My Commonplace Book: June 2023

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A selection of quotes to represent June’s reading:

commonplace book
noun
a book into which notable extracts from other works are copied for personal use.

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“I rather like being a detective,” she said with modesty. “You see, I’ve been to see so many murder mysteries, in the movies, but I’ve never had a – er – chance at the real thing. It’s gruesome” – she refrained from looking at Mayhew – “but fascinating. Fascinating.”

The Cat Saw Murder by Dolores Hitchens (1939)

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“Are kings, soldiers, and diplomatists exceptions to the general rule of humanity? Not they! I tell you seriously, if the newspapers of Europe had one and all decided not to take the smallest notice in print of the war between France and Germany, it is my firm conviction the war would have come to an end for want of encouragement long since. Let the pen cease to advertise the sword, and I, for one, can see the result. No report — no fighting.”

“Your views have the merit of perfect novelty, ma’am,” said Horace. “Would you object to see them in the newspapers?”

The New Magdalen by Wilkie Collins (1873)

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Mairéad raised her hands. ‘Whichever or whatever. Catholic. Protestant. Hindu, Sikh, Jew. We don’t recognise such fabrications, such man-made labels here. Simply cloaks we wear. Cloaks that conceal our natural form and hide the truth. That we are all born from the one universal energy, draw from the one breath of life.’

The Graces by Siobhan MacGowan (2023)

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‘Well, it is so, isn’t it?’ said Benovek. ‘What ought to be free and running in you is tied up in a knot. And that is because of this strong hate, which is using up nearly all of your energy. As for love, where is it? You have the capacity, no doubt; anybody who can hate can love also…hate is no good, it is a self-destructive emotion.’

The Embroidered Sunset by Joan Aiken (1970)

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Favourite book read in June:

The New Magdalen

Authors read for the first time in June:

Dolores Hitchens

Places visited in my June reading:

England, France, America, Ireland

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Reading notes: This was another slow month of reading for me, but at least the four books that I finished were all from my 20 Books of Summer list so I do still have a chance of completing the list by the end of August, although it’s not very likely! One of my books also counted towards Reading the Meow and I was pleased to be able to take part in that event. Coming up in July, Jo at The Book Jotter will be hosting Six in Six, something I enjoy participating in every year as it’s a great way to look back on our first six months of reading. See Jo’s post for the full details!

How was June for you? What are you planning to read in July?

The New Magdalen by Wilkie Collins

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Wilkie Collins is one of my favourite Victorian authors, but I feel that I haven’t featured him very often on my blog – probably because I read so many of his books pre-blog, including all of his most famous ones (and I don’t re-read very often these days). Even so, there are still some that I haven’t read yet and I was intrigued when I noticed a few years ago that The New Magdalen was being reprinted by Persephone Books, as they’re a publisher associated more with women authors (although there are a small number of Persephones by male authors as well). It has taken me a while to get round to reading it, so I decided to put it on my 20 Books of Summer list to make sure it didn’t linger on my TBR any longer.

First published in 1873, the novel opens during the Franco-Prussian War in a small cottage in France where Mercy Merrick is working as a Red Cross nurse. As the Germany army draws closer, Mercy has taken shelter in the cottage to nurse some wounded French soldiers and has been joined by another young woman, Grace Roseberry. Grace is on her way to England following the death of her father in Rome; she has spent most of her life in Canada and doesn’t know anybody in England, but she is carrying a letter of introduction from her father to a Lady Janet Roy, a wealthy woman whom she hopes will employ her as a lady’s companion. Grace shares this information with Mercy, who in turn tells Grace her own story – that she is a ‘fallen woman’ who has had a difficult past, eventually ending up in a women’s refuge before volunteering as a nurse.

As the two women talk, the cottage suddenly comes under fire from the advancing army and receives a direct hit from a shell. Grace is badly wounded and is declared dead by a French surgeon. Finding herself alone with Grace’s lifeless body, it occurs to Mercy that she could take Grace’s papers, dress herself in Grace’s clothes and present herself to Lady Janet Roy under the name Grace Roseberry. Desperate to escape from her own troubled past and start a new life, Mercy is unable to resist the temptation and goes through with the plan. It proves to be a huge success and soon Mercy is living as Lady Janet’s adopted daughter and even receives a marriage proposal. Before the marriage can take place, however, Mercy makes a shocking discovery – it seems that the real Grace Roseberry may still be alive and looking for revenge!

