 |
 |
Publishing date: September 11, 2012
Publisher: Touchstone
Format: Hardcover, 320 pages
Description from
Goodreads:
In
the bestselling tradition of The
Night Circus and Sarah Waters’s The Little Stranger,
Adam McOmber’s hauntingly original debut novel follows a young woman in
Victorian England whose peculiar abilities help her infiltrate a mysterious
secret society.
Young Jane Silverlake lives with her father at a crumbling family estate on the edge of Hampstead Heath. Jane has a secret—an unexplainable gift that allows her to see the souls of manmade objects—and this talent isolates her from the outside world. Her greatest joy is wandering the wild heath with her neighbors, Madeline and Nathan. But as the friends come of age, their idyll is shattered by the feelings both girls develop for Nathan, and by Nathan’s interest in a cult led by Ariston Day, a charismatic mystic popular with London's elite. Day encourages his followers to explore dream manipulation, with the goal of discovering a new virtual reality, a place he calls the Empyrean.
Young Jane Silverlake lives with her father at a crumbling family estate on the edge of Hampstead Heath. Jane has a secret—an unexplainable gift that allows her to see the souls of manmade objects—and this talent isolates her from the outside world. Her greatest joy is wandering the wild heath with her neighbors, Madeline and Nathan. But as the friends come of age, their idyll is shattered by the feelings both girls develop for Nathan, and by Nathan’s interest in a cult led by Ariston Day, a charismatic mystic popular with London's elite. Day encourages his followers to explore dream manipulation, with the goal of discovering a new virtual reality, a place he calls the Empyrean.
A year later, Nathan has vanished, and the famed Inspector Vidocq arrives in
London to untangle the events that led up to Nathan’s disappearance. As a
sinister truth emerges, Jane realizes she must discover the origins of her
talent and use it to find Nathan herself, before it’s too
late.
Adam McOmber, whose short story collection This New and Poisonous Air earned glowing praise for its evocative prose, here reveals a gift for fantastical twists and dark turns that literary fans will relish.
Adam McOmber, whose short story collection This New and Poisonous Air earned glowing praise for its evocative prose, here reveals a gift for fantastical twists and dark turns that literary fans will relish.
The following review is based on an advance copy the publisher provided for me via NetGalley and states my honest impression of the book.
Review (no spoilers):
The White Forest
is unlike any book I have read before, and I’d be hard pressed to categorize
it. Part mystery or detective novel, part coming-of-age story, part fantasy,
the novel is written in the literary tone and using many of the conventions of
the Victorian epoch where it is set.
The reader meets
Jane Silverlake, the first person narrator, several weeks after the disappearance
of her close friend Nathan Ashe. The story of his disappearance and the
subsequent investigation and search for him is told alternately in the present
and in flashbacks to the time when Jane, her best and only friend Maddy, and
Nathan first met years ago as well as to the weeks shortly before his disappearance.
As the tale unravels, I was constantly torn between empathy for Jane (for
example when we learn how she is treated by some of the staff as well as her
general isolation) and the feeling that there was something sinister about her,
that she was hiding something from both the reader and herself.
Jane’s ability
to feel the souls of man-made objects emerged shortly after her mother’s death.
They assault her mind with flashes of images or sounds, sometimes to the point
where being inside her own home becomes unbearable and she seeks refuge in the
nature of Hampstead Heath. While her friend Maddy feels uneasy about her
ability and calls it a disease, Nathan is fascinated and often asks her to hold
his hand so she can transfer the experience to him. He also wants her to
experiment with her talent and develop it. As the story progresses and the
young people grow up, it becomes clear that their friendly triangle transforms
into an unhealthy power-dynamic of half-hidden rivalry, envy, and betrayal.
Before his
disappearance, Nathan had fallen in with a man called Ariston Day who leads a
cult or secret society in Southwark and lures in the sons of wealthy
aristocrats with promises of leading them to a place called the Empyrean, a
sort of earthly paradise where life will be like before the Fall. Day is an
elusive and mysterious character who experiments with both magic and science
and has no scruples when it comes to achieving his goals. Because of Nathan’s
indiscreetness, Day has heard of Jane’s talents and wants to use them for his
own ends. The mixture of fear and allure that draws in his followers can
definitely be felt by the reader as well.
Adam McOmbers
prose is gorgeous. There are so many hidden undertones and layers to his
writing, sometimes with and sometimes without the knowledge of the characters
who utter his words. The Victorian world he recreated is realistic and magical
all at once and incorporates many of the typical and often contradictory traits
of that society: a delight in mysticism, a simultaneous belief in science, the
new technique of photography, the importance of reputation vs. what went on
behind closed doors anyway, the roles and opportunities open to women. As a
lover of the history of that era, reading this novel was a real delight. I was
never quite sure where Jane’s journey towards the recovery of her friend as
well as her own self-discovery would end up.
I would
recommend The White Forest to a more
mature YA or adult audience because of its complexity especially as it
approaches the ending. A knowledge of English literary tradition enriches the
reading but is not necessary – anyone looking for something truly different in
the fantasy or literary genre can enjoy this novel and the uniqueness of its
world, plot and style.
I am awed. I’d
actually rather write a literary essay on this one than a review.
Have you had the chance to read White Forest early? Is this something you think you might enjoy? As always, feel free to comment :)
Have you had the chance to read White Forest early? Is this something you think you might enjoy? As always, feel free to comment :)
