It's dark and dank and and cold, and no flower will grow on the prison's grounds. Built in the shape of a pentagon, it's approached through many gates and twisting passages. As part of her rehabilitation she begins visiting the women incarcerated at Millbank Prison, which has to be one of the direst places in all of Victorian London.
A Victorian woman so often had little to keep her mind stimulated, it must have felt horribly oppressive and Waters marvelously captures that feeling of claustrophobia-both in Margaret's mind and in the prison as well. Her father died, though, and her friend married Margaret's brother, so now she has little to keep her together except the chloral that her mother dispenses to her each evening, carefully measuring out each dose. Margaret is an intellectual, always helping her father with his work, she had expected to travel to Italy with him and a friend. After the death of her father, with whom she shared a close relationship, she has a mental breakdown. Margaret Prior is an upper-class lady, though quickly verging on spinsterhood.
She did, though I won't tell you how, as this is one novel I can heartily recommend you read, and it's best not to know too much of what's in store. Coul d Waters really convince me? I will say she had me going for a while, and I wondered if she coul d pull it off. Stil l, I've alway s thought of Spiritu alists as being charlatans, feeding on other people's grief over the loss of loved ones. Could I really sit through an entire novel about Spiritualism? The Spiritualis t movement was at its peak in the mid-1800s, so this is a prime topic for Wa ters to write about. Sarah Waters is an excellent writer, but I started reading Affinity with a little trepidation.
I like the uncertainty that a really good ghost story might provoke, however. I love ghost stories, though I can't really say I believe in ghosts. Although Fingersmith is still my favorite, I enjoyed Affinity far more than I thought I would. Affinity is set for the mos t part in the Victorian wo men's prison Millbank and concerns one of the inmates, a s piritualist, and a Lady Visi tor. Her plots are like a coil twisting tighter and tighter and then all of a sudden springing free when you least expect it. Oh lordy but Sarah Waters knows how to tell a good story, and I mean good story. Alternative History/Dystopian Fiction (7).
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