{"id":8029,"date":"2018-11-12T12:15:39","date_gmt":"2018-11-12T12:15:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=8029"},"modified":"2018-11-26T13:18:34","modified_gmt":"2018-11-26T13:18:34","slug":"house-of-glass-by-susan-fletcher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=8029","title":{"rendered":"House of Glass by Susan Fletcher"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Published by Virago 1 November 2018<\/strong><\/p>\n

368pp, hardback, \u00a316.99<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reviewed by Rachel Hore<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Susan Fletcher\u2019s new novel is the seventh in a body of work that is mostly, but not entirely, historical.\u00a0 Since her prize-winning debut, Eve Green<\/em>, with its contemporary Welsh setting, she has addressed a quirky range of historical subjects from a nineteenth-century French mental hospital in Let Me Tell You About a Man I Knew<\/em>, to the aftermath of the 1692 Glencoe Massacre in Corrag<\/em>. Past or present, the novels are linked by their deep emotional intensity, the way they employ myth and folklore, and by their beguiling, dreamlike style.<\/p>\n

House of Glass<\/em> occupies the historical gothic genre, which bestselling literary authors such as Sarah Perry and Natasha Pulley have brought back into vogue. \u00a0Its protagonist is Clare Waterfield, a young Edwardian woman set apart from society by a debilitating brittle bone condition that has left her curiously shaped and with a bluish tinge to the whites of her eyes. She\u2019s recently orphaned (in the best gothic tradition), and it\u2019s to exorcise her grief that, after an unofficial apprenticeship with the curator of the Palm House at Kew Gardens in 1914, she accepts a commission at Shadowbrook, a rundown country house in Gloucestershire, where the owner Mr Fox wishes her to fill his restored glasshouse with exotic plants.<\/p>\n

Shrewd, stubborn, outspoken, Clara\u2019s first person voice dominates the narrative.\u00a0\u00a0 She\u2019s struck by the beauty of Shadowbrook\u2019s grounds, impressed by doughty Mr Hollis and his team of gardeners who tend them, but senses immediately that all is not well in the house itself.\u00a0 Why is Mr Fox rarely in residence and why is she not permitted to meet him when he is?\u00a0 What causes the housekeeper, Mrs Bale, such anxiety and exhaustion? Why are the local villagers so critical of the Pettigrew family who once owned Shadowbrook, and particularly of Veronique Pettigrew, a beautiful woman whose independent behaviour was considered monstrous and whose body was buried in the orchard?\u00a0 Above all, what causes the strange noises Clara hears in the night, the tapping on doors and the footsteps, and what kills the flowers in their vases and smashes pictures? She\u2019s determined to get to the bottom of these matters through rational enquiry, but finds herself stymied at every turn.<\/p>\n

Clara\u2019s confusion extends to the men she meets. There is Kit, the brooding neighbouring farmer, over whom hangs rumours of philandering and violence; Matthew, the diffident, conflicted rector of the parish church, who is no match for Clara\u2019s rationalist arguments; Mr Fox himself, cultured and enigmatic; charismatic George, the ghost-hunter brought in to investigate the \u2018haunting\u2019. \u00a0None proves to be what he first seems.<\/p>\n

Susan Fletcher\u2019s characters have a powerful presence. Clara, who describes herself as \u2018crippled, pale, petulant\u2019, makes up for bodily weakness with her forceful personality.\u00a0 George is a tall, broad, handsome man who makes her \u2018think of the beechwoods \u2026formed, warm and capable. Articulate. Careful with the things he held.\u2019\u00a0 The physical presence of another \u2018broad, heavy\u2019 character, Mr Jarvis, the misogynistic shopkeeper, feels more threatening to Clara: \u2018As he trod, I felt the floor move beneath me; I heard jars and metalwork tinkle on the shelves.\u2019\u00a0 Even very minor characters are summed up economically.\u00a0 Here is the man sent to meet Clara at the station:\u00a0 \u2018A moustache, the smell of tobacco.\u2019<\/p>\n

Susan Fletcher evokes the lushness of Clara\u2019s world with sensuous prose. The Palmhouse at Kew is where \u2018vines twisted on metalwork; condensation pooled on beams and, having pooled, dripped on my shoulders and the backs of my hands.\u2019\u00a0 The garden at Shadowbrook has \u2018deep, fire-coloured\u2019 flower borders and \u2018a dark, thatched tennis pavilion in which the furniture had rusted\u2019. \u00a0Such description piles up like the greenery to rich cumulative effect.<\/p>\n

There are respects in which the author subverts her chosen genre by not delivering what is promised.\u00a0 Clara, in her relentless dismissal of the supernatural, topples all the gothic tropes that been so carefully set up and disperses the delicious brooding atmosphere. Whilst one applauds her search for truth, the loss of the romance is a shame. On the other hand, since the novel yields up its final secrets at the outbreak of the First World War perhaps a note of sombre reality is the only option.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Rachel Hore<\/p>\n

House of Glass<\/em> occupies the historical gothic genre, which bestselling literary authors such as Sarah Perry and Natasha Pulley have brought back into vogue. Its protagonist is Clare Waterfield, a young Edwardian woman set apart from society by a debilitating brittle bone condition that has left her curiously shaped and with a bluish tinge to the whites of her eyes. She\u2019s recently orphaned (in the best gothic tradition), and it\u2019s to exorcise her grief that, after an unofficial apprenticeship with the curator of the Palm House at Kew Gardens in 1914, she accepts a commission at Shadowbrook, a rundown country house in Gloucestershire […] in Reviews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-fiction-and-non-fiction","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8029"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8029\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8051,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8029\/revisions\/8051"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}