. The Greek concept of ‘temenos’, a sacred place reserved for worship of ancient gods or pagan rituals, embodied in this case by the Dancing Floor, is also a feature.

I’m not sure I can be quite as enthusiastic as Buchan expert, Kate Macdonald, who argues The Dancing Floor demonstrates Buchan’s ‘complete mastery of plotting’. She praises the way the reader is ‘lulled into accepting absurd and impossible coincidences because of the need to know what happens next’. Admittedly my experience is coloured by having read the book before but, to me, the coincidences were just a little too unlikely, such as all the key players ending up in the same place at the same time, and in one case by pure chance. However, as you would expect from a Buchan novel, the story moves along at a swift pace and there is a particularly powerful scene in which Leithen and a comrade participate in the Greek Easter ritual through the silent, empty village whose inhabitants have deserted it to await events on the Dancing Floor.

‘We were celebrating but there were no votaries. The torches had gone to redden the Dancing Floor, sorrow had been exchanged for a guilty ecstasy, the worshippers were seeking another Saviour. Our rite was more than a commemoration, it was a defiance, and I felt like a man who carries a challenge to the enemy.’

#ReadJB2019

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an expanded version of a short story, first published in 1914, called 'Basilissa'. I've read it in a volume of Buchan's weird fiction published by Penguin Classics, 'The Strange Adventures of Mr. Andrew Hawthorn and other stories'. Edward Leithen, Buchan's barrister/MP protagonist isn't present in the original story, which may explain why his role in this narrative isn't really pivotal so much as that of a fly on the wall, albeit a fly whose paths intersect with those of the main players in a number of ways.

On the other hand, other things are drawn in greater detail - the two young people whom the story revolves around emerge as distinctive characters, especially Kore Arabin, the Basilissa of the title. The crisis of the story, although quite close, is also improved.

The plot draws on the idea of archaic survivals, of regression to ancient, primitive rituals. So much of the novel is spent unravelling exactly who Kore Arabin is and why she is in so much danger back on the Greek isle where her family holds a vast estate that I feel loth to reveal too much. Let's just say that her family's bad behaviour was epic, and she is being forced to pay the price in a blood ritual that was previously forgotten even by scholars of Greek legend. Thrilling stuff, but just as fascinating is the case of Vernon Milburne, an intelligent, decent but somewhat austere and cold young man who has been haunted all his life by a dream. In the dream, which arrives at the same time each year, he is in a room and - something - he is not sure what has come one room closer to him. He is convinced that it, and a life-changing crisis, will overtake him in his 24th year. How his paths intersect with Kore's and what it all means are fascinating revelations, full of drama and also a sense of timeless, archetypal legend.

Come to think of it, this is heady stuff and best experienced, literarily, at a remove. And that makes Leithen the ideal man to narrate this novel. He is prosaic enough to rebel against the more wild implications of what is going on, intelligent enough to realise their basis and imaginative enough to harbour a spark of faith in the fantastic. Buchan had clearly read Frazer at some point, and possibly some Freud and Jung, and while you don't have to agree with any of their theories to enjoy this novel, it makes for a great bedrock of ideas on which to build a story. Buchan's ability to mix visceral action, the long tense stretches of suspense, musings on civilization and humanity and mythic themes into a novel are at the forefront here. It's a little different from the best of the Hannay novels where one is thrown into the midst of intrigue and conflict, but Leithen seems to have been a bit of a peg for Buchan to hang some of his own pet speculation on.

[Narin · Rating 4 out of 5]

In an effort to gain some perspective, I spent this Christmas break rereading old favorites. Incidentally, the first time I read John Buchan's The Dancing Floor, in 2010, was also during a Christmas break. At the time, the story of Vernon, Kore, and Leithen comforted me. An attempt at re-experiencing those feelings and thoughts drew me back to this book.

Though I read this book with different - older - eyes than I did the first time around, my hope of comfort was not disappointed. John Buchan writes beautifully. The image of the "mailed virgin", of the soul standing defiantly against evil or unfortunate circumstances, is still one of the most poignant descriptions of courage I've ever read. Moreover, I appreciate its articulation by Sir Edward Leithen, whose general sobriety makes its romanticism stand out all the sharper without veering into melodrama.

