Fayne

by Ann-Marie MacDonald

In the late nineteenth century, Charlotte Bell is growing up at Fayne, a vast and lonely estate straddling the border between England and Scotland, where she has been kept from the world by her adoring father, Lord Henry Bell, owing to a mysterious condition. Charlotte, strong and insatiably curious, revels in the moorlands, and has learned the treacherous and healing ways of the bog from the old hired man, Byrn, whose own origins are shrouded in mystery. Her idyllic existence is shadowed by the magnificent portrait on the landing in Fayne House which depicts her mother, a beautiful Irish-American heiress, holding Charlotte’s brother, Charles Bell. Charlotte has grown up with the knowledge that her mother died in giving birth to her, and that her older brother, Charles, the long-awaited heir, died soon afterwards at the age of two. When Charlotte’s appetite for learning threatens to exceed the bounds of the estate, her father breaks with tradition and hires a tutor to teach his daughter “as you would my son, had I one.” But when Charlotte and her tutor’s explorations of the bog turn up an unexpected artefact, her father announces he has arranged for her to be cured of her condition, and her world is upended. Charlotte’s passion for knowledge and adventure will take her to the bottom of family secrets and to the heart of her own identity.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Canada, Historical, Audiobook, Queer, Gothic

736 pages, Paperback

First published October 11, 2022

About the author

Ann-Marie MacDonald is a Canadian playwright, author, actress, and broadcast host who lives in Toronto, Ontario.

Reviews

[JR is Reading · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best book of 2022 calling it now. PROVE ME WRONG.

[NILTON TEIXEIRA · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the author of one of my top ten favourite books of all time (to date and excluding the classics): “ Fall On Your Knees”.
When a copy was immediately available from my local library I decided to prioritize it.
I did not read the synopsis but I did read one review on GoodReads (by Carolyn Walsh) that motivated me even more.
The opening of this book got hooked me right away. I needed to know more about this captivating relationship between father and daughter, and I was extremely curious to find out about her “special condition”.
The writing is, in my opinion, stunning and superb.
The development of the story is a bit slow, and, because of the timeline structure, some times repetitive and sometimes a bit boring (too much description - as an example, the colour of fabrics or the position of the furnitures).
I thought that the concept was unique.
As I love historical fiction, this one easily transported me to the era (late nineteenth century), thanks to the amazing writing and storytelling skills.
There are some heartbreaking moments.
Most of the drama could have been easily avoided if there were sincere communication. But we have to face the time when the story was set in.
I can easily see this book adapted for the screen.
I read the book while simultaneously listening to the audiobook, which is narrated by the author, and who did a terrific job.
I do think that this book could have been reduced by 200 pages, hence my hesitation to rate it 5 stars, but the writing is definitely the best thing about this book.

PS. I have never heard of this unusual birth condition before (I can’t spell it out without spoiling).

As for the language used, archaic or not, I loved it! It felt so authentic.
And I learned a new word: livery

Hardcover (Knopf Canada): 736 pages
Ebook: 246k words, 906 pages (default)
Reading time: 20-22 hours
Audiobook, narrated by Ann-Marie MacDonald: 30.9 hours (normal speed)

[Rose · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have just finished reading Fayne by Author Ann-Marie MacDonald.

This is a beautifully written book, with the words feeling almost magical and whimsical. This is an author who can really tell a story. It takes place in the late nineteenth century on a vast property between England and Scotland in the moorlands.

The prose makes you feel like you are in the setting while reading it.

Charlotte Bell is growing up at Fayne, which is a lonely large estate with her father, Lord Henry Bell. It is a very secluded life for the young girl, who is sheltered from life outside of the estate. Charlotte’s mother and infant brother have died, and young Charlotte has a brightness about her and a longing to go to school and become a doctor.

Her father brings on a tutor to teach her daughter, and it is an uncommon tradition of teaching girls. She takes to learning and has great ambitions.

This is an extremely long book and commanded a great deal of my time to finish, at over 700 pages.

I did like this book, and the Author’s words, but was not in love with it to be all right with the length of it.

I do however think this book will be enjoyed by many readers.