Wilkie Collins was known for his sensation novels, a genre that takes elements of Gothic melodrama and places them in an ordinary, often domestic setting. His books typically feature family secrets, disputed inheritances, intercepted letters, stolen jewels, mistaken identities and amazing coincidences. The New Magdalen is less sensational than some of his others, but still falls firmly into the genre so you can expect a very entertaining novel. I’ve always found Collins’ writing to be the most readable of all the Victorians and that, in addition to this being a relatively short book for a 19th century classic, makes it a gripping and surprisingly quick read.

I can see why Persephone chose to add this book to their collection as Collins does write such strong and sympathetic female characters and with Mercy’s story he highlights some of the injustices women faced in Victorian society (and in some ways still do today). I think my favourite Collins novels will always be The Woman in White and Armadale, but this is still a great book and would probably be a good introduction to his work if you didn’t want to commit to a longer one.

This is book 2/20 of my 20 Books of Summer 2023 and book 40/50 from my second Classics Club list.

The Other Side of Mrs Wood by Lucy Barker

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Mrs Wood is the most successful medium in Victorian London. Together with her assistant, Miss Newman, she hosts spectacular séances that have made her the talk of the town and brought the rich and famous to her door requesting private consultations. Of course, Mrs Wood can’t really communicate with spirits, but she doesn’t feel too guilty about what she’s doing – after all, a widow has to make a living somehow and this is the work she’s been raised to do. Recently, however, things have started going wrong. There are reports from America of mediums promising to materialise full spirits and although Mrs Wood disapproves of such things, she worries that her own more traditional shows are losing their spark. When she hears the unmistakable sound of a yawn during one of her séances, she knows she has to take action.

The answer to Mrs Wood’s problems arrives in the form of sixteen-year-old Emmie Finch, who wants nothing more than to become a medium. Impressed by the girl’s talent and enthusiasm, Mrs Wood agrees to take her on as an apprentice. Miss Finch is an instant hit with Mrs Wood’s friends and clients, but is she really the sweet, innocent young woman she appears to be or has Mrs Wood made a big mistake?

The Other Side of Mrs Wood is Lucy Barker’s debut novel and a very enjoyable one! It took me a few chapters to get into the story as the beginning was quite slow, but by the middle of the book I had been completely drawn in. At first I wasn’t sure whether I liked Mrs Wood, but I quickly warmed to her. It was nice to have an older, more mature heroine, who is starting to worry about greying hair and aching bones, has already been married and divorced before the story begins and is devoting herself to her career rather than looking for romance. The beautiful young Emmie Finch, on the other hand, is portrayed as the novel’s villain, but whether she really is trying to cause trouble or whether it’s all in Mrs Wood’s mind is something you’ll have to read the book to find out!

Apart from a subplot featuring Mrs Wood’s assistant Miss Newman, who is involved in the early women’s rights movement, this is not really a book that tackles a lot of deep issues and I enjoyed it primarily for its entertainment value. However, that doesn’t mean it’s a silly, frothy book in any way – it’s well written, evocative of the Victorian era, and I learned a huge amount about the 19th century fascination with spiritualism. It was interesting to read about the techniques used by mediums to produce dramatic effects, the etiquette of hosting a meeting of the Circle, and the preparations that go into holding a Grand Séance. What I found particularly intriguing was that although Mrs Wood, like her rival mediums, lives in fear of being caught out and exposed, she doesn’t actually view herself as a fraud or a con artist. She believes she is using her skills to bring comfort to other people and although she has no qualms over using trickery to ‘apport’ (transport using spiritual means) small objects and even herself, she feels that materialising full spirits is a step too far!

The Other Side of Mrs Wood was fun to read (except when I became infuriated by the actions of certain characters!) but I can’t agree with the publisher’s description of the book as an ‘irresistible historical comedy’. It was amusing in places but not particularly funny and definitely not what I would call a comedy. Misleading description aside, it’s an impressive first novel with a great twist at the end and I’m already looking forward to Lucy Barker’s next book.

Thanks to Fourth Estate for providing a copy of this book for review via NetGalley.

This is book 25/50 read for the 2023 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge.

The Square of Sevens by Laura Shepherd-Robinson

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Laura Shepherd-Robinson’s books are getting better and better! This one will be on my books of the year list in December, without a doubt.

A standalone novel set in the first half of the 18th century, The Square of Sevens is the story of Red, the daughter of a Cornish fortune teller or ‘cunning-man’. Red can’t remember her mother and has spent the first seven years of her life moving from village to village with her father, telling fortunes using an ancient method of cartomancy known as the Square of Sevens. They need to keep on the move, her father says, to avoid being caught by enemies who wish them harm.