I think perhaps that's why, even after 6 years, I can still say I love this book so much. It doesn't try too hard to make a point or get through to the reader. It just stands, sober, robust, and unapologetic, and so it pierces the mind almost effortlessly. I wish more books did that.

[Eugene · Rating 5 out of 5]

As I was reading this, I was struck by how much of it would probably make a modern editor howl with outrage. The relatively slow start, the exposition, the fact that the protagonist (Edward Leithen) is himself relatively passive and ineffective and more of a witness to the action, the coincidences, etc., etc.

BUT

What do modern editors know?

I thoroughly enjoyed this story and was fascinated by the build-up to what was a very satisfying adventure story cum psychological thriller. One of John Buchan's many strengths as a writer is his ability to bring setting to life. Whether it is a small yacht running before a storm in the Aegean, or a misty landing on an half-seen shore of a mysterious Greek island, I am there with the protagonists.

Five stars, a great read in my humble opinion.

[Alex Sarll]

I've never read a John Buchan novel before, though I've definitely seen at least one film version of The Thirty-Nine Steps, albeit maybe not all in one sitting. Acquired a couple as a kid, vaguely planning to get around to them one day – yes, I have been doing that for more than three decades now – but in the intervening years, I'd come to suspect all that patriotic pluck might have dated just a tad. What I have read, though, are a couple of his short stories, which surprised me, having ancient survivals right out of Arthur Machen sapping the vitality of Britons gone astray. And I forget where, but I got the impression that this novel was along similar lines. So it initially seems, with young Vernon Milburne haunted since childhood by an annually recurring dream like something from House Of Leaves – trapped in a room which leads on to a series of identical rooms, a nameless, terrible Something coming one room closer every year. The narrator, MP and authorial stand-in Sir Edward Leithen, is the first person he's ever told about this dream, which rather begs the question of why Sir Edward feels it's OK to publish it, given what a reserved and proper cove he is in most respects, but never mind. The ascetic yet haunted figure of Milburne set me expecting something like EF Benson's The Inheritor with a regime of cold showers to ward off the beastliness, but then the book introduces its third key player, Kore Arabin. Brash daughter of a monstrous father, she was raised on a Greek island where her grandfather established a sort of fiefdom, and her dad then turned it over to vice and infamy. Now, because the narrator is very stiff upper lip, and his feelings of admiration for the younger and very handsome Milburne are emphatically no homo, the novel is as vague on what Shelley Arabin actually got up to as Lovecraft ever was about his nameless rites. Yes, there are various frowning allusions to Gilles de Rais and the corruption of youth, but given how deeply disapproving Leithen is of all the fashions which what he would never call the Jazz Age has brought to the post-War world, that's still not enough for the modern reader to know whether the dead man was a Mediterranean Jimmy Savile, or just threw really banging parties. Either way, the islanders hated the guy, and so did Kore. But after a bad harvest and a cruel winter, they still think of her as responsible for the crimes of her forebears, and more, and now some very old ideas about how to deal with that have bubbled to the surface. But, headstrong young thing that she is, she won't be told, and is determined to stick it out at the family villa. Can Vernon and Sir Edward rescue her before it's too late?

