I Capture the Castle
- 363
- Pages
- about 7 h
- Reading time
- The Big Read
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Our view
“I Capture the Castle” tells a coming-of-age story of family and first love with a light, funny, thoughtful touch. Dodie Smith, by then a known playwright, wrote this first novel in America during the Second World War, far from her native England. The book has its devoted admirers; some readers, though, find that it loses its hold around the midpoint and leaves little impression afterwards. Its natural audience enjoys diaries and a reflective young voice.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
I Capture the Castle is Dodie Smith's first novel, written during the Second World War when she and her husband Alec Beesley, a conscientious objector, moved from their native England to Pennsylvania. Smith was already an established playwright and later became famous for writing the children's classic The Hundred and One Dalmatians.
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.6 across 166 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 53% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Young adult average of 7.8. That is how 7.7 comes out.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 9.1 | 9 | 5% |
| Hardcover | 7.5 | 157 | 95% |
Frequently asked
What age is I Capture the Castle for?
I Capture the Castle sits on the Young adult shelf in the sources we use, which by convention means roughly ages 13 and up. This is a guide from the book’s category, not a publisher’s age rating. It has 363 pages — shorter than 73% of the ranked books in Young adult.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Young adult — with scores between 7.3 and 7.9, closest to this book.
