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The Devil Rides Out (Wordsworth Mystery & Supernatural) (Wordsworth Mystery & Supernatural)


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The Devil Rides Out
Review date: 2008-11-02 Rating: 8 out of 10

Classic tale of the Occult which moves along at a cracking pace. Perhaps the book flags towards the end but this matters little overall. Excellent set pieces include the night spent in the Circle, also the confrontation between the villain and the books nominal heroine. Worth reading.

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Reviews


A FANTASTIC READ
Review date: 2008-10-19 Rating: 10 out of 10

Having got bored with the whole horror novel genre, I picked this book up by chance (and due to the fact it was really cheap as well), this really is a great book. The atmosphere created within the pages, as well as the superb charecters, I found I could not put this book down until I finished the last page. If only every horror author wrote as good as this, even if your not into horror novels, this is a must read for your book collection.

Still the Best after 70 years!
Review date: 2008-07-07 Rating: 10 out of 10

Having read all of Wheatley's books in my youth (I am now 64)and loved them all, this one is THE best.
I believe that it was written in the 1930's so the style is a little different from modern books but the story is excellent and has stood the test of time.
Wheatley researched deeply into all things esoteric and always gave a warning in his foreword to his books on black magic, 'not to get involved'.
Good advice, I think, as if you read this book, you will see what he means.
Read it, I know you will love it. Also, 'To the Devil a Daughter' by him is another excellent read in the same genre.

Grand adventure!
Review date: 2007-07-03 Rating: 8 out of 10

Being under 30, I had heard of the Devil Rides Out and Dennis Wheatley without really knowing what it was all about, so finding that such an inexpensive edition of the work was now available from Wordsworth's excellent line of supernatural stories, well I had to buy it, didn't I?

What surprised me is that once I started reading, I couldn't put the book down. The tale is of the Duc de Richleau's battle for the soul of his friend Simon Aron, the fate of a young girl, and ultimately the fate of the world, as he takes on satanist Mocata and his entourage. Having read a biography of Aleister Crowley, we can see that he was the touchstone for Mocata, although it is only a surface representation as Mocata is presented as a villain, rather than as a human being. As far as I know, the representations of magic are well researched, with Wheatley representing both white and black magic and the will to power.

Because of the era it was written in, there are no shades of grey in the story, just as the magic used in the tale is black or white, so is the morality and Wheatley is clearly from the same stable as the other great British adventure writers like Buchan, Sapper and Ian Fleming. It also reminds me of the excellent Carnacki stories by Hodgson. As such you may feel that some of the views are a little dated. I didn't notice anything that I thought was necessarily objectionable as I do with Fleming. But the story is written at such a rollicking pace that it is impossible not to get swept up.

This is not a horror story, I doubt that unless you're under the age of ten and sensitive (as I once was) you will find anything chilling in the book, but there certainly is atmosphere and the midnight vigil inside the pentacle, when Mocata sends the Angel of Death to our heroes, is as tense as can be. It's a supernatural adventure - a predecessor to the X-Files and Buffy, and as good a supernatural adventure as I've read. The ending seems like a bit of a copout at first, but the final page makes it all matter again and I can't recommend it enough.

So why not five stars? Well, there are a few typographical errors in the book, errant speech marks and punctuation, but that shouldn't dissuade you from buying this book!

a classic back in print !
Review date: 2007-04-21 Rating: 10 out of 10

James Hilton (Goodbye Mr Chips, Lost Horizon) described "The Devil Rides Out" as "The best tale of its kind since Dracula" and I don't think he was far wrong. Many believe it to be Wheatley's finest work and it's a classic of its kind. I first read the book many years ago and on reading it again, it has lost none of its power to grip.

The book is the second, in published terms, to feature DW's hero the Duke de Richleau, and was his first ever black magic novel. It was a huge bestseller in the 1930s when it first came out, and continued to be a bestseller until he went out of fashion in the 1980s/1990s. Fortunately DW is now experiencing something of a resurgence, and well done Wordsworth for bringing this out in a cheap but elegant reprint (a good first edition would cost you several thousands of pounds !).

It's full of 1930s atmosphere, skilfully written and well researched too - although Wheatley never practiced magic himself, he met with many of the most famous occultists of his day (Aleister Crowley, Rollo Ahmed etc) in his endeavour to make the book as authentic as possible.

In The Devil Rides Out, the Duke and a friend find that one of their number (Simon) is missing from a reunion, and it turns out that he has fallen under the influence of a black magic sect. At first disbelieving the Duke, his friends soon discover that he is right when he says that magic still exists and that the powers of darkness are still alive and very real, as they fight a series of terrific earthly and occult battles to save their friend's soul.

The book was filmed in the 1960s with Christopher Lee taking the lead role as the Duke in one of his few appearances as a `goodie', and while Lee was first rate, for my money the book is superior to the film.

If you're grey haired and read it in your youth, it's worth reading again. If you're about to read it for the first time, I envy you. You're in for a treat !

Product Details/Specifications


Authors:
Dennis Wheatley

Recording label: Wordsworth Editions Ltd
Manufacturer: Wordsworth Editions Ltd
EAN: 9781840225433
Binding: Paperback
ISBN: 1840225432
Number of pages: 320
Publication date: 2007-03-01
Language: English (Original Language)
Language: English (Unknown)
Language: English (Published)

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