So far, that sounds a lot like The Wicker Man with better weather, doesn't it? Classic pagan village conspiracy stuff. Old rites of sacrifice, harvest, outsider sanctified as victim. And I was expecting the main difference to be that in The Dancing Floor, a couple of plucky Brits would get in with a spot of derring-do, show Johnny Foreigner what-for, and get their countrywoman out safe - one in the eye for the old ways, what? Which is not altogether absent, but what I expected is a long way from what I got. For one thing, think about the participants. In The Wicker Man, or Lovecraft, or even a modern version like Midsommar, the weird sex stuff and the bloody sacrifices are the same faction, aren't they? Whereas here it's the islanders who've turned from a somewhat old-fashioned Christianity to a far more ancient paganism, bloodthirsty yet pure, whereas the orgies were Arabin and the incomers, who may have been dabbling in diabolism but probably more as symptom than cause. Two different and opposed players, with the reasonably rational, mostly modern Brits not in favour of either, thank you very much. Perhaps it was Buchan's own experience in politics that contributed to this extra nuance, an awareness that in fact your enemy's enemy, while potentially useful in their way, can also be your enemy? But nor are the Brits quite the conquering heroes here, none of their daring rescue plans going altogether to plan, and very much tempted at times by the mystical currents swirling on Plakos. And from the off they're a little less chauvinistic than I'd anticipated; certainly there's a fascination with national/racial characteristics which can't help but read a little queasily now, but it's not always to Britons' credit, as when Leithen, the first time he sees Milburne, assumes the boy must have some foreign blood because of his "silken reserve. We of the North are apt to be angular in our silences; we have not learned the art of gracious reticence." And the book has something of that same characteristic, taking much longer than I'd expected to get going. The introduction to my edition makes much of Buchan as a more varied writer than he's sometimes been remembered as, and I consider myself suitably chastised; pretty much half of this novel is taken up with slowly building the tension, moving the pieces into place, setting up everyday social relations which we can then see upended. Even the Great War, which you'd think might have been used to string adrenaline junkie readers along, is emphatically backgrounded (and their pandemic, so much deadlier than ours, gets one passing mention, and only as it affected the benighted island rather than anywhere urban). And yet for all that these sections can be slow, I never found them dull, because as well as all the psychologically fascinating stuff about an older breed of Englishman reluctantly coming to terms with a changed era, Buchan is very good at writing beautifully about nature – something which will also stand him in good stead later when, in the numinous meadow which gives the book its name, the characters will find themselves trembling in that hinterland where the border between nature and supernature suddenly falls away. It's weird; lately I've been getting through a lot of folk horror, not least thanks to that bonkers Severin Blu-ray box set, and also a lot of the Good Twenties thanks to the centenary of Ulysses and The Waste Land. But in its resolute non-Modernism (in multiple senses), its existence at an odd angle to what would become the pathways of folk horror, this book feels less like a bridge between the two than the bridge's reflection in the waters beneath.

[Hugo · Rating 1 out of 5]

Pompous, bumptious self-aggrandisement of The Author as hero; takes an age to get going and then stops dead as The Hero, despite setting out his stall as being well above the 'lower classes', can't manage to land a boat and visit a castle. I have other things I could be doing.

[dragonhelmuk · Rating 4 out of 5]

Amazing read, Buchan delivers once again. Leithan the lawyer has an adventure in some of the islands of Greece, where the inhabitants haven’t yet given up the classical Greek religion, along with attendant human sacrifice. This book is very reminiscent to his short story “The Wind in the Portico” and marks a big change from John Macnab in that the storyline admits some almost fantastic elements in places. I actually enjoyed this one more than some of the final Richard Hanney books, and having an older character is starting to grow on me. Three quotes:

{Buchan accepting post-war women!}
I remembered a phrase which Vernon had once used about "the mailed virgin." It fitted this girl, and I began to realize the meaning of virginity. True purity, I thought, whether in woman or man, was something far more than the narrow sex thing which was the common notion of it. It meant keeping oneself, as the Bible says, altogether unspotted from the world, free from all tyranny and stain, whether of flesh or spirit, defying the universe to touch even the outworks of the sanctuary which is one's soul. It must be defiant, not the inert fragile crystal, but the supple shining sword. Virginity meant nothing unless it was mailed, and I wondered whether we were not coming to a better understanding of it. The modern girl, with all her harshness, had the gallantry of a free woman. She was a crude Artemis, but her feet were on the hills. Was the blushing, sheltered maid of our grandmother's day no more than an untempted Aphrodite?

