Sarah Waters is a powerful writer, and she excels at creating an immersive world in this book. Fingersmith is set in Victorian England, in the 1860s. The settings and characters are reminiscent of Dickens, with a more modern flavor. If you like Victorian dramas, you will devour the descriptions of winding London streets, heroic orphans, bleak asylums, misty landscapes, and dark crumbling country houses full of books.
Fingersmith is divided into three parts. Part One is narrated by Sue Trinder, an orphan raised by a group of thieves. Sue is recruited into a plot to trick a wealthy young woman – Maud Lilly - into marrying one of the thieves so that they can steal her fortune. Sue travels to Briar, an isolated country house, to act as Maud’s maid, and thus manipulate her into the sham marriage.
Part Two is narrated by the wealthy young mark, Maud, who has been locked away in her Uncle’s country house Briar, and wants nothing more than to escape to London. I think I can say, without giving anything away, that you will be wow-ed by Sarah Water’s cleverness and skill in executing a major plot twist halfway through the book, and then again, with another major twist in Part Three, when our two heroines are reunited. These literary surprises catch me off guard and propel me through this gripping book each time I re-read it. When you read this book, remember that you can’t trust anyone. Not the likeable thieves, the charming gentlemen, or the seemingly innocent characters.
Fingersmith deals with themes of escape, deceit, secrets, survival, friendship, and motherhood. It is also an erotic and sensually written love story. The first time I read Fingersmith, I related to the two young women in the story, Maud and Lilly.
When I re-read the book recently, I was drawn to the conflict of the mother figure, Mrs. Sucksby, who raised Sue, and who, in a very misguided way, tries to survive and take care of her children.
Fingersmith was shortlisted for the Orange Prize and the Man Booker Prize and adapted into a television Series by the BBC. If you are a film-lover you may recognize the plot from the South Korean adaptation, The Handmaiden, directed by Park Chan-wook.
In her review of Fingersmith for the Guardian, titled Corsets and Cliffhangers, Julie Meyerson says, “There are always novels that you envy people for not yet having read, for the pleasures they still have to come.
Well, this is one. Long, dark, twisted and satisfying, ...it feel less like reading, more like living: an unforgettable experience.”
I envy you for not having yet read Fingersmith. Add it to your reading list for an unforgettable experience.