Life changes abruptly for Red when her father dies of a sudden illness and she becomes the ward of a respectable gentleman, Mr Antrobus. Going to live with him in his elegant home in Bath, Red finds herself thrust into society for the first time. Raised by Mr Antrobus and his kindly housekeeper, she settles into her new life while entertaining the people of Bath by reading their cards for them. It’s through her gift for card-reading that Red crosses paths with the wealthy De Lacy family, whom she believes hold the key to the secrets of her own past. And so a sequence of events are set in motion that take Red from Bath to London’s Bartholomew Fair and a grand house in Devon in search of answers.

It’s not really possible for me to say much more about the story without spoiling it, but if I tell you it includes family secrets, disputed inheritances, stolen documents, and lots of surprising twists and turns you’ll get the idea! It’s very entertaining, with the feel of a Charles Dickens novel at times, and I was often reminded of Charles Palliser’s The Quincunx (another great Dickensian novel with an inheritance at the heart of the plot).

I found Red a very engaging narrator; I initially had a lot of sympathy for her, as she struggles to uncover the secrets of her family background and find her place in the world, while others around her try to prevent her from learning the truth at all costs. However, I soon discovered that Red can be just as ruthless herself and is not above doing some plotting and scheming of her own in order to get what she wants. As she tells us at one point in the novel, If you’d wanted a saint, then you should have read a different book. There are plenty of other interesting and memorable characters to get to know – I was particularly intrigued by Lazarus Darke – and what makes the book so fascinating to read is that we can never be quite sure who can be trusted and who can’t.

The ‘Square of Sevens’ method of card reading was described in an 1897 book by Edward Irenaeus Stevenson and Shepherd-Robinson incorporates it throughout the novel. Red tells the fortunes of many of the characters she meets and the fortune-telling theme is carried further with each chapter heading including a picture of a playing card and an interpretation of that card’s meaning. Reading the author’s note at the end of the book, a lot of thought went into choosing the correct card for each chapter and I feel a bit guilty that I didn’t always pick up on the significance of that choice.

If you’ve read and enjoyed Laura Shepherd-Robinson’s two previous novels, the Georgian mysteries Blood and Sugar and Daughters of Night, I’m sure you’ll enjoy this book too – I think it’s even better. If you’re yet to try any of her books then this would be a great place to start!

Thanks to Mantle for providing a copy of this book for review via NetGalley.

This is book 24/50 read for the 2023 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge.

Random Harvest by James Hilton

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“Sometimes I have a feeling of being — if it isn’t too absurd to say such a thing — of being half somebody else. Some casual little thing — a tune or a scent or a name in a newspaper or a look of something or somebody will remind me, just for a second — and yet I haven’t time to get any grip of what it does remind me of — it’s a sort of wisp of memory that can’t be trapped before it fades away…”

After enjoying Lost Horizon and Goodbye, Mr Chips, I decided that the next James Hilton book I read would be his 1941 novel Random Harvest. I knew very little about it except that it was very popular at the time it was published and that the film starring Greer Garson and Ronald Colman is one of my mother’s favourites. I haven’t seen it, but I think reading the book first was the right decision anyway, for reasons I’ll explain later.

The novel opens in 1937 with our narrator, Mr Harrison, falling into conversation with a stranger, Charles Rainier, whom he meets on a train to London. Rainier is now a successful businessman and politician, but he confesses to Harrison that since returning from fighting in World War I twenty years ago a whole chunk of memory has been lost to him. He remembers being injured in the trenches of France in 1917 and he remembers waking up in Liverpool one day in 1919, but can recall nothing at all of what happened in between – a period of two years which are now a complete blank to him.

When the train arrives at the station, the two men go their separate ways, but their paths soon cross again and Rainier offers Harrison a job as his secretary. As they get to know each other better, Rainier tells his new friend the story of his life since that day in Liverpool and gradually his earlier memories begin to return, with surprising results.

This book wasn’t quite what I’d expected; I thought it was going to be more of a romance, but although it does have a very moving love story at its heart, there’s much more to Random Harvest than that. It can be considered an anti-war novel, with it’s theme of loss that runs through the story from beginning to end – not just the obvious loss of memory, but also lost opportunities, lost or broken relationships, lost innocence and, on a wider scale, a way of life that has been lost forever as the world moves on from one war and heads straight for another:

It all depended whether one were tired or eager after the strain. Most of us were both — tired of the war and everything connected with it, eager to push ahead into something new. We soon stopped hating the Germans, and just as soon we began to laugh at the idea of anyone caring enough about the horrid past to ask us that famous question on the recruiting posters — ‘What did you do in the Great War?’ But even the most cynical of us couldn’t see ahead to a time when the only logical answer to that question would be another one — ‘WHICH Great War?’

