Book Review 2021 #1 - Laura Purcell's The House of Whispers
The House of Whispers by Laura Purcell
Published by: Penguin Books
Publication Date: June 9th, 2020
Format: Paperback, 336 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
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Hester Why isn't really Hester Why. But who she was had too much baggage. Too much pain. Too many secrets. In fact, she might just be cursed. So she is making a new start, or more accurately, a new start is being foisted upon her. So why not take a new name in the process as an extra level of protection? With only a handful of belongings and a hip flask she heads to Cornwall and Morvoren House. She is to be nurse to the elderly Louise Pinecroft. When Hester arrives at Morvoren the winter is harsh and bleak, there is a sense the snow is finally coming, and the sea is ominous. Hester always thought she'd like to see the sea, now she's wondering if she'll regret this desire. Miss Pinecroft's house perches precariously above the churning waves. She spends her days in an unheated room with all the curtains drawn keeping vigil over bone china. Big vases, small figurines, plates, teacups, all this, as well as Miss Pinecroft, are now Hester's bounden duty. The nurse in her rebels. This elderly woman needs warmth and sustenance and proper clothes, not a drafty room where she wallows in her own filth and myopically watches knickknacks! But just as Hester has her secrets, so does Morvoren House. Bought by Louise's father after their family was ravaged by consumption, he was going to regain his medical renown by finding the cure to the disease that carried away his family. But forty years later there is no cure. Louise is an old woman consumed by the horrors of the past and the uncanny. Morvoren House might have meant to foster in a new age of medical understanding, instead it's caught in the old ties of folklore and fairy tales. Something is happening in the house. Locked doors are being opened without a key, salt borders doorways, clothes are wore inside out, young fertile women are in danger, and the bone china must never be left alone.
Whenever someone tells me to read a book because it reminds them of Daphne Du Maurier I gird my loins. Because if there's one thing this has proven to me time and time again is that people haven't actually read Daphne Du Maurier. They think they know what her writing is like, probably because they watched Rebecca, and have therefore jumped to conclusions. So let it be known when I say a book reminds me of Daphne Du Maurier I actually mean it. I've done my research. Meaning I've read more than one of her books. In fact I've broken double digits not counting re-reads. So yes, The House of Whispers doesn't let you down on the Du Maurier vibe. Now I won't go as far as Natasha Pulley and say it might be better than Du Maurier, because it's different, and that makes it it's own wonderful thing. This is part Poldark part Du Maurier part Fairy Tale and it's bloody brilliant. Pushing aside her first two Georgian books, once Purcell embraced the Gothic aesthetic, her next two books, The Silent Companions and The Poison Thread, could, in a way, be interchangeable in their narrative structure, drawing out the supernatural reveal until right at the end. It felt rushed to have the reveal and then the curtain drop literally within the span of a handful of words. This was gimmicky, and I was fully prepared to have it repeat here, but it didn't. I wouldn't necessarily say I was pleasantly surprised, more in awe. Laura Purcell has grown so much as an author it's almost like this book is separate from the rest of her body of work. I can't put my finger on any one thing that made this book better except that everything is better. Her character development, her plotting, her structure, every little thing kept me invested as I devoured this book. She has always had a well developed sense of place, almost at the cost of the characters, but here the characters, even those I didn't like, were fully rounded and fascinating. This is a tale of tragedy and otherness and obsession, and I can't wait to see what Laura Purcell will do next!
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