Tag: London

Day 194: Burning Bright

~ whatmeread ~ 2 Comments

Cover for Burning BrightI’m afraid I cannot read any book by Tracy Chevalier without thinking of the purity of the character she created in Girl with a Pearl Earring. Unfortunately, I haven’t read a book by her that was as good, but I keep hoping for one.

In Burning Bright, set in 18th century London, Jem Kellaway, a young lad from the country, moves with his family into Lambeth. They settle into a row house owned by Kellaway’s new employer, next door to the poet and artist William Blake and his wife.

Jem befriends a London street urchin named Maggie Butterfield, and they spend some time with the Blakes. These two children are meant to represent Blake’s ideas of innocence and experience.

Jem’s father has taken a carpentry job with Astley’s Circus. Unfortunately, Jem’s sister Maisie soon attracts the eye of John Astley, the rapscallion son of the circus owner.

Most of the action of the novel centers around the unease generated in England by the French Revolution. Blake’s unusual publications have made him appear to be seditious, and he and his family are threatened as the hysteria rises.

Unfortunately, the characters and story are not very interesting, and William Blake is almost incidental to the novel. The novel does nothing to make the mysterious Blake more understandable to us.

Day 188: The Nature of Monsters

~ whatmeread ~ Leave a comment

Cover for The Nature of MonstersClare Clark seems to be fascinated with shit. Her first book, The Great Stink, featured a mystery during the digging of the London sewer system, and it seemed to revel in descriptions of filth. The Nature of Monsters also spends a great deal of time describing the sanitary conditions of 18th century London.

The novel begins with a description of the 1666 Great Fire of London and the subsequent birth of a disfigured child. This opening is perplexing, and it takes you awhile to figure out the connection to the rest of the novel.

It is 1718, and Eliza Tally has essentially been sold by her mother to a wealthy man’s son, although they first perform a semi-legal marriage ceremony. When Eliza gets pregnant, her mother goes to the man’s father to negotiate a settlement. The results are not what she expects, as Eliza is sold into servitude in London as a maid for an apothecary, whom she thinks is supposed to rid her of her child. But he has other plans.

Eliza is trapped in a bizarre household. She is never allowed to see the apothecary. His wife, Mrs. Black, is intimidating and maintains an iron control over the household. The apothecary has a slimy assistant, and the only other servant is Mary, a mentally handicapped girl. The atmosphere of the house is dark and creepy.

Convinced that he is a scientist and that he is making scientific experiments, the apothecary believes that what a pregnant woman experiences determines the formation of her child. Since he has a handy pregnant woman in his house, he decides to use her for his experiments. Clark has written another disturbing but well-written and suspenseful novel.