This book made me feel joyful. I had read it once maybe 25 years ago and I remember I really liked it then. But this time I loved it. It reminded me oThis book made me feel joyful. I had read it once maybe 25 years ago and I remember I really liked it then. But this time I loved it. It reminded me of Ben Aaronovitch’s Rivers of London books but not quite. Although I do believe they are the same London. But not quite. All of this magic and squalor swished together in such a glorious way. ...more
**spoiler alert** Such a short novel and so very very dark. The two Blackwood sisters and their Uncle Julian. Constance who never leaves the house. Me**spoiler alert** Such a short novel and so very very dark. The two Blackwood sisters and their Uncle Julian. Constance who never leaves the house. Merricat who leaves only twice a week to get food and go to the library. The story is told by Merricat, obsessive compulsive Merricat who lives by her routines and practices magic.
Six years previously the rest of the Blackwood family were murdered, poisoned with arsenic in the sugar bowl. Constance was accused as she did the cooking, but was acquitted and never again left the house. Julian has been ill ever since, weakened by the poison but not killed. The three of them live their quiet lives until one day cousin Charles shows up. He is far too interested in the house and in the money left by his uncle, left to the two girls. It is easy to dislike Charles, grasping and acquisitive. I found it hard to believe anything Merricat said at first. Merricat hates everyone except Constance, who she is obsessed with and the house. As I read it was easy to question her hatred of everyone in the village and it is easy to see that she was the one who really poisoned the Blackwoods. She is by turns vicious and childlike, horrifying really, and yet increasingly we come to accept her version of reality. “Oh Constance,” I said, “we are so happy.”
This novel is so short and so brilliant. I had signed it out of the library weeks ago. I don’t know why I waited so long to read it. ...more
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