Rachel Cosgrove Payes: The House of Tarot
Sometime ago I made what seemed to be a miraculous find in the nearby Here Be Dragons used bookstore: a copy of Rachel Cosgrove Payes' The House of Tarot. Even better, I got it for free, which seemed really miraculous until I started reading it and discovered that once again the bookstore owner really knew her used books.
For those who have forgotten, Rachel Cosgrove Payes wrote The Hidden Valley in Oz, the serviceable but not great 39th book in the original Famous Forty Oz books. For whatever reason -- possibly the terrible illustrations -- the book didn't sell well, and the publishers turned to Eloise Jarvis McGraw and Lauren McGraw for the next book in the series. Cosgrove moved to writing romances, science fiction, and Gothic romances. The House of Tarot is a 1975 Gothic romance, and oh, it's terrible.
A few words about Gothic romances: the idea is pretty much standard: Girl arrives at old house which is sometimes crumbling, sometimes not, and finds herself wildly attracted to a Man with a mysterious past or a Man with a Strangely Compelling Personality. Mystery Ensues, usually combined with possible Very Real Ghosts and Insanity. The books have multiple variations -- Victoria Holt, a leader of the genre, sometimes said "oh, screw this" and refused to give her readers the expected happy ending (especially once she'd reached the level where she could do so and remain financially comfortable); Elizabeth Peters typically made fun of the entire genre (while milking it under her other pseudonym of Barbara Michaels); Mary Stewart played with the personalities of her male leads, and so on.
Payes flops on nearly every level.
Oh, she has the naive heroine (Amanda) and the Rival Woman with Questionable Motives (Toni) and the Mysterious House and Things That Go Bump in the Night. So far, so good. She's killed off the Man with the Brutal Personality early on in the novel (also good) replacing him in a sorta romantic role with the Man Who Is Just Really Boring (less good) and who May Or May Not Have Mysterious Motives But We Are All Yawning Too Much To Tell. Since Boring Man shows up early on I was expecting another Mysterious Stranger to show up, and he does, taking up the role of Surprisingly Boring Mysterious Stranger. And then not much happens apart from Thumping Things until The End when Amanda Must Escape.
It's the end where things really fail: Payes fails to provide the expected romance, or a reason for not having the expected romance, instead leaving something that's both vaguely dissatisfying and incoherent.
Nonetheless, I'm glad I read this -- it answered a nagging question I've had since doing my read through the Oz series -- which is, what could Payes have done with the series had she been allowed to continue? And alas, the answer seems to be, not much.
For those who have forgotten, Rachel Cosgrove Payes wrote The Hidden Valley in Oz, the serviceable but not great 39th book in the original Famous Forty Oz books. For whatever reason -- possibly the terrible illustrations -- the book didn't sell well, and the publishers turned to Eloise Jarvis McGraw and Lauren McGraw for the next book in the series. Cosgrove moved to writing romances, science fiction, and Gothic romances. The House of Tarot is a 1975 Gothic romance, and oh, it's terrible.
A few words about Gothic romances: the idea is pretty much standard: Girl arrives at old house which is sometimes crumbling, sometimes not, and finds herself wildly attracted to a Man with a mysterious past or a Man with a Strangely Compelling Personality. Mystery Ensues, usually combined with possible Very Real Ghosts and Insanity. The books have multiple variations -- Victoria Holt, a leader of the genre, sometimes said "oh, screw this" and refused to give her readers the expected happy ending (especially once she'd reached the level where she could do so and remain financially comfortable); Elizabeth Peters typically made fun of the entire genre (while milking it under her other pseudonym of Barbara Michaels); Mary Stewart played with the personalities of her male leads, and so on.
Payes flops on nearly every level.
Oh, she has the naive heroine (Amanda) and the Rival Woman with Questionable Motives (Toni) and the Mysterious House and Things That Go Bump in the Night. So far, so good. She's killed off the Man with the Brutal Personality early on in the novel (also good) replacing him in a sorta romantic role with the Man Who Is Just Really Boring (less good) and who May Or May Not Have Mysterious Motives But We Are All Yawning Too Much To Tell. Since Boring Man shows up early on I was expecting another Mysterious Stranger to show up, and he does, taking up the role of Surprisingly Boring Mysterious Stranger. And then not much happens apart from Thumping Things until The End when Amanda Must Escape.
It's the end where things really fail: Payes fails to provide the expected romance, or a reason for not having the expected romance, instead leaving something that's both vaguely dissatisfying and incoherent.
Nonetheless, I'm glad I read this -- it answered a nagging question I've had since doing my read through the Oz series -- which is, what could Payes have done with the series had she been allowed to continue? And alas, the answer seems to be, not much.