Fingersmith
by Sarah Waters
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Book Summary Information
Author: Sarah WatersEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2002-10-01
ISBN: 1573229725
Number of pages: 582
Publisher: Riverhead Trade
Product features:
- ISBN13: 9781573229722
- Condition: New
- Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
Book Reviews of Fingersmith
Book Review: A Female Oliver Twist Meets a Perverted Jane Eyre
Summary: 3 Stars
During a trip, I was in my favorite bookstore, Books and Company in Dayton, Ohio browsing the fiction shelves from Z backwards rather from A forwards when I came across "Fingersmith." The blurbs on the covers mentioned some good comments/awards by recognizable reviewers and I like to read good historical era fiction to supplement my readings in non-fiction history; so, I bought it on impulse as I did not have access to the net to check for more lengthy reviews. Thus my introduction to "lesbian soft " literature; otherwise, I might not have read it which would have been a shame because it is a good read and is not focused on or excessively graphical about female-female sex. After I finished it, I said to yself, "Self" wasn't it strange that no man had sex with a female (or any sex at all) and the males were either eunuchs or villains or both?
The story is, however, well constructed and ultimately compels one to read it through with as few stops as possible - for me the compulsion was the solution of the mysteries presented in the middle part of the novel. It is set in the time of Charles Dickens - a play based on his novel "Oliver Twist" is discussed on the first page of this novel. His novels were hot items for turning into live theater during his life time.
The two young female protagonists are of quite different backgrounds and the writer switches between the two in moving through the telling of the tale. The first is Susan Trinder who was adopted as an infant by a common law "couple" Mrs Sucksby and Mr Ibbs, who have separate bedrooms even in a very crowded household in the slums of London. Between them, the couple run criminal enterprises of several sorts, including Mrs Sucksby's baby-selling business. She takes in unwanted or stolen babies and finds buyers for them. Susan, however, she has retained, ostensibly due to a promise to Susan's mother who was hanged on the gallows. The couple have trained her in various criminal arts.
Then comes in a gentry-turned-to-trash by the name of Richard Rivers whom the family calls "Gentleman." He has a scheme to swindle a young woman of Susan's age who will become rich if she marries but not if she remains single or dies. This woman is named Maud Lilly, living with her uncle, Christopher Lilly. Gentleman tells Susan of plans to marry Maud and then force her into an insane asylum so that he can control her whole fortune; he says he wants Susan to help in guiding Lilly into the marriage. It seems that Miss Lilly's maid has resigned and she is to be convinced to take Susan as a replacement. Rather improbable that Susan's slum-trained tongue could be retrained in a few weeks but apparently the author is also a fan of GBS's "Pygmalion." There are a number of improbabilities in the novel but they probably won't spoil the story to the point where
you might be tempted to stop reading.
Now to Miss Lilly. For some reason which is never explained, her uncle has had the nurses in an insane asylum raise her until she was ten years old. They live in a gruesome old mansion in a rural area beyond the outskirts of London. He retrieves her from her caretakers and then begins to train her in reading, diction and deportment so as to take a place in his compulsive hobby and business - the erotic literature known at the time. We are treated to this picture of a girl in her tender teen-age years helping to care for his beloved collection and reading choice bits to a collection of fans and booksellers who dote on such stuff.
Suffice it to say that Susan is indeed accepted by Miss Lilly as her maid and the marriage takes place. It is at this time that the real mysteries begin to arise and we find that things are not what they seem to be. From here on the compulsion to read to the end begins. If you are a reader of murder mysteries and Gothic tales, you may solve the mystery before the end but I was left with many questions and had a number of surprises right up to the end.
In summary, not great literature but a good read; kind of a soap opera set in Dickensian times.
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