Harvest Home by Thomas Tryon is a slow-burning gothic horror story set in the rural village of Cornwall Coombe, where ancient fertility cult rituals and sinister traditions lurk beneath the surface. The novel follows the Constantine family's move to the village, where they encounter eerie superstitions and unsettling mysteries surrounding the corn crop and the secretive Harvest Home ceremony. As the family delves deeper into the village's traditions, they uncover dark secrets that challenge their perceptions of the idyllic small town life they initially sought.

Characters:

Characters are complex and unsettling, with the protagonist struggling against the village's women-led traditions.

Writing/Prose:

The writing style is lyrical and richly descriptive, providing an immersive experience that some may find slow.

Plot/Storyline:

The plot involves a family's unsettling discovery of the horrific secrets underlying the quaint traditions of a small New England village.

Setting:

The setting is a small, insular New England village steeped in tradition and eerie customs.

Pacing:

The pacing is gradual, with a slow buildup that may deter some readers, but leads to a satisfying climax.

I awakened that morning to birdsong. It was only the little yellow bird who lives in the locust tree outside our bedroom window, but I could have wrung his neck, for it was not yet six and I had a han...

Notes:

Harvest Home is a horror novel published in the 1970s.

Set in Cornwall Coombe, a small village in New England.

The story follows a family moving from the city seeking a simple life.

Ned Constantine, the main character, is an aspiring painter.

The villagers have strange, outdated customs centered around a festival called Harvest Home.

The book explores themes of female empowerment versus male dominance.

The plot involves a young girl's suicide and a mysterious harvest ritual.

Ned's character is seen as a busybody trying to meddle in village affairs.

The narrative unfolds slowly, focusing on daily village life for much of its length.

The ending of the novel is often described as shocking and satisfying.

The book has been compared to other horror works like The Wicker Man.

Thomas Tryon's writing is noted for its rich descriptions and careful world-building.

The novel reflects a fear of women, portraying them as unknowable and dangerous.

Many readers found the pacing to be slow, especially in the beginning.

The book is cited as an influence on later horror writers like Stephen King.

Sensitive Topics/Content Warnings

Triggers include themes of suicide, violence against women, misogyny, and unsettling grotesque imagery.

From The Publisher:

In this spellbinding horror novel, a family trades their crime-ridden city for country life-and encounters an evil more sinister than they could have imagined

After watching his asthmatic daughter suffer in the foul city air, Theodore Constantine decides to get back to the land. When he and his wife search New England for the perfect nineteenth-century home, they find no township more charming, no countryside more idyllic than the farming village of Cornwall Coombe. Here they begin a new life: simple, pure, close to nature-and ultimately more terrifying than Manhattan's darkest alley.

When the Constantines win the friendship of the town matriarch, the mysterious Widow Fortune, they are invited to join the ancient festival of Harvest Home, a ceremony whose quaintness disguises dark intentions. In this bucolic hamlet, where bootleggers work by moonlight and all of the villagers seem to share the same last name, the past is more present than outsiders can fathom-and something far more sinister than the annual harvest is about to rise out of the earth.

Credited as the inspiration for Stephen King's Children of the Corn, Thomas Tryon's chilling novel was ahead of its time when first published, and continues to provoke abject terror in readers.

Ratings (8)

Incredible (1)
Loved It (2)
Liked It (1)
It Was OK (3)
Did Not Like (1)

Reader Stats (26):

Read It (8)
Want To Read (10)
Did Not Finish (1)
Not Interested (7)

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Harvest Home?

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About the Author:

Thomas Tryon (1926-1991), actor turned author, made his bestselling debut with The Other (1971), which spent nearly six months on the New York Times bestseller list and allowed him to quit acting for good; a film adaptation, with a screenplay by Tryon and directed by Robert Mulligan, appeared in 1972. Tryon wrote two more novels set in the fictional Pequot Landing of The Other-Harvest Home (1973) and Lady (1974). Crowned Heads (1976) detailed the lives of four fictional film stars and All That Glitters (1986) explored the dark side of the golden age of Hollywood. Night Magic (published posthumously in 1995) was a modern-day retelling of The Sorcerer's Apprentice.

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Harvest Home

Thomas Tryon