We Have Always Lived in the Castle

I know most people’s favorite Shirley Jackson haunted house book is The Haunting of Hill House, but I find the mystery in this book even more compelling.

Give me two sisters, a family killed by poison under mysterious circumstances, a suitor, an angry mob filled with class envy, and an unreliable narrator, and I will be filled with that peculiar combination of happiness, unease, and dread that all of us haunted house readers desire. I love this novel. 

I love a story with ‘outsiders’ at the heart of it, and Shirley Jackson’s gothic masterpiece gives us exactly that. This book tells the tale of the strange Blackwood sisters who live in a crumbling great house on the outskirts of a small American town, whose locals view the reclusive family with suspicion. 

Unsettling from the outset, we are nevertheless attracted to the main character, Merricat, whose possible involvement in the poison murder of the rest of her family only spurs us on to keep reading. I’m always drawn to these characters, the ones who don’t behave quite as convention… show more.

Secret’s out: I love (fictional) relationships that are kind of toxic and disturbing. And the Blackwood sisters are just twisted.

Don’t get me wrong—I’m fairly certain that I’m on their side. From the opening paragraph, Mary Katherine “Merricat” Blackwood cemented herself as one of my favorite narrators of all time. She’s uncanny and compelling, and it’s impossible to look away from her and Constance’s eerie state of codependence.

This is another book that features themes of otherness, this time through the lens of Gothic horror. I want a better world for the Blackwood sisters, but I don’t trust that their… show more.

This is one of my favorite reads of all time. I love the way Jackson can make you so uncomfortable with her writing.

I love the way her characters are full of idiosyncrasies. I love the twists and turns. Mostly, I love the co-dependent, creepy, yet captivating sister bond she manages to display throughout this wild mystery!

Shirley Jackson is perhaps best known for The Haunting of Hill House, but her final work, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, is masterful. The novel is narrated from the knowing perspective of eighteen-year-old Merricat Blackwood.

In the wake of the murder of their family, Merricat lives with her preternaturally serene sister Constance and their Uncle Julian. Six years earlier, the rest of their family died from arsenic poisoning at dinner, Julian being the sole survivor – Merricat had been sent to her room without supper, and Constance, who avoided consuming the poisoned sugar, was tried for… show more.

This is one of the oddest books I have ever read. It concerns Merricat Blackwood from whose point of view the story is told. Something awful has happened, and the characters go on living after the demolition of a once-comfortable lifestyle. The dysfunctional family harbors secrets, but they hardly matter compared to the setting and the strange characters that seem to grow from the house like fungus.

First published in 1962, the novel revolves around the lives of two sisters, Mary Katherine “Merricat” and Constance Blackwood, who live in isolation in their family mansion with their Uncle Julian after the rest of their family is poisoned with arsenic.

I loved this book because of how subtlety the plot develops—I devoured each page wanting to learn more about Merricat and the true story behind the poisoning of her family.

I read this as part of a Spooky October read, but it is way more than a quick, haunting read. It is a well-deserved classic. I much prefer it over Jackson’s more famous story, The Lottery.

It is gothic at its finest. A slow, burn creepy novel set in small-town Vermont that will keep you turning pages to find out how everything comes together in the end. Prepare to have your heartstrings tugged and goosebumps raised. 

I’m not sure anyone has written with such clarity about the everyday horror of social/cultural alienation better than Shirley Jackson.

I loved reading about the main character, Merricat, and her trips into town to purchase groceries and other common household goods. The pariah-like way she is received by the allegedly typical townsfolk is a theme I—admittedly to a much lesser degree—wanted to include in my own writing.