The Gathering

At face value, Cheshunt is a model neighbourhood. But almost as soon as he and his mother move there Nathanial knows there is something wrong--something hideously wrong. And it isn't just the stench from the old abattoir, which doesn't seem to bother most residents.

Nathanial soon learns he is not in Cheshunt by accident. As the dark calls its own, so does the light. Nathanial must confront phantoms from his own past if he and all the others called by the light have any hope of stopping the Gathering and its creator.

The word "dark" in The Gathering should really have a capital letter (as it does in Susan Cooper's The Dark Is Rising) for the forces of evil could not have been more vividly realised than in this book. A number of people who have read it see the Cheshunt school's headmaster, Mr Karle ("the Kraken") as a representation of Hitler. In a quote on the book's front flyleaf Terry Lane is reported to have called The Gathering "a dark, grim allegory of fascism". Many young readers might not realise just how accurate the analogy is because Hitler actually ran an organisation called The Occult Bureau. (If anything proves how insane Hitler was, this waste of time and resources surely does.)

The evil depicted in The Gathering is truly spine-chilling and I think the main reason for this is that Carmody doesn't rely solely on occultism to create the evil. While Nathanial's schoolmate Buddha (a very strange name for an evil character) is clearly driven by the Kraken's supernatural influence when he burns Nathanial's dog alive, there is nothing supernatural about how he does it. I found this incident so disturbing it kept me awake for hours. The scene in the fourth Harry Potter book that several people described as too frightening for many children pales by comparison. This is partly because monsters like Voldemort exist only in someone's imagination. Any well-adjusted child knows this, but also knows that it would be all too easy to murder a little dog as Buddha does.

I found a page of reviews by teenagers (http://owl.infosys.utas.edu.au/reading_room/books/4.html) where there were quite a few readers who didn't like The Gathering, and I suspect this is because they had to study it at school and write an essay on it, or answer a series of questions calculated to make them really think. (Some of them seem to have entered their views here.) Most young people would probably have enjoyed The Gathering if simply given it as being a "cool" book to read. Although the page of reviews mentioned above is peppered with the sort of review so often found on amazon.com (i.e., the "this is the best book in the world" type of review) several children have posted the material they were required to produce when studying the book at school.


excellent!   February 6, 2000
2 out of 4 found this review helpful

I loved The Gathering! I first read this book when I was 14, and now at 17, everytime I read it, its like I'm reading it for the first time! You really get to know all the characters, and feel for them in some way. The plot was superb and very gripping. I loved it how all the characters stood by each other through thick and thin. This is a must read for anyone, no matter what your age!


Suspensful, nerve-wracking and utterly wonderful!   April 25, 2000
2 out of 3 found this review helpful

Carmody shows her mastery of plot and theme in "The Gathering" as she writes about the sinister town of Cheshunt, where Nathanial has been drawn. He finds others like himself, called to fight the evil that grew a long time ago in Cheshunt. Just as good- the Circle has been called to fight evil, so has the Darkness been called. Nathanial, must not only face this evil, but the hostility of the "good" members of the circle, and the betrayal within the circle as he searches for the answer to unlock the key of the evil in Cheshunt, and forever purge the evil that has lain there for so long. A thoroughly superb book to be read by any age, and person, it's unputdownable!


One of the worst books I've ever read   May 29, 2000
2 out of 6 found this review helpful

To whomever it may concern,

We were forced to read this book in English class. I'm 14. And there is no one in the class that enjoyed it, and most of my friends had to ask me to tell them the plot because they could not bear reading it. Which was also a problem. The plot. Besides being pathetically written, it doesn't so much have a plot as a list of events which are poorly tied at up at the end. If you are a teacher looking for books to give to your class, please avoid this one. Try "Adventures of Tom Sawyer" or "Animal Farm". But have mercy, don't subject your students to this. If you are a parent, don't give them the book, confirming that books are bad is not a good message to send. I warn you, don't read it, ever.

Sincerely, Michael