The Turn of the Screw

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James

The Turn of the Screw follows the life of a young unnamed governess as she makes an exciting journey to Bly House, the dreary property of an attractive yet equally distant and mysterious uncle who has employed her to govern his young niece Flora and nephew Miles. On the massive estate the governess is immediately taken with the uncle’s charm but her infatuation is somewhat crushed when she is informed, by the caretaker Mrs. Grose, that he is frequently away from Bly and that he prefers to handle business that way, in fact, he prefers to take a back-burner approach to anything that has to do with the children. Mrs. Grose also informs her that she’s not the first to fall in love with him, yet the previous governesses who were also so fond of him seem to have all mysteriously disappeared or suffered misfortunate fates. The children are introduced and are just as charming as their uncle but twice as affectionate and present. Yet, just when the governess seems to be enjoying her time at Bly and learning her place on the large estate strange noises and apparitions begin to stalk her. Frantic, she recounts these to Mrs. Grose who reluctantly admits that there were two previous employees, Peter Quint and Miss Jessel, who worked on the estate that match the descriptions of the apparitions that have been haunting the governess. The governess begins to calm down, rationalizing that these employees must have come back, only to learn that they had both died years ago. As the loving behavior of the children begins to shift to mischievous and hurtful antics the governess begins to wonder if she’s simply going mad or if the ghosts of Bly house are purposely using everything she loves against her.  

  

I found this book incredibly hard to get into. I really had to focus (as in turn off all electronics, background noise and stare at it until it makes sense). The writing style is aged, old century lingo with the narrator constantly using run on sentences and injecting opposing ideas into the middle of them. There’s also the issue of, at some points, not knowing exactly who it is that is speaking, which made it even more difficult to follow the storyline. When I reached the middle of the story however, (almost 59% through my Kindle says) the plot pace quickened and became increasingly interesting (or perhaps that was just the excitement of being more than half-way done with the book). If you’re into that old century feel and can withstand the somewhat annoying and confusing dialogue then this just might be the book for you.