Thank you to NetGalley, Author Ann-Marie MacDonald., and Penguin Random House Canada for my advanced copy to read and review.

#netgalley

[Paul Weiss · Rating 5 out of 5]

“An educated daughter is not the end of the world. Indeed it might be the beginning.”

Not to put too fine a point on it but FAYNE must be characterized as no less than a literary masterpiece. At once heartwarming and heartbreaking, it is a completely captivating 19th century family drama set on a vast, bleak and lonely estate set within the awesome natural beauty of a dangerous Scottish fen that would have challenged Dickens’ powers of description. Ann-Marie MacDonald proved herself more than worthy of that challenge.

Did I say Dickens? You bet I did!

Consider the depth of the characters, the despicable cringe-worthy evil of the primary antagonist, the twists and turns of a plot that Dickens himself would have been pleased to produce and, of course, social commentary. Oh my word, yes! FAYNE is an informative extended critique of England and Scotland's 19th and early 20th century systemic misogyny and homophobia and the snobbish self-centered, self-entitled narcissism of wealth and the titled class.

Charlotte Bell is portrayed as an intersex hermaphrodite and FAYNE is the story of her life subject to England’s disturbing attitudes towards women and their virtually non-existent rights added to (and compounded with) the enduring disgust aimed at any member of the then deeply closeted LGBTQ community.

Like any Dickens novel, best practice would be to read slowly to digest the twists and turns of a complex plot while savoring the positively luscious narrative, bleak atmosphere, and compelling conversation. Despite its intimidating door-stopper length of 700+ long pages of fine print, FAYNE is over all too quickly.

Definitely recommended.

Paul Weiss

[Fraser Simons · Rating 5 out of 5]

My first book by this author, and what a great experience it was! I am actually quite glad I didn’t remember what it was about and didn’t read the synopsis, because much of the novel, maybe even for half of it—it felt like—is about Mary, at a young age. Her hopes and ambitions and sketching the 19th century, when arranged marriages and bloodlines were king, and the stigma against the working poor was codified in the entire population of Irish stock, which she comes from.

It transitions into quite a sweeping, historical tale though, as it traces the relationship between her and her husband, and can be nonlinear, and even a bit mysterious with the narrator of the story, who addresses the reader directly and is clearly not Mary, but we don’t know of her significance until much later on. It becomes a generational tale, reminding me of Downton Abbey, at times, where it’s the last of the aristocrats and the changing of the country, doing away with old notions and old ways of life, and old ways of thinking, too.

Folklore also permeates to the bone, the narrator of the story; nature playing a significant role in the land of Fayne, and a counterpoint to the unnatural city and ways in which people are treated and how food transitions into how we know it today. The “old ways” at Fayne are still practiced, and it is in many ways a sanctuary from the changing of time that takes place outside of it.

At a macro plot level, id describe this book as where a lot happens, but at a very slow pace. It’s great at situating time and place and setting scenes. The prose are accessible but erudite, fitting the time period—language changing along with the generations. It’s something to sink into, which will be something some readers enjoy, others, looking for the plot will probably find it middling, on that front. If you read for character work, you’ll find a lot to love, however.

Their intersections with all revenant social constructs today and topical issues, including queerness becoming a larger theme than I had expected, situates this as fantastic historical fiction. It does everything I want from the genre: Educating me on the time period and placing me there, while also showing how that life is relevant to my own, now. The more things change, the more things stay the same, essentially. I will certainly go on to read more from this author in the future.

[Laurie Burns · Rating 5 out of 5]

"And it occurred to me that memory is shaped not merely by events and their retention, but also by the telling, and by the listening. Thereby, too, is shaped the future."

A large, sweeping tale that needs reading.

There are twists and turns and plenty of surprise, but I dare not tell you all of it.

The language is difficult (old, Scottish, Irish) and I had to stop a lot, but oh, oh it is worth it. A sweeping and magical tale.

