Uncle Silas

Uncle Silas
by Joseph Sheridan le Fanu
read: 2018
Guardian 1000 Novels

For some reason I thought Uncle Silas was going to be a horror novel, so I kept expecting some supernatural element to show up. It never did, but the machinations of Silas, his son Dudley, and Madame de la Rougierre kept me in suspense, with their intentions and the true stakes unclear until late in the game. The one piece I could not square was the esteem that narrator Maud holds her father in. He sheltered her in an unhealthy fashion, hired de la Rougierre as governess, and then stuck Maud with her Uncle Silas, a man she had never met. His judgment of character seems pretty wanting.