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Because it is a love story to readers and writers. This just might be my favorite book if 2007, just as Elantris was my favorite of 2006. I will be hard-pressed, I think, to find another book that immediately enfolded me in its mystery and charm, leaving me dazed in my everyday activities as I contemplated the characters and plot. Every character is tangible and sympathetic, the setting is distinct, and the plot is original (to me, at least). The style is romantic in the classic sense of the word, yet entirely believable given the narrator's (Margaret) deep appreciation of books. We're never given a time period, yet I'm left with the impression that Margaret lives in the 1930s, 40s, or perhaps even 1950s.

Reading this book left me with sensations of DuMarier's Rebecca, Bronte's Wuthering Heights, LeFanu's The Wyvern Mystery, and other such romantic, gothic, books. Read it for the intense characterizations. Read it to know the language of a bibliophile speaking with another bibliophile, describing favorite works. I feel as though The Thirteenth Tale has changed me and so my writing: it's let me believe that there are readers willing to entertain a more romantic and classic style from a modern author, and that is good news indeed.

Originally posted at http://worderella.com/2007/05/book-the-thirteenth-tale/

The genre for this book is gothic novel. It was my mother's favorite kind of book. Because I didn't want to go against my mom, and because it was at least a way to have books to read, I read a plethora of gothic novels as a teen. In fact, it was just about the only sort of story I read.

So lots of elements of this story were familiar to me: the governess who comes to live with a family, a remote castle-like home, the mists of the moors, a silent bachelor, strange servants, possible ghosts, mysterious death, the elevated language.

The gothic elements put me off a bit because of overfamiliarity; that won't happen to you, I imagine, so set that aside. It's related, for the most part, as if the various characters are telling the stories of their lives, talking right to the reader, and that's quite appealing and quite novel. The sense of mystery and all the questions in my head kept me reading along at a brisk pace.

It was a satisfying book.

“I have always been a reader; I have read at every stage of my life, and there has never been a time when reading was not my greatest joy...“A book about love, secrets and ghosts.When the story of Margaret began so similar to us those who find joy in books, you get the feel that you are gonna enjoy the read, and i did. Gothic literature has never been my kind of reads, but I liked this one (surprisingly). As interesting as it was, for me, the ending wasn't up to the mark. Although the puzzle was complete, it still felt like some pieces were missing.

I was really excited to read this book because someone told that it was great and I thought that this could renew my love for books but ir wasn't. It was pretty interesting at the beginning but then... Was awful and extremely boring. It's all about Miss Winter's life and the thoughts of Margaret Lea. But her thoughts are boring, full of fear and strange ghosts that don't exist.And the life of Miss Winter is conpletely weird and the main characters as Charlie and Isabella are pyschotic and maniac, also the twins are... Just freaks.

I really wanted to like this book but unfortunately I couldn't. The only thing that I liked was some interesting quotes that I've found.

The premise of the book sounds interesting. It has nearly everything. A family secret, a ghost, twins, a mystery, a fire. Unfortunately the book becomes clogged with too much. The characters all start to blend. They appear for a handful of pages, then dissappear. When they reappear you're left struggling to remember who is who. At first I tried to separate the characters by what they did, the gardener, the twins. then the characters with those titles kept multiplying. Honestly, a book does not need more than 1 set of twins as main characters In a book. It became so confusing that I kept having to give up or flip back. It was like a sink full of dirty dishes and food scraps on thanksgiving night. There were thing everywhere. Cleaning the dishes should have been the main focus. Instead, in this book, the author decided to ignore the dishes and try to identify all the floating food scraps.

Dark and creepy mysteries. Family secrets. Brooding mansions. Dusty libraries. Crazy Bertha locked up in the opposite tower. Setterfield has pulled off a classic romantic mystery, although the worst her heroine Margaret suffers is a nasty cold from having wandered the gardens at night with no wrap. No knife-wielding crazy people chasing her, no suspicious young men befriending her, just an old lady who may or may not be telling her the truth.

Heavily influenced by the Bronte sisters and Yorkshire landscapes. If you thought Jane Eyre was stuffy or Wuthering Heights was creepy, you won't like this book.

Ми з цією книгою не зійшлись. Можливо, якби я прочитала її раніше, коли була більш impressionable, це склалось трохи по іншому. Але зараз для мене це тільки велика загадку, чому цю книгу так рекомендували всім і з будь якого приводу.

Я не відчувала емоційної прив'язаності до жодного з героїв, більшість з них викликали в мене тільки різні ступені роздратування. Закрученість стилю авторки з одного боку перешкоджала сюжету, а з іншої хоч якось мене розважала своєю гіперболізованістю.

Загалом, я дуже сильно відчувала нестачу одного дуже важливого персонажа - психіатра, який би поговорив з кожним з героїв.

