My Cousin Rachel

What a magnificent writer, so skillfully written that you felt you were in every page soaking up the details & becoming part of the story. Was he going crazy with lust? The hero must have questioned himself many times, he must have known the truth but refused to give in to it. I read this book in one day, hours, because I needed to know. Now I want more!

It's nice to know that there are authors like Daphne du Maurier out there who can always be counted upon to provide an enjoyable reading experience. If one has struggled through a couple of sub-par contemporary novels, one knows with du Maurier he can sink his teeth into something excellent, and My Cousin Rachel delivers big time.

It is the story of a young man, Philip, 25, who has been brought up by his older, male, bachelor cousin, Ambrose. They are well-to-do and live on an estate in the Cornwall, England so beloved by Ms. du Maurier, and have a varied and busy life. Neither seems too particularly interested in women. As he gets older, Ambrose decides for health reasons that he must begin to winter in Italy, leaving Philip behind to take care of things.

Ambrose, of course, writes to Philip, and eventually tells him he has met a woman--their cousin Rachel--with whom he has fallen in love with and whom he has married. As time goes by, however, the letters become less enthusiastic. She is spending too much. He is becoming ill. He no longer trusts her or the Italian friend who seems to be hanging around her all of the time. Philip decides that he must go to Italy, but by the time he gets there, his beloved cousin is dead and buried and Rachel is nowhere to be found. Philip returns to England, disconsolate, heartbroken and angry.

Shortly thereafter he learns that Rachel is coming to pay a visit. And this is where the meat of the novel begins: although determined to get to the truth of the matter out of her, Philip instead becomes smitten.

The reason the novel works so well--indeed, the reason all of du Maurier's novels work so well--is that the characters are perfectly etched. Philip is not unintelligent and he is not uneducated. But he is 25, and he has traveled practically nowhere. The story is written in the first person by him, and although he is clearly self-confident, the reader sees how easily he is manipulated by the beautiful Rachel. She has him, as a major character points out, wrapped around her finger.

Rachel, of course, is etched through the eyes of Philip, and she is also a distinct, memorable character. Always dressed appropriately, always made up perfectly, she knows precisely how she must act with the various persons in the community in which Philip lives. They are enchanted by her, as is Philip, to whom she is alternately bewitching and standoffish.

The suspense begins when Philip learns little things about Rachel’s actions that don’t seem to fit with her overall charm. She is spending too much. He discovers additional letters from Ambrose that never made it to him previously. He is beginning to feel ill. Philip does not want to believe the implications of these things and does his best to ignore them. And then the Italian friend comes to visit.

Best not say more, except that the tension continues to build until the conclusion; a conclusion which, again typically of du Maurier, is unexpected. First-rate, page-turning fiction all the way.

"They used to hang men at Four Turnings in the old days. Not any more, though...."

I'm a mystery writer, and Daphne du Maurier was one of my earliest inspirations. REBECCA is her masterpiece, followed by two other novels, THE SCAPEGOAT and this 1951 bestseller. The opening sentences of MY COUSIN RACHEL (above) are second only to the immortal opening line of REBECCA.

In 1840s Cornwall, young Philip Ashley inherits the fortune of the cousin who raised him, who has recently married abroad (Italy) and died under mysterious circumstances. Philip's pleasant life is disrupted by the sudden arrival of his cousin's beautiful widow, Rachel. Initially planning to send her on her way with a generous pension, he soon finds himself falling in love with her--even as he begins to suspect that she murdered his cousin and may be planning the same fate for him.

Rarely have I read a novel in which the tension and suspense arise almost exclusively from character. Who is this woman? What is she doing? How is the young hero going to respond to her? These questions have haunted readers since the book first appeared, and they will continue to do so for a long time to come. Reading the book again after all these years, I was amazed by du Maurier's plotting, her use of language, and the way she can create an atmosphere of foreboding that is almost palpable. Writers can learn a lot from this master, and RACHEL is a must for anyone who loves the very best in suspense.

PS: The 1952 film version, with Olivia de Havilland and an incredibly young Richard Burton in the leads, is also excellent.