[Anna Murphy · Rating 3 out of 5]

While beautifully written, this is just too long. It needed trimming by at least 200 pages. I loved the story and the characters but at many points it dragged, and by the end, seemed self-indulgent.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have just closed the book on Fayne and am immediately beginning this review without having read any other reviews or information about the book....my gut reaction: what a story! And no wonder this is the first book in a long time from Ann-Marie MacDonald; this must have taken her YEARS to research and write. Well done!
It took about 20% to get into this book. The language is extremely old, bordering on archaic with extensive use of Latin, Gaelic (I think) and old Scottish expressions. The vocabulary throughout the book is very advanced. I will usually skip over a word I don’t recognize, getting the meaning from the context. Not always possible to do in this book – I used the dictionary multiple times. We realize how English has evolved as a language. The writing style seemed very true to its time period setting.
The time setting started out around 1885, but it took many pages for me to figure that out! 12 year old Charlotte Bell lives with her widowed father Lord Henry Bell on 12000 acre estate called Fayne, that divides the border between England and Scotland. Charlotte’s mother died giving birth to her, and her brother Charles died shortly after at the age of 2. Charlotte has had a reclusive upbringing, because of her mysterious Condition which has precluded her from attending school or socializing with others. The story moves forward from that point, and then also goes back to Lord Henry’s marriage to Irish/American Marie Corcoran. The dual time line is at times confusing, and is also repetitive, because events are repeated from different viewpoints.
This is a long book and not a quick read, but I always looked forward to picking it up and immersing myself in Fayne. By the time I was at 50%, I was completely engaged. I did have to go back to review some of the details in the beginning chapters, which may have been easier to do with a paper book.
The characters in this story became so real for me. Although I did not always agree with the choices they made, I feel the author did an outstanding job of creating characters who acted according to the time period in which they lived.
I would love to give my opinion on some of the subject matter, character development and plot points in this story, but at risk of spoiling it, I will only say to future readers: go in with a very open mind to read a book that touches on many social conditions and conflicts. There is also a thread of magic or old world beliefs throughout the story which lends itself delightfully to the setting in the countryside of Scotland. The parts of the story that are set in Edinburgh also give a very strong sense of place.
A strong 4 star rating from me. Many thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Random House for the ARC in exchange for a review.

[Elene Hartman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don’t give 5 stars lightly.
This book is that piece of literature my brain has been starved of

[Paul Fulcher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mr Margalo explained that this tiny Drosera, commonly “sundew”, was every bit as carnivorous as its giant cousins in equatorial Africa and the Amazonian jungle. How, I wished to know, did that square with their designation as “flora”? Surely only “fauna” were capable of such a feat

“Photosynthesis is eating by any other name,” replied my tutor.

“Aye,” I said, “but ‘eating’ sunshine and ‘drinking’ rain are of a different order to consuming a living being.” And as I watched, a gnat landed and fluttered its wings in a doomed attempt to free itself as the tentacles closed over it.

“Miss Bell, you have yourself seen the promiscuous multitudes that dwell in a drop of rainwater. Nature’s so-called lines are often in fact a blur. That is evolution in action. Nature does not care if something f its a manmade category. She does not care if what arises is beautiful or useful to man. She is a Vesuvius, spewing forth variations, many of which we are pleased to call ‘mistakes’. Yet who knows but that one of those mistakes might someday prove the key to our survival.”

Fayne is a pastiche of the late 19th century gothic novel with all of its traits (yes a codicil plays a key part), strengths and weaknesses. On the latter these include a ridiculously contrived plot (reader, they all turn out to be related) and excessive length. In particular this of the type where the secrets are withheld more from the character than the reader, so the reader sometimes have to wait hundreds of pages for the characters to catch up.

But Fayne is elevated by an extra element in the intersex nature of the main narrator (which again takes them 100 pages to realise) which makes for a particularly interesting challenge to the agnatic primogeniture around which the plot revolves.

As to the strengths, well as a lover of 100 pages novellas who usually regards anything over 300 pages as excessive, this held by interest for almost all of its 700+ pages, with the exception of the rather bolted-on modern day epilogue which felt heavy-handed and unnecessary.

Overall an enjoyable read but not terribly interesting in literary terms.