{Buchan on the first world war}
There has been a good deal of nonsense talked about the horror of war memories and the passionate desire to bury them. The vocal people were apt to be damaged sensitives, who were scarcely typical of the average man. There were horrors enough, God knows, but in most people's recollections these were overlaid by the fierce interest and excitement, even by the comedy of it. At any rate that was the case with most of my friends, and it was certainly the case with me. I found a positive pleasure in recalling the incidents of the past four years. The war had made me younger. You see--apart from regular officers--I had met few of my own year and standing. I had consorted chiefly with youth, and had recovered the standpoint of twenty years ago. That was what made my feeble body so offensive. I could not regard myself as a man in middle age, but as a sick undergraduate whose malady was likely to keep him out of the Boat or the Eleven.

{Latin as a lingua franca}
It was borne in on me that at any price I must find some means of communicating with him, for my hour of action was approaching. I tried him in French, but he never lifted his head. Then it occurred to me that even a priest of the Greek Church must know a little Latin. I used the English pronunciation, and though he did not understand me, he seemed to realize what tongue I was talking, for he replied in a slow, broad Latin. I could not follow it, but at any rate we had found a common speech. I tore a page from my notebook and was about to write, when he snatched it and the pencil from my hand. There was something he badly wanted to say to me. He hesitated a good deal, and then in laborious capitals he wrote: "Si populus aliquid periculi tibi minatur, invenies refugium in ecclesia." Then he scored out "refugium" and wrote in "sanctuarium." "Quid periculi?" I wrote. He looked at me helplessly, and spread out his hands. Danger, he seemed to suggest, lay in every quarter of the compass. We used up five pages in a conversation in the doggiest kind of style. My Latin was chiefly of the legal type, and I often used a word that puzzled him, while he also set me guessing with phrases which I suppose were ecclesiastical. But the result was that he repeated the instructions he had given me through Maris. If I was to enter the House, the only way was by the Dancing Floor--it took me some time to identify "locus saltatorum"--and to climb the great wall which separated it from the demesne. But it would be guarded, probably by the "incolæ montium," and I must go warily, and not attempt it till the moon was down. Also I must be back before the first light of dawn.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

In some ways, it's easy to tell this was expanded from a much shorter story to a full book.

But in many other ways, it's a deliciously atmospheric slow-burn thriller with shades of Greek mythos and WickerMan-esque paganism crashing against deep-rooted Christianity.

Also, the finale put me in mind of this quote from Lewis' TLB: "This fool of an Ape, who didn't believe in Tash, will get more than he bargained for! He called for Tash: Tash has come."

4.5 stars

[Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Part character-study, part thriller, part cult horror, The Dancing Floor is an arresting and unusual adventure. Full review for John Buchan June at the blog.

[Alice · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought I loved only Hannay, but I got very into this tale of Greek islands harbouring dark ancient rituals, narrated in classic 'yarn told in the smoking-room at the club' style.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of Buchan's best! This book is mystic in nature combined with action and a great plot. This would make a superb movie.

[Igenlode Wordsmith · Rating 4 out of 5]

This reminds me oddly of Mary Stewart's Greek-island thrillers, with their protagonists' glimpsed echoes of a numinous classical past- either it's a common illusion imposed upon the exotic setting by remnants of a public school education, or Greece in the pre-package-holiday era, at least in the remote areas, actually did retain that air of continuity...

According to the footnotes in this edition Leithen, the narrator, is a returning Buchan character, though I don't think I remember coming across him before. He is a somewhat unusual choice of protagonist in that he is a middle-aged lawyer (and indeed an elected Member of Parliament, although evidently a somewhat absentee one!) who by his own admission isn't much use with a pistol, though his hobbies include advanced rock-climbing and he is physically fit for his age. But another unusual choice is that there isn't actually any villain in this thriller, despite the fact that Leithen arrives with an entourage of hired soldiers in order to try to rescue the damsel in distress (although they almost all run away and she ends up rescuing herself, or at least without any practical assistance from him).

