The Woman In Black - Susan Hill - Chapters 1-4 Smells Fishy

Woo ok so onward to the next book, now that's exciting! Sort of, anyway yeah so The Woman In Black by Susan Hill. Does anyone know when this is set, because I always thought of it as Victorian, but there was this one line where the narrator referred to the Victorians/19th Century so it must be later than that. I didn't realise it was written in 1983 either - I assumed it was wriiten around the time of The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins, but apparently not. Moving swiftly on... I chose this book because I've heard the stage show in London's really good, and also Daniel Radcliffe is going to be in a film of it so I thought it would be good to read it first... see how I relate everything to Harry Potter? Oh good grief I actually am obsessed aren't I?

So we start at the end, when the narrator, a man named Arthur Kipps, is a few years older (not quite sure how old, but I got the sense that he was maybe in his fifties?) and it's obvious that this memory of something awful in his past still plagues him. He's asked to tell a ghost story and practically wets himself, running out of the room and not returning until hours later. Overreaction much? I'll have to wait and see what actually happens, but this did seem a tad melodramatic. He alludes to this awful past and decides to write it down - presumably so he doesn't have to physically talk  about it.

So then we go back into his past, delving into his memory (bit like a pensieve? OH MY GOSH STOP MAKING THESE CONNECTIONS!) Anywaaay he's sent to attend the funeral of a Mrs Alice Drablow and he gets on a train and tells us in detail about the train and the journey which I didn't particularly like because, with exception to HP7, I don't really like reading about long journeys. But he does discover something very fishy, and that's people's reaction when he mentions Mrs Drablow's name. She seems to have been some kind of ominous presence because they all look shifty and change the subject/stop talking altogether. Hmm. Something supernatural taking place at her house involving a woman who wears black? We studied the gothic genre of 19th century novels in Year 12, and I found it really interesting, so hopefully there'll be some of that here.

So Mr Kipps arrives in the village and is told that Mrs Drablow's house is on this sort of island thing so he has to wait for the tide to be right in order to get in there. Or out. Convenient. He's staying in an Inn, eats lots of food, talks to some men who get nervous when he mentions Mrs Drablow, and then finally goes to the funeral.

It's not until the funeral in Chapter 4 that we meet who I presume is the mysterious Woman in Black. Mysterious is certainly the word anyway. It seems that he's the only one who sees her - making me think she's supernatural or something. He describes her like this:
"The skin, and, it seemed, only the thinnest layer of flesh, was taughtly stretched and stained across her bones, so that it gleamed with a curious, blue-white sheen, and her eyes seemed sunken back into her head"
He says lots more like this and she does seem quite creepy, but then when he points her out to his colleague, Mr Jerome, he nearly faints right there and is absolutely terrified. Strange...

That's all I've read so far, and I think it was quite a slow start - nothing much happened, but I'm keeping an open mind because I've heard such good stuff about it. Anyhoo I'll keep reading and do another review in a few days!