[Sooz · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked it .... but I wanted to -and rather expected to- really really like it. This book started so so well for me. I loved the first segment describing Charlotte and her life on the moors and that hint of mystery .... her unexplained condition and the painting of her deceased mother and brother that gently but persistently haunts her. The introduction of the other timeframe and it's story feels a little soap-opera-y to me and I am less enamoured. It's a very long novel and -for me- too many of it's 800 pages are given over to that part of the story and unfortunately -again for me- I just never again find the joy I experienced reading the first quarter or so- of the book. I am a big admirer of MacDonald's writing .... especially Fall On Your Knees, which is just a marvelous, dark, compelling story ... and Fayne held so much promise, but by the last quarter or so I was wanted to be done. I found the end particularly disappointing ... MacDonald seemed fixated on explaining everything ... everybody's birth had to link in some significant way to Charlotte. MacDonald left no room for the wonder of the strange randomness of life.

[Rachel McMillan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maddeningly good and gothic and steeped in the brew of Brontë and will definitely hold those enamoured by Emma Donoghue tight! Imaginatively evocative. MacDonald serves up language so that you read words you thought you knew before but understand better now. With thanks to @penguincanada for the advanced copy

[Miki]

Backstory: With the exception of Adult Onset, I’ve read everything that Ann-Marie MacDonald has published. I prefer MacDonald’s plays. However, The Way the Crow Flies remains to be one of my favourite novels, and I read that in one sitting.

This story was an emotional rollercoaster, and I loved it—every single moment of it!

For those who don’t enjoy historical fiction, you’ve been warned. This longer historical fiction touches on issues of nationality, class, gender, sexuality, morality/social behaviours, and culture. At its forefront, however, is gender and by extension of gender, sexism and sexuality: unsurprising considering the time period: Scotland in the 19th century.

I promise that I tried to slowly savour Fayne. I didn’t want to devour it all in one mouthful, and initially I did well . . . Until I didn’t. I don’t even know where to start with this review because the plot isn’t the highlight. The character development is, and so is the setting.

As expected, MacDonald created a time and place that I felt completely immersed in. I could smell the bog on the grounds of Fayne, taste Clarissa’s social default dessert of “pooding”, and hear the ruckus at Miss Gourley’s Refuge. And yet the settings don’t detract from the plot and/or character development. The various locations (No. One Bell Gardens, Fayne, The Refuge, etc.) are not merely places in the story, but are locations of micro stories within the bigger story of Charlotte’s/Charles’ life as well as backdrops of various types of lives some women in Scotland would have lived. While these backdrops can serve as divisive, they’re also places where women commune.

The strength of setting and place in this novel, at least for me, was in the locations where women came together to support one another: Mae, Sheehan, and Knox together in Mae’s room where she lost her babies; Charlotte/Charles and Gwen developing their life-long friendship in Charlotte’s/Charles’ gigantic ancestral grounds of Fayne; and Miss Gourley’s Refuge, where mothers and daughters reunite/unite and where community among women is paramount to the survival and success of those who seek refuge there.

Is it the places where the women live that shape and develop their character or is it their relationships? Because the strength of female character dominates this story. And whether you like her or not, even Clarissa is a reminder of the sacrifices and compromises that women make on a daily basis, and I loved the moments when Clarissa's sharpness were punctuated with why she was the way she was. And in retrospect, I loved all of the women’s strength in this novel. It’s one of its best features of the story, for even in the face of adversity, the women fight and prevail. Does that make the ending a bit too much of a happy one? One could argue it does. But it’s fiction, and I read too many books where women are afterthoughts instead of heroines, so this “sappy” ending sat well with me.

While the men are not the centre of attention in this story, they are, regardless at the centre of so many of the women’s stories, but they’re not caricatures; they’re complex, multi-dimensional people who are faced with making difficult choices about their lives while aware how their choices could and would affect the women in their lives. Sometimes they were clueless, but we know those men exist, too.

Kudos to MacDonald for making each and every character unique, interesting, and complex. I won’t touch on how the story focuses on gender, anatomy, sexuality, and the acceptance of people’s choices because I didn’t know about that when I requested this ARC, and it was the best thematic/topical surprise of the novel for me! Just know it’s intrinsically part of the characters’ arcs and that—without the questions posed about gender and sexuality, the protagonist Charlotte/Charles wouldn’t have been able to fully come alive, and what a lively character they are!