It's a Wicker Man type story of credulous peasants whose ancestral grudges and hardships lead them into a quasi-religious frenzy of belief that they must 'sacrifice' the last remaining heir of their oppressors and burn down the building in order to bring back prosperity... but ultimately nobody on either side is actually killed and no grudges are held, while the protagonist himself gets a glimpse of very real power in the place and speaks of one man's superstition being another man's true faith. None of the English characters are particularly fervent believers, and when Leithen finds himself assisting the local priest against his recalcitrant flock it is not out of a tradition of muscular Christianity but more out of a sense of clinging to the one bulwark of familiarity in a world gone mad.

Another interesting element is in the book's depiction of an older generation coming to terms with social change after the Great War (of which Buchan remarks, presumably autobiographically, that there is a lot of nonsense talked about people being traumatised and never speaking about it again, but that in his experience most men are happy to yarn reminiscently about the bits that they remember as funny episodes or the general camaraderie). Initially Leithen is tolerant of the frenetic excesses of the young, but regards their taste in music, clothes and dancing as deplorable, but quite early on his perception starts to shift to a gradual admiration of the new young women, with their direct manners, short hair and straight clothes; in keeping with the themes of the book he ends up with the comparison between Artemis and Aphrodite, and not in favour of the soft, clinging Aphrodite but of the 'mailed virgin' who fights her own path.

It's strange to realise that in the 1920s it was still possible for a young woman to have had a grandfather who knew Byron personally and exchanged letters with Castlereagh...

[Ed · Rating 3 out of 5]

Looking for a ‘good yarn’ to read over the holiday period I returned to a favourite author of the old fashioned mystery/thriller genre. Having enjoyed an Edward Leithen novel at a similar time last year I chose another in the series. However this proved to be a somewhat different confrontation between the forces of good and evil from Buchan’s normal fare. The setting was a Greek island whose inhabitants have rejected Christianity for a belief system based on the ancient gods and the need for human sacrifice to appease them. In this respect the novel had similarities to ‘The Magus’ leading me to speculate whether John Fowles had read it and been influenced by it.

Rather like The Magus the plot was somewhat far-fetched. It provided a vehicle for the author to espouse his philosophical views on what constitutes a virtuous life. For modern day readers his values will seem somewhat dated. His heroes are Anglo-Scots, males, Oxbridge educated, athletic usually with a military background. They are able to judge an individual’s character incisively from their looks, deportment and minimum of actions. This intuitive ability enables them to quickly distinguish those who can be relied on to ‘to do the right thing’ from the villains of piece. This simplistic characterisation and the fanciful plot made for an enjoyable read marred by a somewhat lengthy description of one of the characters explorations of the island. A suitably escapist novel in keeping with the relaxed nature of the festive season.

[Serena Series · Rating 4 out of 5]

“A girl whom I loved and a man who was my companion were imprisoned and at the mercy of a maddened populace.”


just like I have already said before, John Buchan has this talent for writing that well in stories that deal with the most ridiculous scenario ever. and the problem is that I still enjoy it - it's so absurd, isn't it? at first I was very happy with it being a real first person viewpoint so it felt promising to me. 


“I was struggling with something which I had never known before, a mixture of fear, abasement and a crazy desire to worship. Yes – to worship.”


I grew disappointed in witnessing how submissive Edward was as he pushed inland. I had thought of Edward a very clever man so far and it felt like a mischaractherizing. it was giving The Three Hostages plot. also, the love story was weak. and, even though all of these not liked elements, I still appreciate John Buchan's dedication to adventure so I always wanted to know what comes next so this is also a good job at the same time. decent I'd say.

[Bill Lawrence · Rating 2 out of 5]

I've read a couple of John Buchan's novels, both enjoyed, but this was didn't work for me. It is ponderous, a lot of description that is repeated and drawn out. Very early on there is a wild coincidence when Leithen, after walking the hills and injuring himself struggles to find his way to the first house where he can get help and just happens to be the house, in the middle of nowhere, of someone he knows. And so it goes. It plods along for about 80 pages before we arrive at the wholly predictable point and then staggers on for another 150 to the end with little in the way of surprise, as the conclusion seems wholly inevitable. It is always a problem when the characters cannot see the blindingly obvious. And then the occasional plot holes. I don't think it was helped having an introduction by Robin Hardy, who I assume is the director of The Wicker Man, so that connection does give a strong clue as to the nature of book. All very disappointing.