The book has an unusual structure, divided into five long sections with no chapter breaks and moving backwards and forwards in time, piecing together Rainier’s memories as they begin to flood back. However, it’s always easy enough to follow what’s happening. The plot never becomes confusing and the story is structured the way it is for a good reason, allowing Hilton to obscure whole episodes in Rainier’s life from the reader and also from Rainier himself until it’s the right time to reveal them. And when the final revelation comes, right at the end of the book, I was taken completely by surprise as I hadn’t seen it coming at all. Apparently the film is structured differently, with the truth obvious from the beginning instead of being saved for the end, which is why I’m so glad I’ve read the book first and could experience everything as Hilton intended it.

This is a great book, possibly even better than Lost Horizon, and I’ll definitely be looking for more by James Hilton.

This is book 39/50 read from my second Classics Club list.

Historical Musings #80: Books to look out for from July to December

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Welcome to this month’s post on all things historical fiction!

First of all, congratulations to Lucy Caldwell, the winner of this year’s Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction, announced at the Borders Book Festival last week. The winning novel, These Days, is set in Northern Ireland during the Belfast Blitz and is one of the few books I’ve actually managed to read from this year’s shortlist so far. It’s difficult for me to say whether it’s a deserving winner as I’ve only read two of the other books, but I did like it better than The Sun Walks Down and possibly Act of Oblivion as well.

Moving on, last December I posted a list of upcoming historical fiction being published in 2023. Now that we’re halfway through the year, more titles have been announced so I thought I would post an updated list below for July to December. This is a selection of books that have caught my attention for one reason or another – some are review copies I’ve received (and in a few cases have already read), some are new books by authors I’ve previously enjoyed and others just sounded interesting. I hope there’s something here that appeals to you.

Dates provided are for the UK and were correct at the time of posting.

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July

The Witching Tide by Margaret Meyer (6th July 2023) – This is on my 20 Books of Summer list, as are several of the others mentioned here. It’s Meyer’s debut novel, based on the real life 17th century East Anglia witch trials.

The Housekeepers by Alex Hay (6th July 2023) – I’ve read and enjoyed this debut novel in which a group of servants plan to carry out a daring heist in a grand London house in 1905. My review will be up in a few weeks!

Disobedient by Elizabeth Fremantle (27th July 2023) – A new Fremantle novel is always something to look forward to and this one, about the 17th century artist Artemisia Gentileschi, sounds great.

August

Fair Rosaline by Natasha Solomons (3rd August 2023) – The first of two novels I’m listing here that have a Shakespeare connection, this is the story of Rosaline, the woman Romeo loved before beginning his tragic romance with Juliet.

The Black Crescent by Jane Johnson (3rd August 2023) – I enjoyed some of Jane Johnson’s previous books set in Morocco; this is another and it sounds fascinating.

The Orchid Hour by Nancy Bilyeau (10th August 2023) – I’ve already read my copy of this new Bilyeau novel and will be sharing my review with you in August. It’s set in a 1920s New York nightclub during the era of prohibition.

Learned by Heart by Emma Donoghue (24th August 2023) – I’ve loved some of Emma Donoghue’s historical novels, but not others so I’ll be interested to see what I think of this one about Anne Lister (better known as ‘Gentleman Jack’) and her relationship with Eliza Raine.

A Lady’s Guide to Scandal by Sophie Irwin (31st August 2023) – A Lady’s Guide to Fortune-Hunting was one of my favourite books of 2022, so I have high hopes for this one. Like some of the others listed here, it’s on my 20 Books of Summer list.

September

Night Train to Marrakech by Dinah Jefferies (14th September 2023) – The third book in the Daughters of War trilogy is going to be set in 1960s Morocco. I’m looking forward to finding out how the story ends.

Once a Monster by Robert Dinsdale (21st September 2023) – I’ve just finished reading this one, but you’ll have to wait until nearer publication date for my review. The book is set in 19th century London but inspired by the legend of the minotaur.

The Armour of Light by Ken Follett (26th September 2023) – The new book in Follett’s Kingsbridge series covers the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution. I still haven’t read the previous book, The Evening and the Morning, but as they are set in different periods with different characters I think I could probably read them in either order.