Книгу читала для книжкового клубу і це єдине, що змусило мене дочитати. Зате обговорення було класним))

Fragments that caught my attention:

“People disappear when they die. Their voice, their laughter, the warmth of their breath. Their flesh. Eventually their bones. All living memory of them ceases. This is both dreadful and natural. Yet for some there is an exception to this annihilation. For in the books they write they continue to exist. We can rediscover them. Their humor, their tone of voice, their moods. Through the written word they can anger you or make you happy. They can comfort you. They can perplex you. They can alter you. All this, even though they are dead. Like flies in amber, like corpses frozen in ice, that which according to the laws of nature should pass away is, by the miracle of ink on paper, preserved. It is a kind of magic.”

“My gripe is not with lovers of the truth but with truth herself. What succor, what consolation is there in truth, compared to a story? What good is truth, at midnight, in the dark, when the wind is roaring like a bear in the chimney? When the lightning strikes shadows on the bedroom wall and the rain taps at the window with its long fingernails? No. When fear and cold make a statue of you in your bed, don't expect hard-boned and fleshless truth to come running to your aid. What you need are the plump comforts of a story. The soothing, rocking safety of a lie.”

I read this after following a lead on Olivia Coleman when we finished watching Broadchurch. I saw that she was to be in a televised version with Vanessa Redgrave. The story sounded intriguing so I downloaded the Audible version and made it my penultimate book for the 25-book challenge on Goodreads.

It started out very well indeed. In fact, rarely am I ever drawn into an audiobook quite so quickly. It was read by Jenny Agutter and she did a marvellous job of hooking me right away. As the tale progressed however, I found myself becoming less and less enchanted, so it gradually went down from five to four and ended up with three stars. It seemed to be trying hard to be literature in the style of Daphne du Maurier, and while it got close, the plot had too flimsy of an ending.

The TV adaptation was on the same day that I finished the book, but I didn't know until half an hour after it had started, so we saved it to watch on new year's eve. It was reasonably entertaining, but I feel that the two great performers weren't given the space to show us what they can really do. Shame.

This book took me a while to read, but now that I finally finished it, I'm happy I stayed with it. From the beginning, I couldn't predict how I would end up feeling about this one. Even after finishing, it is still hard for me to rate it. I like so much about it, yet at the same time I struggled with some parts of it. I settled on a rating of 3.5 out of 5 stars.

I will begin with what I like about the book. The writing is incredible. The author's style is very literary and reminds me of great writers I have studied. It felt almost like I was reading a Victorian novel. The atmosphere of the story is also a plus. The moody, Gothic feel of the novel is very well done. It is reminiscent of the writings of the Romantic period, which is my favorite literary period. The characters are interesting and mysterious, and I wanted to know more about their pasts. There is a bit of twist as the reader nears the end of the tale, which is always fun in a book. The book also deals with the idea of truth in storytelling, which is intriguing.

It is harder to explain what I do not like about the book. The whole “twin” relationship that is explored in the novel bothered me at times. There is a bit too much emphasis on it for my liking. The main character's obsession with her sister became annoying to me. I also found that some characters, like Charles, were not developed enough. In addition, the pace of the story is too slow at some points. This made it hard to stick with the book early on.

I am glad that I did continue reading this book. In the end, I really enjoyed it and would recommend it to anyone that enjoys a dark, moody read.

I picked this up because I adore the cover and the classic literature it references. However, in the end, I think it just wasn't really my genre (more contemporary fiction, whereas I prefer mystery these days). As a writer I can appreciate the voice of the narrative, but as a reader it felt a little pretentiously opaque rather than nostalgic . . . maybe I'm too removed from the author's world. The prose was lovely, certainly, but not something that made me personally love the characters or feel welcomed into the story: it was more something to be admired. There's certainly nothing wrong with that, particularly if you love contemporary lit and have a long afternoon ahead of you!

This book pulled me out of a long period lacking in spare-time reading (i.e., I had no brain power left over for spare-time reading), so I am grateful to it for that. It was fun in a bookish nerd kind of way, like the Thursday Next books, except with a ‘level-headed spinster intrigue' rather than ‘epic fantasy adventure' quality which, you know, is not necessarily a bad thing. Which actually means that this book and the Thursday Next series have little to nothing in common, so why do I even bring it up? Because I have nothing else to say about this book? This may be true. The ending came in sight long before the story was over, though, posing as a Big Reveal without a satisfactory payoff, so the ending was a bit of a letdown. Although I seem to feel that way about most books.

The Thirteenth Tale is a Gothic mystery, full of dark atmosphere and family shadows.

I wasn't sure what to expect when I started this one, but I've had it on my shelf for a while now and decided it was time to pick it up.

The pace is very slow for this one, and I'm sure that will put off a lot of readers. For me, it was perfect for the style of writing and for the underlying story. This was not meant to be fast, or even medium-paced.

The mystery surrounding the author, Vida Winter, and her story of beginnings, middles and endings was done very well. I did not expect the conclusion that came at the end.

Overall, a very dark and enjoyable read and one I recommend.