[Sally · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not my favorite John Buchan. Sir Edward Leithen, a continuing character in Buchan novels, befriends Vernon Milbourne, a school friend of his nephew, and hears about his continuing dreams of some strange and momentous event, which seems to get closer every year. Leithen also makes the acquaintance of Kore Arabin, daughter of a rich and wicked man who owns a huge villa on an isolated part of Greece. She acts the modern woman, but is determined to do right by the people who her father harmed. She returns to the villa, only to discover that the people have reverted to pagan ways, and plan to sacrifice her to put things to right. Leithen and Vernon arrive in time to effect her escape, through tapping in to Greek mythology. Sort of silly and overwrought.

[Jay Rothermel · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Dancing Floor is a superb novel braiding pagan and Christian, ancient and modern, youth and age, Fate and ingenuity, family shame and family honor. Its characters traverse landscape and social obligations in England and on the small Greek island of Plakos. The larger imperial island in the northwest of Europe is in the thick of post-bellum metropolitan life; in southeast Europe, on Plakos,  ancient folkways are barely below the surface: in the island cemetary peasants still keep lamps at relatives' grave-heads to ward off vampires.

Full review:
http://jayrothermel.blogspot.com/2021...

[Keeley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This "villagers crazed by ancient superstition" adventure takes a long time to get started and has summer predictable elements, but the later part of the book is classic Buchan adventure. I appreciated the literal references throughout -- Arnold's "Empedocles on Etna"??? I read the Oxford World's Classics edition, and the introduction by Deegan, which I read after the book of course, was pretty interesting in how it showed the changes Buchan made to an earlier short story. She argues convincingly that the plot was better balanced in the original story, but that Vernon and Koré have become more developed characters in the novel.

[Viva · Rating 2 out of 5]

I liked the 39 steps (Hannay #1), so I tried book 2 of the Hannay series but it was overly complicated and overly written, when it could have been more straightforward. I decided to give a different series from Buchan a try just to see what it was like. Unfortunately, it just meandered on and on seemingly without a plot. I got to 20% of it before dnf'ing it. The art and skill of writing fiction has really just improved a lot. This might have been considered a good book in 1914 but the writing was just too archaic for me.

[James Cary · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m glad I read this book, as it’s got all the hallmarks of a Buchan thriller, but with an added element of spiritual warfare, which is a nice twist. For a writing point of view, there are a few things that bother me, mainly a bit of a coincidence towards the end, plus the middle section contains quite a lot of wandering about it. But it’s an interesting read nonetheless.

[Genevieve · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the beginning to the middle of the book, but the pacing took a remarkable nosedive in what should have been the most thrilling sections, even given stylistic preferences of the time period.

Content warning for one slur, and stereotypical attitudes of the time. Not at all a must-read, but the author definitely has a flair to his writing that draws you in.

[Alayne · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was another quite exciting John Buchan story. However, the reason for 4 rather than 5 stars is that, as the climax was coming, the author lapsed into a whole lot of descriptive writing instead of just getting on with the story and I must confess, I skipped a lot of it.

[Hannah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable.

[Stephen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not one of Buchan's best

[GeraniumCat · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although somewhat flawed, I found this very enjoyable. I shall go back to some of Buchan's short stories over the summer.

[Jeanne Symonds · Rating 3 out of 5]

He spins a good yarn and eloquently, but it’s very dated with unattractive chauvinism.

[Emily · Rating 2 out of 5]

Gone half-mythic like later Conan-Doyle

[Maria Longley · Rating 2 out of 5]

Odd. First half starts well and then it goes rather paranormal and gets more and more of its time, which I wasn't particularly in the mood for... Sir Edward Leithen is our narrator and witness to the story although not full protagonist and we bounce between London+ and a small Greek island with a menacing aura. The Dancing Floor is the name of the house and I kept forgetting that and being confused about the title.