In the author’s note that opens The Confessions of Frannie Langton, Sara Collins remembers reading books like Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre on the small Caribbean island where she grew up and asking the questions: “Why couldn’t a Jamaican former slave be the star of her own gothic romance? Why couldn’t she be complicated, ambiguous, complex? Why had no one like that ever had a love story like those?’ Frannie Langton is Collins’ attempt to redress the balance and give that Jamaican former slave her very own story in which to star.
The novel opens in 1826 with Frannie – or the ‘Mulatta Murderess’, as she has become known – awaiting trial at London’s Old Bailey for the murders of her employers, George and Marguerite Benham. Frannie, who had been a maid in the Benham household, had been found lying in bed, covered in blood, beside Marguerite’s dead body. She has no idea how she came to be there and is sure she couldn’t possibly have killed her beloved mistress, yet all the evidence suggests that she is guilty. While she waits for her fate to be decided, Frannie looks back on her life and recalls the sequence of events that have led her to this point.
Frannie remembers her childhood, growing up on the Langtons’ sugar plantation in Jamaica (ironically called ‘Paradise’) and describes the circumstances that meant she received an education that would usually be denied to a slave. Later, when Mr Langton returns to England, he takes Frannie with him and she looks forward to new experiences and new opportunities. On their arrival in London, however, she is handed over to the Benhams to become a servant in their home and finds that life is not much better here than it was on the plantation. The one bright spot in her life is her relationship with ‘Madame’ (Mrs Benham), but as we already know from the opening chapter of the book, that relationship will end in tragedy.
The Confessions of Frannie Langton is Sara Collins’ first novel and I’m sure it’s going to be a big success for her. It has been given a beautiful front cover, which stands out even amongst the many other beautiful covers that are around at the moment and the book has already been getting lots of very positive reviews since its publication last week. I didn’t love it as much as most other people seem to have done, but that’s probably because it wasn’t really what I’d expected. I thought the crime element would have been a more important part of the story, but the murder and the trial are confined mainly to the final few chapters, and I’m not sure I would agree with the description of the book as a gothic novel either, although I suppose it would depend on what you consider gothic to mean.
I did find Frannie an interesting and engaging heroine with a strong narrative voice and although there were some parts of her story that I felt I’d read many times before (bearing in mind that I do read a lot of historical novels set in the 19th century), Frannie’s background and unusual circumstances mean that we are seeing things from a slightly different angle. Having one white parent and one black, Frannie never really fits in with the other slaves on the plantation – especially when she is given an education and an enviable position as house slave – but she knows she will never be accepted by most white people either. As you can imagine, she experiences a lot of cruelty and prejudice in her life and this is quite a sad story at times – and also quite disturbing, particularly the descriptions of the ‘scientific experiments’ and research carried out by Frannie’s two masters, Langton and Benham.
Sara Collins writes beautifully and I was struck by sentences like “A man writes to separate himself from the common history. A woman writes to try to join it…” and “A good scientist merely searches for the answer to the question posed, but the one whose name history will record reaches for the questions no one has even thought to ask”. And of course, as a fellow book lover, I appreciated Frannie’s love of literature and her determination to read all the books she could get her hands on. But was Frannie really responsible for the deaths of George and Marguerite Benham? You will need to read her confessions to find out…
Thanks to Penguin/Viking Books for providing a review copy of The Confessions of Frannie Langton and for inviting me to take part in their blog tour.
She Reads Novels 
I’d already made a note of this one after reading Jane’s review on Beyond Eden Rock. You’ve just reinforced that this sounds like it would be right up my street. Thanks Helen!
That’s great, Sandra. I think Jane enjoyed it a bit more than I did, but it’s definitely a fascinating story and well worth reading!
This one sounds very good.
Yes, I enjoyed it. I was expecting it to have a stronger crime element, but it was still an interesting read.
This story doesn’t sound that gothic to me, but it does sound interesting. 🙂
I suppose when I think of gothic I think of ghosts and moors and thunderstorms. It’s an interesting book, anyway!
You did much better with this than me. I’m afraid I gave up on it – partly because I was in a reading slump admittedly, but mainly because it felt like so many other books of the last few years, especially once she got to London. However I agree her writing style is very good, and I’ll still be keeping an eye on her to see what she does next.
Yes, I’ve read some very similar books over the last few years too. I really liked Sara Collins’ writing, though, so I’m hoping her next book will have some more original ideas in it.
I don’t guess we can ever have enough stories about slavery, mixed race people and their troubles, and women in weak positions. We need to know and remember and not let it go on any more.
Yes, I agree. Books about slavery can sometimes be difficult or unpleasant to read, but it’s important that we remember and learn from history.
Your review reminded me to check our library, which finally has the US edition on order. I’m very interested to read this one.
I’m glad you won’t have to wait too much longer for it. I hope you find it interesting!
I read another intriguing review of this books a few weeks back at Lynn @ Lynn’s Books. Lynn, like you, enjoyed it with some caveats. It seems there were some weird experiments going on, eh?
Yes, very weird! Although I, like Lynn, did have some caveats, I thought it was an interesting book overall.
I keep seeing this book everywhere – it must be the cover. It sounds really interesting and thank you for reviewing. Certainly one I am going to put on my list.
The cover is very eye-catching, isn’t it? Although I couldn’t quite manage to love this book, it was an interesting read and definitely worth putting on your list.
Great review, Helen! I’ve just started this and hope it will live up to my high expectations. Thanks so much for the warning about the trial and murder mystery being less of a focus. I definitely thought they would be more central too, so I’m glad to know that’s not the case ahead of time.
I hope you enjoy it! I did find the story interesting even though the crime element wasn’t as strong as I’d expected.
Thanks, I am so far!