Now, I’m faced with a tough decision: Do I dare read Adult Onset knowing that I may have to wait years for MacDonald to publish another story/play or do I wait for a day when I want to read something well-written by a beloved author?!

Many, many thanks to NetGalley, Penguin Random House Canada and Knopf Canada for an ARC of Ann-Marie MacDonald’s newest novel, Fayne!

[Erin Clemence · Rating 5 out of 5]

Special thanks to NetGalley and the author for a free, electronic ARC of this novel received in exchange for an honest review.

Expected publication date: October 11, 2022

Charlotte Bell is the daughter of Lord Henry Bell, and as a result of an invisible yet deadly illness, she has been confined to the grounds of her family estate, Fayne. Torn between England and Scotland, the grounds sit betwixt the two, belonging to both countries and neither. Charlotte’s aunt, Clarissa, is determined that Henry marry, so that the legacy of the Bell name and the ownership of Fayne, can be secured, as Charlotte, being a female, cannot inherit property. Charlotte is desperate to travel to Edinburgh and study medicine, another dream denied her on the basis of sex, so instead, her father hires a tutor for her so that she may learn and study as if she were a boy. However, when the tutor uncovers something mysterious about Charlotte, and the Bell family, Henry decides to take matters into his own hands and take care of the problem, before Charlotte realizes that it exists.

Ann Marie MacDonald is a Canadian author and playwright, and has some very powerful novels under her belt (“The Way the Crow Flies” being a favourite) and “Fayne” is destined to become another literary masterpiece.

Beautifully written, “Fayne” covers intense subject matter, including intricate parent-child relationships, infant loss and infertility, sex (both of the physical kind and the identification of a physical gender-and its related stereotypes) and for a historical novel, it holds extreme relevance and importance. A beautifully atmospheric coming-of-age novel, “Fayne”’s pages are reminiscent of Jeffrey Eugenides’ “Middlesex”, and leaves just as much of an infallible mark.

The novel is long, divided into six parts, each narrated in the third person from the viewpoint of either Charlotte, or her mother, Mae. The first sections focus on Charlotte’s development on the grounds of Fayne, raised by a single father, believing that her mother died in childbirth. The middle portions have Mae taking over, where her struggles to procreate and produce an heir for Henry are forefront. For a historical novel, MacDonald still manages to include a few delicious twists, and the latter sections of the novel alternate between both Mae and Charlotte, once their surprises have been outed.

This was a slow burn for me, but each turn of the page provided a deeper view of MacDonald’s characters, and the heartbreaking struggles they faced, both as females in the late nineteenth century, and as Bell’s. “Fayne” setting was beautiful and lonely, as were its characters, and this was one of those novels I was glad to enjoy slowly.

[Lata · Rating 4 out of 5]

Set in Edinburgh and in the Scottish countryside, on an estate situated on a section of “disputed” border between Scotland and England, this big, compelling novel about a young woman and damning family secrets kept me reading late into the night.

It was so easy to get lost in this story of fortune-hunting, marriage, heir-getting, women labelled mad and incarcerated on the flimsiest of excuses, foggy moors and bogs, myths and legends, and identity….for fear of spoiling this story about the magnetic main character Charlotte, I won’t give anything else away.

The massive book grabbed from its opening, and pulled me along, desperate to know what would happen next to the irresistible characters, none more so than the irrepressible, ebullient and ever curious Charlotte, whom I fell in love with immediately.

This was such an entertaining book!

Thank you to Netgalley and to Penguin Random House Canada for this ARC in exchange for my review.

[Kira · Rating 5 out of 5]

I adore Ann-Marie Macdonald. This I know to be true. Fayne was no exception to my adoration.

The book starts off slowly, focusing on a young girl living with her father in an estate bordering England and Scotland. Lots of descriptions of books, bogs, and Latin translations. At first I was struggling a bit to get into the story but I'm so glad I kept going because I was fully absorbed and by the end I did not want it to be over.

Macdonald continues to delight and make me weep.

Thank you to the publishers and net galley for the e-arc.

[R · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book killed me.
I have so many thoughts.
So apparently did the author.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautifully written but way too long. Could have been 300 pages shorter, it was quite laborious to get through

[Allison · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow - just incredible.

