Touch Not the Cat: The classic suspense novel from the Queen of the Romantic Mystery

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The aftermath of the defeat of the Jacobite army at Culloden radically changed the nature of the Highlands of Scotland, and Clan Chattan took heavy losses. One of the main consequences was that clans which had hitherto been members of the Confederacy broke away to follow their own destinies. I love how Mary Stewart built up the suspense and gave this story atmosphere. Bryony is a likeable and intelligent heroine who has the narration and slowly works out the truth of what is going on and what her father was trying to tell her. Her romance was sweet and the first time I read this, it was a delightful surprise. This time around, I saw the hints at the truth before the reveal and enjoyed that too. Ballindalloch Castle, ancestral home of the Macpersons, is the setting for a long ago tragedy to be revealed. A compelling read. ” The “gift” of the Ashleys provides an eerie recurring theme which runs through the story like a golden thread, and there is plenty of intrigue, dark deeds and greed-fuelled violence, however, the dominating element is romance. In this novel, Mary Stewart gives us an unashamedly romantic love story, in fact more than one, as there is a parallel subplot running alongside the main one. In fact, we are immediately made aware of the author's intent as the literary quotes that introduce each chapter are all taken from that quintessential celebration of love, “Romeo and Juliet”. Several clichés are used to define some of the characters but the main players are richly nuanced and, as usual, we are never sure of who's who until the very end. The mystery here revolves around the last words of a dying man which seem to make no sense but, in time, provide the solution to many old secrets and also point the way forward for the heroine.

Invereshie House, near Kingussie, Strathspey was held by the Macphersons from the fourteenth century. [9] William Macpherson of Invereshie captured Blair Castle from the Marquess of Montrose in 1644. [9] It is at its heart a romantic novel. Be warned, there are torrid descriptions such a “heart-twisting smile”, or “his shirt was open and I could see the glint of a gold chain against the hairs of his chest and the pulse beating strongly in the hollow of his throat”. Occasionally the purple prose runs away with itself, such as here: This tale of dark family secrets, Touch Not the Cat was one of the last of Mary Stewart’s classic mid-century gothic romances, redolent with danger and darkness, magic and suspense. We have all the tropes of gothic novels. There is an ancient grange, the tumbledown ancestral home of the Ashley family where danger lurks behind every shadow. There are missing parish registers and rightful heirs, twins and cousins. Thrillingly, there are churchyard scenes, shadowy figures, storms and floods, darkness … and a very great deal of moonlight. And to cap it all of course there is the supernatural element.

Our sophisticated, spunky young heroine is the narrator, Bryony Ashley. At the start of the story, Bryony is working in Madeira, as a hotel receptionist. Instantly we are drenched in descriptive passages of Funchal, and only right at the end of the novel do we realise that this description of a town with “its very pavements made of patterned mosaics” was teasing us with foreshadowing. We are instantly aware of Mary Stewart’s ability to thrust us into a sense of time and place. We are immersed in mentally experiencing Madeira, just as we then switch briefly to Bavaria where Bryony’s father was hopefully recuperating from his illness. We finally settle at the fictional Ashley Court in the Malvern Hills, Worcestershire in England, where the rest of the novel will be set. What lifts this out of the mass of romantic novels is the quality of Mary Stewart’s descriptive flow. She describes landscape and the countryside very evocatively, with a keen eye for the British countryside in all its seasons. The tension of the most dramatic moments in the story is mirrored and heightened by the savagery of the weather. The unsettling moments may occur in the stillness of the night; a sense of unease created by an animal’s eerie cry. Mary Stewart uses the natural world she is familiar with beautifully Bryony is trying to decide what to do with her future, now that all she owns is the cottage and a little strip of land. She feels comfortable with the people she has known all her life, including the Vicar, Mrs. Henderson who helps out, and Rob Granger, her childhood friend who works on the estate. For much of the novel Bryony hopes that James is her telepathic lover, but she gradually realises that Emory and James are ruthless, and in league together to steal her inheritance. Her own little cottage has vital access for the developers who want to build on the land. The twins may even be willing to murder for it. She also learns, rather belatedly (and after the reader has suspected for some while) that her secret lover is none of these, but Rob Granger, whom she grew up with. Although he is a gardener and general handyman around Ashley Court, in a complicated plot, he is actually a legitimate Ashley, who is in line to inherit the entire estate.

I've recently re-discovered Mary Stewart and even though I read this book many years ago, more than enough time has passed for me to feel it was a brand new read. The only Mary Stewart title I have read often in the last 30 years or so was Airs Above the Ground (there are horses in it, it HAD to get read over and over) but I did not know if Touch Not The Cat would be as fast-paced as Airs. I tried not to expect anything, tried to read it with the fresh eyes that my long absence gave it.

Help

a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai aj ak Way, George of Plean; Squire, Romilly of Rubislaw (1994). Collins Scottish Clan & Family Encyclopedia. Glasgow: HarperCollins (for the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs). pp.230–231. ISBN 0-00-470547-5.

A re-read from several decades ago, the suspense novels of Mary Stewart never fail to please. In this offering, penned during the groovy 1970's, Stewart was no doubt making Touch Not the Cat more relevant for the time period by adding the gift of telepathy to her heroine Bryony Ashley, and Bryony's mysterious telepathic lover. But, how true is this marvellous story? Ewen MacPherson of Cluny, Chief of Clan MacPherson, joined the Stewart army with about six hundred men but missed the fateful battle at Culloden as he had been sent to guard the passes in the Badenoch.First published in 1976, the book does feel a bit outdated for a start. As a warning, there is one instance of a racially offensive word, which did rather take me by surprise. I imagine a fair few readers might also feel rather uncomfortable with the romantic elements between first cousins (I usually don't mind this in historical fiction where such practice would have been much more the norm e.g Austen's Mansfield Park, here though in a story set in the 1970s, it did feel a little awkward, especially as Bryony had grown up with her cousins too).