October

Menewood by Nicola Griffith (3rd October 2023) – The long-awaited sequel to Hild, this book will continue the story of St Hilda of Whitby. The first book was beautifully written and I’ve been looking forward to this one for years!

Scarlet Town by Leonora Nattrass (5th October 2023) – This will be the third book in Nattrass’ Laurence Jago mystery series. The last one, Blue Water, was another of my 2022 favourites so I’m hoping this one will be equally good.

The Murder Wheel by Tom Mead (12th October 2023) – Last year when I read Death and the Conjuror, Mead’s first Golden Age style murder mystery, I said I hoped we’d be meeting his magician detective, Joseph Spector, again. My wish has come true as Spector is returning in October with a second mystery to solve!

The Wayward Sisters by Kate Hodges (26th October 2023) – In the second novel on this list with a link to Shakespeare, the three witches from Macbeth reappear in 1780s Scotland.

November

The Temple of Fortuna by Elodie Harper (23rd November 2023) – This will be the final book in Elodie Harper’s trilogy set in ancient Pompeii. I loved The Wolf Den but still need to read the middle book; it’s on my 20 Books of Summer list, so I’m hoping to get to it soon.

December

The Witch’s Daughter by Imogen Edwards-Jones (7th December 2023) – The sequel to The Witches of St Petersburg is set in 1916 and will follow the story of Princess Militza’s daughter Nadezhda as the Russian Revolution approaches.

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Are you tempted by any of these? Which other new historical novels are you looking forward to before the end of the year? And what do you think about These Days winning the 2023 Walter Scott Prize?

Voices of the Dead by Ambrose Parry

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This is the fourth book in Ambrose Parry’s series of crime novels set in the medical world of 19th century Edinburgh – and it’s my favourite so far. Ambrose Parry is a pseudonym of Dr Marisa Haetzman, a consultant anaesthetist, and her husband, the crime author Chris Brookmyre, and they each bring their own set of skills and knowledge to the writing of these books. The series follows Dr Will Raven, assistant to the great Scottish obstetrician James Simpson (a real historical figure), and Sarah Fisher, who dreams of one day becoming a doctor herself, so each book includes a wealth of medical detail as well as a murder mystery to be solved.

In Voices of the Dead, set in 1854, Will is now married with a child and another on the way, but he doesn’t have much time to enjoy being a husband and father – not only is he struggling to move out from under the wing of Dr Simpson and establish his own reputation, he has also become mixed up in yet another murder case. Parts of a dismembered body have been turning up in random places around Edinburgh and Will’s friend, Dr Henry Littlejohn, has asked for his help in identifying the victim.

Meanwhile, Sarah Fisher’s plans to study medicine and follow in the footsteps of Dr Elizabeth Blackwell have had to be put on hold. Disappointed and frustrated, she turns instead to the emerging science of mesmerism, which is beginning to grow in popularity. An American mesmerist has just arrived in Edinburgh and Sarah is keen to learn more about the possible uses of mesmerism in healing patients. Will Raven, however, has a low opinion of such things and, not for the first time, he and Sarah find themselves in conflict. Eventually, however, Sarah is also drawn into the murder investigation and she and Will must work together again to find the culprit.

If you’re new to this series you may be wondering whether you could start here without having read the previous three books. Well, this one does work as a standalone mystery, but I would recommend reading all four in order if you can, starting with The Way of All Flesh. Will and Sarah have a complex relationship – made even more complex by the addition of Will’s wife, Eugenie – and it would be best to get to know them both from the beginning. There are also lots of recurring characters who develop throughout the series; in this book, I particularly enjoyed being reacquainted with Gregor the giant. Like the real life Irishman Charles Byrne (whom I read about recently in Hilary Mantel’s The Giant, O’Brien), Gregor’s size has made him the target of unscrupulous men who hope to acquire his body for exhibition after his death.

As well as the usual details of Will’s work as an obstetrician, I found it fascinating to read about the public displays of mesmerism, hypnotism and spiritualism being staged across Edinburgh and the differing views people held towards them. Were the mesmerists and spiritualists really just frauds preying on gullible victims, as Will believed, or were they acting with the best intentions, trying to provide comfort to people who needed it? This storyline introduces some colourful new characters, including a magician of whom I became quite fond and am hoping we’ll meet again.

Every book in this series has been very enjoyable, but I think this one is the best yet. I’m looking forward to the next one and hope we won’t have to wait too long for it!

Thanks to Canongate for providing a copy of this book for review via NetGalley.

This is book 23/50 read for the 2023 Historical Fiction Reading Challenge.