The writing, the imagination, the scenery, the characters - the CHARACTERS! - the story and the understory... I just absolutely loved this book.

I am in awe that Ann-Marie MacDonald was able to conceive of all this out of my mind. How!? The details, the people were all so REAL. The weaving of storylines so that all of a sudden they all tighten into one big knot, which takes work to unravel.

My review can't come anywhere near doing justice. The book is huge and daunting, yes, but it's incredibly rewarding. I've put it on my special-away-from-other-books shelf in the dining room where it sits with other (mostly Canadian) books that have left me feeling this way - sort of numb and reflective and wildly impressed.

[Line Magnus · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a much-anticipated read, so it's extra disappointing that I ended up not liking it. I actually loved the first 100 pages and thought this would be an easy five-star, but then the narrative shifted in time and perspective, and it all went downhill from there. The only reason I kept reading was because I really wanted to know how the first storyline would continue, but the book never regained its magic for me. I really wish I'd DNF'ed it instead of reading on with ever-increasing frustration.

My issues with the story:

- it was TOO LONG. This book needed an editor with a steady hand, and about 300 pages cut

- connected to point 1: overlong, trivial and repetitive descriptions, and an ungodly amount of detail. I, for one, did not need to know what the characters had to eat for. every. meal. every. day.

- the author makes the absolutely BAFFLING choice in part 1 to include a number of letters which entirely summarize part 2. Part 2 is then just a 200-page detailed narration of a storyline that we already knew all the major plot points of! Maddening.

- there were a few random elements of magical realism that came out of absolutely nowhere for pure plot convenience. There was no magical realism anywhere else in the book. It felt shoe-horned in.

- I guessed every single plot twist literally hundreds of pages in advance, and then just had to wait for the characters to catch up

- I really disliked the ending. It kept dragging on and on, and I hated the conceit it was working with

I really want to support indie presses, though, and this book has tons of great reviews! So I'm sure I'm just overly critical 😅 If a Victorian mystery with a queer twist sounds appealing to you, then by all means give it a go! Maybe you'll end up liking it way more than I did.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an epic book. There are so many twists that even as I'd start to wonder if certain things were possible, they came as a surprise if those things were true (that happened a few times). The twist at the end was completely unexpected, though.

I loved that Fayne felt like another character in a book of exceptional characters. You really feel for Charlotte as her world gets turned upside down and she goes from freedom and exploration, a delight for learning and growth to the realities of a Victorian woman, trussed up in skirts and unable to persue her own dreams and ideas. But there is so much more to her story than just the constraints against women of her time.

This book is as deep and rich as the bogs surrounding Fayne. As full of disputed areas as the Disputed County of Fayne. Just a brilliant book all around.

[Scott Baird (Gunpowder Fiction and Plot) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just read this book.

[Doreen · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

I loved Ann-Marie MacDonald’s previous novels, particularly Fall on Your Knees and The Way the Crow Flies. This one didn’t wow me as much, though I’m willing to admit that this is my second consecutive 700+page book so I might be fatigued.

Charlotte Bell lives on the large estate known as Fayne on the English/Scottish border. Her childhood has been without friends her own age; she has been kept isolated by her father, Lord Henry, because she has a mysterious illness which she has been told leaves her “morbidly susceptible to germs.” Her mother died giving birth to Charlotte, and her older brother Charles, who would have been the heir to the estate and the title, died at the age of two. Charlotte loves the bogs and moors and spends a great deal of time with Byrn, an old hired man who teaches her about the fen. She also educates herself by reading through her father’s library, but for her twelfth birthday, her father gifts her a tutor.

The arrival of that tutor changes her life. She decides she wants to attend university, though that is not really an option for women in the late 19th century. Her father takes her to Edinburgh for an examination which she assumes is the first step towards admission, but it turns out to be entirely different from what she foresees. The treatment for her ailment is also something she never imagined. Thus begins the unravelling of deep and dark family secrets.

