In the House of the Seven Gables, Nathaniel Hawthorne chronicles the story of a family whose fortunes are poisoned by its past wrongdoings. The sins of the forefathers are visited upon the children over a period of several generations until one of the descendants unites with a member of the family he has wronged. Love conquers hate and new blood washes away the original sin. Hawthorne thus explores guilt, revenge and atonement in this novel through the lives of the Pynchon family in their gloomy, bleak, seven gabled, New England mansion.