Need to Read: I Capture the Castle

This just recently got re-printed! Lucky you!

Dodie Smith, the author of I Capture the Castle has already, without your knowledge, found her way into your heart. She's been there since your childhood just waiting for you to realize it is her, that she is Pongo's creator!

Yes! Pongo from 101 Dalmations! She wrote that, the story (adapted by Disney) that we all grew up with. I, personally, watched that movie every day when I was a youngster. Every day.

I Capture the Castle was her first book, written in 1940. It features the young narrator Cassandra Mortmain, who has literary ambitions and has taken to observing and writing down everything she sees in her journal. The Mortmain home, however, is not exactly ordinary. They live in the ruins of a castle! There, her father Mr. Mortmain, suffers from the most crippling case of writer's block I have ever seen. He has not written so much as a word since his first novel Jacob Wrestling was so acclaimed in Britain and in American universities.

Cassandra sort of gives a play-by-play of their everyday life, from her sister, Rose's, first encounter with the wealthy and handsome Cotton brothers to her stepmother, Topaz's, odd habits of communing with nature wearing nothing but a pair of high wellingtons.

Yes, it's an odd family, but a charming one. Cassandra's eye sees nearly all and become a bit clouded when she experiences love for the first time.

When I bought this book the lady behind the counter said that I was in for a real treat and, boy, was she right! As soon as I finished it I wanted to pick it  up and start all over again.

J.K. Rowling said that, "This book has one of the most charismatic narrators I've ever met."

So if Rowling loves it then you are likely to as well.