Fingersmith: Sarah Waters

[poliphilo]

Wilkie Collins might have come up with the plot and characters but the writing wouldn't have been half as good.  Fingersmith is gripping and vivid and if it isn't quite a masterpiece it's because exposing the hells of Victorian England is a bit old hat.

Comments

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

And Dickens (not to mention Henry Mayhew) do it better than anyone else! :o)

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

On the very first page of Fingersmith- in a little nod to the master- our heroine attends a stage production of Oliver Twist.

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

And that's good research- the stage version was hugely popular throughout the Victorian era.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Waters has a great feel for period. Her version of the late 1940s (in The Little Stranger) strikes me as spot on.