This is the second novel by Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year
Sarah Waters. Set in Victorian London, it tells the sad and dark
tale of Margaret Prior as she becomes ensnared by the spiritualist
Selina Dawes. The pair meet when, in an attempt to shake off the
grief of her father's death and to escape the shackles of bourgeois
society, Margaret decides to become a Lady Visitor at Millbank
prison. She is immediately drawn to the cell of Selina, who, over
the course of her visits, winds her in like a fish on a hook, with
a heady mix of spiritualism and eroticism. Tokens such as a spray
of orange blossom and a tress of Selina's hair begin to arrive in
Margaret's bedroom, convincing her that she is indeed Selina's
'affinity' and that by allowing her to take over her body, and
thereby escape, they can begin a new life together on the
Continent. This is a beautifully written novel, with its evocative
descriptions of smog-bound London and the Thames as it seeps into
the creaking Kafkaesque edifice of Millbank. These passages are
counter-balanced by Margaret's beautifully stilted prose as she
recounts the misery of her stifling and repressed life as a
Victorian spinster. Such is the bewitching quality of Waters's
writing that we, like Margaret, are taken in and it comes as a rude
shock to learn that Selinas scheme is nothing more than an
elaborate hoax to facilitate her own escape. Underlying this
haunting tale is an interesting social commentary on the status of
women in Victorian society and a sensitive study of female
sexuality. We are constantly made aware of the inferior position
occupied by women of the time, and throughout there are veiled
references to Margaret's lesbian tendencies as she tries to stifle
memories of a previous relationship with her sister-in-law while at
the same time succumbing to Selina's seductive charms. This is a
finely crafted and absorbing novel which has the reader spellbound
from the start by its eerie sensuality. (Kirkus UK)
'Affinity is the work of an intense and atmospheric imagination . .
. Sarah Waters is such an interesting writer, a kind of feminist
Dickens' Fiona Pitt-Kethley, Daily Telegraph Set in and around the
women's prison at Milbank in the 1870s, Affinity is an eerie and
utterly compelling ghost story, a complex and intriguing literary
mystery and a poignant love story with an unexpected twist in the
tale. Following the death of her father, Margaret Prior has decided
to pursue some 'good work' with the lady criminals of one of
London's most notorious gaols. Surrounded by prisoners, murderers
and common thieves, Margaret feels herself drawn to one of the
prisons more unlikely inmates - the imprisoned spiritualist -
Selina Dawes. Sympathetic to the plight of this innocent-seeming
girl, Margaret sees herself dispensing guidance and perhaps
friendship on her visits, little expecting to find herself dabbling
in a twilight world of seances, shadows, unruly spirits and
unseemly passions.
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