In Fox’s follow-up to The Somnambulist, she eschews the sprawling country estate for the dank warren of the Limehouse district. Found floating in the river, like a Victorian Moses, baby Pearl is plucked from the Thames. But she enjoys no pharoah’s life. She is raised by the mysterious but efficient Mrs. Hibbert. The woman of the House…
REVIEW: BEAUTIFUL LIES by Clare Clark
Yes, the novel is as gorgeous as the cover. Ethereal, impactful*, vintage and evocative. The heroine, Maribel, is the vivacious wife of parliamentary representative Edward Campbell Lowe. Himself a boisterous, outspoken politician, the two make an unforgettable pair, if an unlikely one. Maribel employs her energies in photography, working to capture true images —…
31 DAYS OF HALLOWEEN – Day 25
From Ruth Edna Kelley’s The Book of Halloween, a description of a Victorian Halloween: In 1874, at Balmoral, a royal celebration of Hallowe’en was recorded. Royalty, tenants, and servants bore torches through the grounds and round the estates. In front of the castle was a heap of stuff saved for the occasion. The torches were…
31 DAYS OF HALLOWEEN – Victorian Superstitions
The Victorians, possibly because of their concern about propriety, had numerous superstitions about death and funerals.
REVIEW: THE WHITE FOREST by Adam McOmber
McOmber’s debut novel explores an unseen fantasy just under the surface of Victorian England. Heroine Jane Silverlake has always been a but different, but she has never quite understood how, or why. In an ever-changing, growing London Jane attempts to find her place. Though she was well-born, her mother died mysteriously when she was…