The Wyvern Mystery

Rating: 4 of 5

Rife with Victorian Era mystery and intrigue, The Wyvern Mystery was my first encounter with J.S. Le Fanu, and I dug it.

There were times Le Fanu had me on the edge of my seat and other times laughing out loud, but always wondering what would happen to Alice. All the trappings of a soap opera - secret affairs, greed, betrayal, murder - yet written with such style and skill that I don't feel the least bit guilty for having enjoyed the melodramatic ride.

And what a ride it was; I thought for sure I'd solved the mystery at least three times only to have the next chapter ruin my prediction. Oh, and the foreboding, brilliant! I was so dang worried for Alice and at the same time more than a little peeved with her for being totally show more naive and oblivious; it was simultaneously exciting and nerve-racking.

My only complaint, if I were forced to make one, would be the story's pace. It definitely could've moved faster in certain areas; however, maybe that was just my impatience at wanting to solve the mystery and (hopefully) arrive at a happy ending?

Disclaimer: Not for anyone bored by 1869 prose, a slow pace and/or melodrama.

Fave bits:

"Something of the ghostly terrors of the nursery haunt us through life, and the tyrant of early days maintains a strange and unavowed ascendancy over the imagination long after his real power to inflict pain or privation has quite come to an end (p. 13)." spot on for those of us with such parents.

"The world will never be without sin, poverty, and attorneys...(p.59)" cracked me up!"

"It is a mistake to fancy that it is either a sign of love or conducive to its longevity that the happy pair should always pass the entire four-and-twenty hours in each other's company...(p.85)." And how true it is.

My reaction upon reading the last page: Well who woulda thunk it, I was fooled by 140-year-old mystery. I mean, I thought it might be what it was but everyone was so doggone shady (except Alice) that I couldn't be sure. Good times. show less

There are several mysteries regarding the Fairfield family of Wyvern house. One is how Charles Fairfield manages to stand without a spine. Another is if Henry Fairfield is loyal to his older brother or not. Perhaps male readers can understand how their father could imagine himself an acceptable bridegroom to a lady young enough to be his granddaughter. The most important mystery, the one involving a cunning, malevolent, and resorceful individual nicknamed 'the old soldier', is never truly answered.

Poor Alice Maybell is your basic sweet and helpless gothic heroine. Neither her old nurse, Ducibella Crane, nor her aunt, Lady Wyndale, are sharp enough to protect her. For women made of sterner stuff, we must look to Mildred Tarnley, the old show more servant at Charles' Carwell Grange, and Vrau Bertha Velderkast.

Spooky-looking Carwell Grange, where most of the action takes place, boasts a real touch of the supernatural. It's an ill omen for poor Alice and her misplaced affections. Everyone who tries to spare the girl's feelings ends up making her wretched with anxiety. She's innocent, not stupid.

The reader who enjoys an old-fashioned gothic will find plenty of atmosphere. Alice's upbringing and most of the men in her life provide plenty to shudder about. What she needed was some lessons in assertiveness, self-defense, and how to spot potential weapons in ordinary objects. Of course a proper lady wasn't going to get them in those days. She also has to face mortal danger in an isolated house without a car, landline or cell phone, e-mail, or even a carriage. I'd add a good pair of running shoes to the list if Alice had been in any condition to run at the time.

There are enough bad and happy endings available to, I think, satisfy this book's readers. show less

I had high hopes for J. Sheridan Le Fanu's The Wyvern Mystery. I heard of him in Dorothy Sayers' Gaudy Night; her character Harriet Vane is doing research on him and compares him favorably with one of my favorite Victorian sensationalist authors, Wilkie Collins. So of course I wanted to find out if I'd been missing anything. It turns out I really hadn't been. (Be warned: there are spoilers in this review.)

Oh, it's Gothic-y and ghost-y. Yes, it's tragic and stagily dramatic. Yes, people die and there are dark secrets galore. So why couldn't I settle in and enjoy it?

Firstly, I wasn't a big fan of Le Fanu's style. He switches between the past and present tenses for no apparent reason and the writing feels sloppy. He also uses contractions show more in the narrative, which is something I can't get used to in a "classic" work.

Secondly, the plot just didn't grab me. Young Alice Maybell is the ward of the old lord of Wyvern, Lord Fairfield, who is old enough to be her grandfather — and who wants to marry her. She runs away and marries his son Charles, an indolent but not wholly despicable man who is in severe financial difficulties. They remove to Carwell Grange, the property left to Charles by his mother. There Alice sees a vision that bodes ill to the Fairfield brides... and of course it starts coming true almost immediately. Tragedies of various kinds ensue, and sadly I didn't care enough about any of the characters to really be engaged with their struggles.

Not only that, but toward the end of the book Le Fanu introduces new characters in a new setting and completely drops the ones we'd been following for the first 200 pages. There were only a few pages left and I was starting to feel desperate. How will we ever wrap this up in time?

I did have a complaint about Bertha, the tall, blind, foul Dutchwoman. When Wilkie Collins does a foreign character, he does it right. The character's speech is heavily accented (yet still quite readable), and he/she displays an otherness that is very distinctive. Le Fanu's Bertha has the potential to be wonderfully creepy, but he doesn't make enough use of her. Her eventual death is so anti-climactic for such an unusual personage. And did he intentionally name her Bertha, in reference to Charlotte Bronte's mad-wife character Bertha in Jane Eyre? The Wyvern Mystery was published in 1869, 22 years after Bronte's famous novel. I wonder.

Another weakness in the story was that Le Fanu never explains how it was possible that there should be any ambiguity about whether or not Charles was married to Bertha. What kind of arrangement would lead to the marriage being questionable? Either you're married or you aren't. Divorce is never mentioned, so it wasn't that. It just doesn't make sense.

I was also a bit disappointed in the way the story didn't have much to do with the title. It's a nice title; "Wyvern" has such craggy edges to it and it would have been nice if the ill luck and hot blood of the Fairfields was linked to the symbol of their estate, the wyvern. Certainly their love of gold and fiery tempers were dragonish enough to warrant a comparison.

There were a couple good things. I enjoyed trying to figure out Harry throughout the book. I think there is a little ambiguity still about just how much of a villain he is. Yes, he wants the estate despite all his protestations to the contrary. He is a liar and a conniver. He switches the baby heir with a sick one from a workhouse, which dies according to plan. The real baby is sent to live in the country, with Harry pretending that it was his own natural son. Thankfully he has time before he dies to confess what he had done (another point in his favor that he would even confess it). But still, it was very dastardly. In some ways this story felt like Silas Marner gone wrong.

I have to confess that if I were to see another Le Fanu book at a library booksale, I would probably snatch it up in hopes that it would be better than this one. It had all the ingredients I usually enjoy; there was just something wrong with the way it was baked. show less

'The Wyvern Mystery' is not a novel of the supernatural,but a melodrama concerning the plight of a somewhat unlucky and unfortunate family.
Not a bad read,but I have to say it goes on a bit in the middle of the book. It also keeps quoting saws and sayings to an inordinate degree.I advise reading Le Fanu's short ghost stories and short novels rather than his full-length works.

I found this novel disappointing; I was expecting more. I love Le Fanu's ghost stories, but can't seem to connect with his novels. I couldn't finish Uncle Silas, couldn't relate to any of the characters.

Who is the mysterious blind woman? How does her story have any involvement with the heroine of the novel, Alice Maybell? What will happen to poor Alice and her infant son? Find out by reading this Victorian gothic.

Another Le Fanu work that I highly recommend.

historical mystery; with the first wife kept in a dark part of the manor house etc