In my 20+ years as a story analyst for Hollywood film studios and production companies, I've read my share of stories and we are always looking for that "sense of foreboding," no matter the genre. This is easy to achieve for a scene or two but difficult to sustain. My Cousin Rachel not only opens with a sense of foreboding but Daphne du Maurier has the skill to continue it all the way to the very last word.

I have been a longtime fan of du Maurier's Rebecca; in fact, it's in my Top 10 all-time favorite novels. But, I found My Cousin Rachel to be just a tad more accessible than Rebecca and equally as compelling.

This is the story of Ambrose Ashley and his ward, his young cousin Philip, who are torn apart by the appearance into their lives of a distant cousin named Rachel. When Ambrose, who is not in good health and must spend winters in warmer climates, moves to Italy for the winter and marries Rachel suddenly, Philip is not pleased. In fact, he's jealous and thinks the worst of Ambrose's new bride. But when Ambrose ends up dying while abroad, all kinds of evil thoughts float through Philip's mind, prompted by letters to him from Ambrose. The most important thought is: did Rachel poison Ambrose?

And then Rachel comes to England and meets Philip. At first suspicious, Philip soon finds his cousin Rachel to be sweet and kind and considerate...or, is she?

This gothic-romance is stirring and engaging and a wonderful literary experience. I highly recommend it.

this is a very interior book. it's not just the first person pov. it's about a lonely young man, who, having had an incredibly isolated childhood under the benign and loving influence of his guardian, ambrose, confronts a crisis in his life, and does all the rash, impetuous things that his interior world dictates.

i found this to have a very slow start, and was about to give it up, when the momentum of events in the plot increased with the death of philip's guardian, ambrose. it's here, within the description of young phillip's journey to italy, that the questions about how his beloved father figure died begin to unspool, and the outward thrust of the narration begins to delve inward with assumptions about the motivations of the characters involved. du Maurier's ability to to nestle mystery inside mystery is flawless, until the whole plot resembles a russian nesting doll,

the ambiguity builds in this novel until it's just about unbearable. is rachel truly a fortune hunting murderess? is philip's illness a by-product of her plotting? was ambrose's paranoia about her and her advisor, rainaldi, justified? du Maurier never lets up, even in the last scenes. this is the product of a mature, brilliant writing mind, as du Maurier has scaled the pinnacle of gothic suspense tales. in my cousin rachel, she shows us how it's done; she's the master of the genre.

The recent movie release based on this book, starring Rachel Weisz has drawn me to this work which is *now the full length (335 pages) on Amazon, if it was not so before.

I found this writer to have the most marvelous and uncanny comprehension of the way that many men struggle to understand the feminine psyche, and Du Maurier's propensity for writing in the first person, male voice is an absolute *gift of discovery for both genders ! The plot was more tightly woven than sailing cloth on a New England Whaler, and the abilities of the author to maintain suspense, intrigue and to employ a fast moving plot remain unsurpassed in her field to this date.

That having been said, however, I would recommend that the reader completely skip the Foreward to this work by Sally Beauman. Ms. Beauman concocts a fantasy "MeToo" consciousness for the author that the reader will find reflected nowhere in the actual work, and which anachronistically represents Du Maurier as a creature clearly *out of the context of Ms. Du Maurier's own time period.

Ms. Du Maurier was born in 1906, at a time when Mark Twain still lived. Ms. Du Maurier wrote "My Cousin Rachel" in 1951, six years after the end of WWII. Presenting Ms. Du Maurier as a "sleeper agent" for the 1970s Women's Lib Movement, or the present day Feminist Resurgence is ridiculous beyond comprehension, and displays a fully absent sense of history, to be kind, or an effort at false and empty propaganda to be less kind, but perhaps more accurate.

Ms. Du Maurier was a product of the early 20th, not the 21st Century. The tortured and twisted paroxysms of pretzel logic required by Ms. Beauman to "recruit" Ms. Du Maurier as a firebrand vanguard of a 21st Century Consciousness and mind set is absolutely hilarious, and does disservice by both misrepresenting Du Maurier's work and embarrassing the Modern Feminist movement with this transparently disingenuous screed of a Foreward that substitutes for Ms. Beauman's "literary analysis".

