Reclusive author Vida Winter, famous for her collection of twelve enchanting stories, has spent the past six decades penning a series of alternate lives for herself. Now old and ailing, she is ready to reveal the truth about her extraordinary existence and the violent and tragic past she has kept secret for so long. Calling on Margaret Lea, a young biographer troubled by her own painful history, Vida disinters the life she meant to bury for good. Margaret is mesmerized by the author's tale of gothic strangeness—featuring the beautiful and willful Isabelle, the feral twins Adeline and Emmeline, a ghost, a governess, a topiary garden and a devastating fire. Together, Margaret and Vida confront the ghosts that have haunted them while becoming, finally, transformed by the truth themselves.
REVIEW:
The Thirteenth Tale was another re-read for me, one I'm shocked to discover I never reviewed. I read this book years ago and fell in love, not just with the story, but with the way the narrator fell into the story and pulled the reader with her. The language, the pictures it paints, the wreck of Angelfield and the family- they pulled me in all those years ago, and they pulled me in again today even though I knew the twist that was coming. This is a book written for readers, one that recognizes the magnetic pull of a good tale and the need to stay up all night to finish it. I've read Bellman and Black and though well-written, it didn't resonate for me the way The Thirteenth Tale did. I was a little afraid that reading this book again would ruin it- that I wouldn't find the same magic and so would ruin the memory of how good it was. Instead I am again bewitched, again finding it hard to shake off the tendrils of the story. 5 stars.
1 comment:
It's so good when a book lives up to a reread!
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