Charlotte is a very intelligent girl who knows “Latin, Logic, Rhetoric, and . . . a tolerable grasp of Greek,” but she is also naive; because she has been so sheltered, she misunderstands so much. For instance, when she visits an area in Edinburgh known for its fallen women, she “scanned the street for a fallen woman, but all were upright.” There are also topics which are never discussed with her, so she has little understanding of her body and sexuality. I did find myself at times wondering if such a perceptive and curious girl would not realize sooner what is really happening to her and around her.

The novel has dual time lines. Charlotte’s story is interspersed with that of her mother. Via flashbacks, we meet Lady Marie when she first meets Lord Henry who has been given strict instructions by his sister Clarissa to find a wife and produce an heir. Unfortunately, this approach results in some repetition: the same event is repeated, though from the perspective of a different character.

There are a lot of plot twists, so readers shouldn’t read too many reviews of the book beforehand; some reviewers tend to divulge events and thereby lessen their impact on readers. Some of the twists revolve around connections between characters which seem rather coincidental. For instance, the mothers of two characters are revealed to be characters previously featured in the book. Key discoveries are made so conveniently just in time.

Characters are developed in great detail and very realistically. As I continued to read, my feelings about characters changed, as more and more was revealed. A positive impression might not remain so and the same is true for characters who give a poor impression initially. For both Lord Henry and Lady Marie, in particular, I felt various emotions. Even for a villain, I could not but feel some sympathy because the reader is made privy to thoughts not openly expressed. Given the time period, women were not able pursue dreams, and a life lived in a secondary role may cause bitterness.

There are elements of magic realism which I didn’t appeal to me. Likewise, the philosophical musings at the end of the book seem superfluous. At 700+ pages, the book could use some trimming, and I don’t think the magic realism is needed to develop theme.

The book has a number of themes: role of women, gender and identity, and even humanity’s abuse of the earth. The novel, therefore, is very relevant, despite its setting. The main message for me is that we should accept and appreciate all of nature and nature’s creations. One man says, “’Nature doesnae deal in mistakes so much as differences.’” The bird that Charlotte and her father create from bits and pieces of other birds serves as a symbol of our unwillingness to accept differences. Lord Henry says, “’It is a chimera. . . . other birds would peck it to death’” and Charlotte feels “a pang of pathos at how the creature was innocent of its own monstrosity.”

There is a great deal in this book to analyze and applaud. Its examination of dualities alone is worthy of an essay. Unfortunately, the book just felt too long for me. As I stated at the beginning, I may have been suffering reader fatigue. I certainly recommend the book to those who have enjoyed Ann-Marie MacDonald’s previous novels.

Note: I received a digital galley from the publisher via NetGalley.

Please check out my reader's blog (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/) and follow me on Twitter (@DCYakabuski).

[Lindsay · Rating 4 out of 5]

We read Fayne for our most recent bookclub and after discussing it was 4 stars across the board.

Ann-Marie MacDonald has such a talent for building atmosphere and setting a story in time and place—in Fayne we’re on the moor, straddling Scotland and England (a theme of inbetweeness will come up again and again) where the honourable Charlotte Bell is being raised and educated by her single father Lord Henry Bell in the late nineteenth century, sequestered from all outside contact due to an unnamed condition.

MacDonald is in no rush to move the plot forward, uses language and terms of the time, and because of that devotion to authenticity it takes a good 50 pages to get my bearings and delve into the mysteries of the bog and this strange family. There’s a chance I might have abandoned this book had I not been reading it for bookclub, but once you get in, you’re in and it’s a fascinating story filled with nuanced realistic characters (no villain is just a villain) and a plot of interconnected secrets and tales that all eventually come to light.

We could all agree this was beautifully written and well done but that both the beginning and end left us wanting—the beginning being a bit too slow to get into and the end too convenient with every possible loose end tied up. There was also a consensus that (no spoilers) when MacDonald introduced magical realism into the chat, it was to the book’s detriment. I think there was also some amazing discussion about the main plot point (no spoilers) and how it was handled might have left some of us feeling she tried to both do too much while somehow not giving us enough at the same time.

All in all most of the above was easy to overlook in the face of such an ambitious, enveloping and immersive story and I’m glad I read it. Ann-Marie MacDonald is a Canadian treasure for a reason and she lives up to it here for sure.