Daphne Du Maurier was a chronologically *perfect contemporary to Hannah Arendt, but the two women wrote *completely different types of literary works. Perhaps Ms. Beauman confuses the two.

It was good getting back to reading Daphne Du Maurier, and her book My Cousin Rachel is a reminder that I need to read more of her works. (I read Rebecca years back and loved it.) As she did with Rebecca, Du Maurier paints vividly a Gothic, mysterious tale that keeps the readers both engaged and guessing, a novel filled with anticipation as to what will come next.

The basis for the story is young Phillip Ashley inheriting the rights to a great Cornwall estate. He admires his older cousin Ambrose and reflects at times and the memories of him. At one point, Ambrose goes off to Italy and Phillip gets word that he has married his cousin Rachel. Points of the narrative are told through letters of correspondence from Ambrose and Phillip’s reminisces of the past. When Ambrose dies suddenly, it raises quite an alarm in Phillip’s mind. However, being young and naïve, what is the reader to make of Phillip judgement? Rachel visits, and the reader waits in anticipation for what is to follow.

One effective technique that Du Maurier effectively employs is simply crafting an air an ambiguity throughout. As we explore further along in the novel questions arise in our heads: Is Rachel duplicitous, pulling manipulations and deceptions, or is Phillip simply too young to understand reality? Was Ambrose losing his mental faculties at his untimely demise, or was there an evil circumstance at play? We, as audience, must follow along and make our own judgements as we see things unfold.

Another highly effective method is the top-notch level of storytelling by the author. Du Maurier aptly weaves suspicions and doubts on both sides through carefully timed revelations. In this way, she keeps the readers on their toes as they try to guess the next move. Through Phillip’s point of view, we see a picture—and puzzle—unfold. There are also carefully placed shifts in the narrative that allow for the added dimension of building tension, especially in the novel’s final parts.

If there is one blemish, I did believe there were a few slow spots in the novel that slowed down the overall momentum. Still, in the big picture, these did not diminish the reading experience.

In the end, while I do not think My Cousin Rachel is quite on par with Rebecca level, it is still particularly good, and fans of the author will most likely be please (or anyone who enjoys this genre). It is a fun, suspenseful mystery, one that keeps the suspense coming and the pages turning.

What a unique love story! Even though I felt like I kind of knew what to expect (curse you movie trailer!!!!!), it kept going in directions that took me by surprise. However, I didn't find the atmosphere quite as brooding and mysterious as I expected to, which was a little disappointing.

Phillip was a fun main character in that he was younger and more naive than a typical hero. He is constantly changing his mind about the other characters and his own values, causing him to be a rather unreliable narrator. He's easily influenced by the thoughts and opinions of those around him, which makes him seem wishy-washy. And he falls in love with Rachel so easily! It's like reading a high school romance, but set in 1800s England!

Rachel was appropriately mysterious. Although I was certain as I was reading the book that she was no murderess, I was not ever sure of her motivations. Is she in love? Is she gold-digging? Is she really just "impulsive" as she in constantly described? Her relationship with her financial advisory, Rainaldi, was also suspicious. Though, again, I doubted Rainaldi was evil, he seemed to have some ulterior motive in everything he did. I didn't trust him any more than our heroes did.

My biggest disappointment was with the surprise ending. I understand that this is one of those books that people argue about. Did Rachel poison her husband or not??? But to me it was clear throughout the story, and especially at the end, exactly what du Maurier intended us to think. I don't think it's supposed to be questionable at all. And so the big reveal felt anti-climactic to me.

That being said, I very much enjoyed this book and its characters. I'm happy to give it a place on my shelf, and I would certainly recommend it to anyone who likes a historical fiction romance.

Why This Book After reading Rebecca several years ago, I placed My Cousin Rachel, another of Daphne du Maurier's famed novels, on my To Be Read (TBR) shelf. Earlier this year, a Goodreads buddy, Michael, and I were chatting about various books when we decided to do a buddy read together, selecting this wonderful Gothic edition. We were both interested to see if it lived up to the hype and how it compared to the author's other words. We agreed on early March and got to it this week. I've only started doing buddy reads in the last few months, but they are quite fun... I recommend them.

