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Cover of The chase

The chase

or, Along fatal love chase

Louisa May Alcott

First published 1995 · 368 pages

A feverish, gothic descent into the terrifying consequences of a Faustian bargain made in the name of love.

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What it feels like

Reading this feels like being swept up in a dark, velvet-draped nightmare. Far removed from the cozy domesticity usually associated with its author, this is a pure, unadulterated Victorian sensation novel that grabs you by the throat. The atmosphere is thick with claustrophobia and feverish intensity, plunging the reader into a world where romantic yearning curdles almost instantly into psychological entrapment. The pacing is relentlessly propulsive, mirroring the frantic, breathless energy of a literal and metaphorical chase across Europe. It is a story of obsession and the terrifying price of naive bargains, wrapped in lush, dramatic prose. Fans of sweeping gothic melodramas and dark, obsessive romances will devour this tense, shadowy thriller.

Mood
  • feverish
  • claustrophobic
  • gothic
  • tense
Tone
  • melodramatic
  • sensational
  • urgent
  • darkly romantic
Pace
propulsive
Themes
obsessive love · the illusion of freedom · fatal attraction · psychological entrapment · loss of innocence
The writing
Lush, dramatic, and unapologetically sensational, leaning heavily into the gothic conventions of the Victorian era.
The arc
Moves from restless, naive yearning to a suffocating realization of danger, culminating in a desperate, breathless flight for survival.
Who it's for
Readers who crave dark, sweeping Victorian melodramas where passion quickly curdles into obsession and danger.
Content notes
  • stalking
  • emotional abuse
  • manipulation
  • domestic entrapment

About the book

Roasamond Vivian, a young girl living with her bitter grandfather, yearns for excitement. When Phillip Tempest pays a visit, Rosamond finds herself charmed by him, though he is nearly twice her age and quite obviously "not a saint." She declares that she would gladly pay a price for happiness, and, thinking that she might change him with her love, marries Tempest a month later. She has no idea just how she'll pay for her decision. The plot is obviously Faustian, with references throughout to Mephistopheles; early in the novel, Rosamond says, "I often feel as if I'd gladly sell my soul to Satan for a year of freedom."

Description from Open Library.

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