in the "present day" timeline we saw...

the foyer, the drawing room, the study, the kitchen/breakfast room, bedrooms for (at various times) vicki/maggie, liz, carolyn, david, roger, julia. willie. jason, amy, hallie and an attic room for quentin. and some no-doubt dumpy (unseen) servant's room for mrs. j.

of course there were countless assorted and sundry closed-off basement and attic rooms as well (and not counting the rooms in the other time periods/alternate time bands). so that does make about 15 rooms actively used during the series run.

needless to say the size of Collinwood is completely out of scale with anything built in this country in the 18th century. it looked like what it was: a mansion put up by the nouveau riche robber barons of the late 19th century.

in the brief segment set in the 1600s the notion of a house of this scale being plunked down in the middle of the colonial wilds was even more ludicrous.

the book generally garners raves on the FB DS pages. i think a lot of fans are so desperate for any new franchise output they lap it up no matter how lousy. 

the book has absolutely no value as a stand alone story. i can't imagine why anyone unfamiliar with the series would bother to read it. it only "works"...and i use the word works very loosely...as a tie in to the original story.


in terms of "tying up loose plot threads" nothing could be further from the truth. it introduces so much new plot, and goes so far outside OS continuity, it ends up leaving more questions than answers.

[spoiler]i suppose the predictable "resolution" that Liz was Vicki's mother could be looked at as "closure" but even the way that played out made no sense.[/spoiler]

actually the "Angelique" equivalent is a completely different character in both books.

so she's clearly not bothering to follow her own canon. 

i did not read her last work the Quentin-themed 'Wolf Moon Rising' but it would seem that 'HTC' has perhaps at least followed her own continuity in one regard...


[spoiler]here the big "revelation" was that Vicki is the illegitimate offspring of the rather yucky Elizabeth/Quentin relationship told in that variation on the tale. gross, and it makes absolutely no sense in terms of OS canon but i believe it links these two stories on that point.  [/spoiler]

like i said i didn't read it but i believe it connects the two books at least on that. it would seem Parker's making a rather clumsy attempt to create some sort of larger "mythology" linking the characters "across the centuries". but it's a misfire. 

i also enjoyed HH. and although she did take the story in it's own direction she got the foundation spot on. which made it fully understandable.

i could "feel' Willie and Jason on the page. Parker's characters leave me mystified.