Approach & Style I purchased the Kindle Reader version from Amazon to read on my iPad. It contains ~350 pages and took me four days to read. The novel is written in first person point of view and told from the perspective of Philip Ashley, a 24-year-old English man set in a somewhat unknown time, but likely the early/mid twentieth century given some of the details in the background setting. The language is intense and full of amazing imagery and astounding descriptions.

Plot, Characters & Setting The novel centers around the Ashley family. Philip's parents die when he is less than a year old, but his cousin Ambrose raises him in their England home. At some point years later, Ambrose unexpectedly marries a widow named Rachel who is half-Italian and grew up in Tuscany. It's an odd pairing, as she has a bit of a reputation for husband-hunting and spending lots of money. After ~2 years, Ambrose mysteriously dies and Rachel disappears. Philip is distraught, but searches for her in Italy. Rachel eventually shows up in England looking to meet her pseudo-stepson, and that's when the story really begins to get interesting. There's an air of darkness concerning Ambrose's death--was Rachel involved? She has a suitor of sorts who follows her from Tuscany--yet both claim there is nothing but friendship. Philip intends to crucify his cousin Rachel after reading a few letters from his late cousin, Ambrose; however, things take a surprising turn when more secrets are revealed and there's a bit of romance developing in the background. Add in a few traditional English families, an inheritance upon Philip's 25th birthday, and a possible proposal to/from a neighboring family... and you've got quite a Gothic story unleashing it's power on you.

Key Thoughts

1. du Maurier truly engages the reader with lyrical and ethereal descriptions of everything going on in the story. You will feel like you are sitting at a table in the house watching everything occur around you. The super-fine details are what challenge your intellect to decide what is real and what is not.

2. As a plot, it's classic -- did she or didn't she kill him? But here's the interesting part... that question hardly ever comes up in the book. It's not a mystery in terms of researching the past to see if murder actually happened. It's entirely psychological in the relationship between Philip and Rachel... where you listen to the words or what isn't said, think about whether you trust either of them... and in the end, you just wish you could have spoken to Ambrose yourself to get the answer.

3. I went back and forth multiple times deciding whether I liked Rachel and Philip as characters and as human beings. Humanity and kindness are huge themes in this novel. Attitude and disinterest are also keen to make themselves present within the relationships. Sometimes I wanted to throttle both, other times, the tenderness was admirable. The last few chapters truly push the envelope in terms of engaging more doubt before there is a final reveal.

4. While reading the first ~75 pages, I was also editing my novel. I had on my 'writer glasses' and couldn't stop analyzing the word choice in du Maurier's initial chapters. It was disconnected and hard to attach myself, too. I also found a few words that were repeated a couple of times on the same page (a pet peeve for me in my own writing) and after the third or fourth, I slapped myself and realized it wasn't important. 99 amazing words on every page and 1 every so often that didn't work. That's way too high of a percentage to ever get stuck! Stick with it past that initial 15% mark and you're in for quite an intellectually stimulating ride.

5. If you love Italy or the quintessential proper English culture and decor, you will enjoy this novel. The only thing that bugged me from time to time was not really knowing enough about Philip prior to meeting Rachel, so I could form a strong enough opinion on who he was as a person, i.e. before he became mesmerized by his cousin Rachel.

6. My favorite part of the whole book... Philip ALWAYS refers to her as 'My cousin Rachel' until a certain event changes their lives... then she simply becomes 'Rachel.' The meaning of the novel is hidden in that ever-so-small alteration in their relationship and future.

Summary du Maurier is quite skilled at creating scenery, characters, and undetermined truth. We really never know who to believe, even in the end. But it works. Whereas Rebecca was a stronger plot, I think My Cousin Rachel pushes the envelope more in terms of who should we believe. Either case, I really enjoyed the read, especially discussing it with Michael, who is an author you might want to take a look at (new book coming out in April '18). I plan to review the author's bibliography this summer to see if there's another potential novel of hers I'd like to read. Overall, I'd give this 4+ stars as I really enjoyed it, but there was some repetition and missing pieces so I couldn't quite knock it up to a 5-star rating.