[Joey Liu · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have much to say about this book…but over 900 pages long on my e-reader I’m maxed out on vocabulary.

I’m embarrassed to say it took me almost 4 months to finish this book…but it really did not need to be 900 pages long.

I really did enjoy the camaraderie between Charlotte and Lord Henry in the early chapters.

However, Henry Bell is a piece of shit for a man. Everyone at Fayne was kind of shit. But the biggest piece of shit was Clarissa. Do we want to talk about gaslighting of Charlotte, and Mae? And this “condition”, we didn’t need 400 pages to learn what it was. I suspected about the condition and the big curveball towards the end, probably because I read a lot of thrillers, and maybe because of that, I was almost underwhelmed.

The ending? Not my fav. After nearly four months of reading this book, I felt like the author suddenly felt it was too long and just wanted to wrap it up.

Apologies for the poor review, but my brain is mush now from deciphering old English for four months.

[Tim Power · Rating 5 out of 5]

Magnificent.

[LaDonna Harris · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a wild ride!

Looking back i should have seen some if the twists and turns but u stifled with the vocabulary, language, class, societal and cultural barriers. I've learned so much and could have expanded that knowledge by taking the time to research specific terms and phrases I that stumbled over every few pages. The story tugged at me when I put the book down. Typically I would have abandoned a story with so many barriers.

I grew to live the characters and became part of the family - a servant girl, or a field hand. I lived and grieved and raged with them. I became entwined in their lives as the were entwined with one another.

I love books that focus on all of life, not just one aspect of life. Life isn't neat and tidy. This story attests to that and normalizes the drama that people / families create and navigate.

The author artfully handles political and social issues, as relevant today as in the story, maybe even more so.

I will recommend this book to others and will likely purchase a hard copy when it becomes available.

[Deborah · Rating 4 out of 5]

Engaging story set in the late 1800s, mostly in Edinburgh and on a Scottish/English estate, Fayne. Fayne exists in “disputed counties” on the borderlands between England and Scotland, and the title of the Baron whose seat it is is 450 years old. This condition of not being one thing or the other is a metaphor for so much else in the novel. I always do my best to avoid spoilers so I won’t give away key plot points, in order to preserve the sense of discovery and excitement—the “aha!” moments—I experienced while reading. This novel is 700-plus pages, a lot of room to pack in a whole heaping helping of highly operatic doings. To name a few, we have deaths by drowning in the bogs surrounding Fayne, madwomen being put away in terrible places, illegitimate children, a baron of the lineage being put away for having a tail, drug addiction—and I’ve avoided mentioning some of the biggies! It slowed down a bit somewhere in the middle for me but soon picked up again and galloped along to the finish.

[Carolyn Whitzman · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had such high hopes for this novel, having loved Fall on Your Knees and MacDonald’s other two novels. What even. About 50 pages in, I guessed the novel’s main conceit, and once the ‘secret’ was revealed, I thought to myself: oh dammit, now she’s gonna go there, there and there… and she did. I don’t mind overstuffed novels, but if you are going to go full Suitable Boy, at least have a large cast of characters and some historical sweep. Similarly, Gothic Revival is clearly a Thing these days, but Washington Black had (again) tremendous action in terms of three hugely different worlds explored. So basically there’s this genius polymath but she’s totally innocent of the ways of the world and lives on the edge of a moor with magical mystical properties and if you want to know what she ate every day this is the novel for you! Also haunting painting and mysterious dad and well, complete predictability.

[Donna Morgan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I want to love everything Ann-Marie MacDonald writes...and I wanted to love C the main character. But I figured out the "mystery" on my first trip up the stairs, and I found this book too long...this book needed a good edit (could be 20% shorter imo). These draggy narratives are just disrespecting the reader. Do these authors think we are made of time? I have recently turned sixty-one...even if I up my game to one book a week, that means I have at most about 1500 books left--you can't take the spot of two books unless you have something really amazing to offer me, sorry.

There was a lot of repetitive, overly detailed description of places and events, and even 2-3 re-tellings of the same events without adding much to the plot. Also, the sprinkling of a little "magyk" but not much seemed a bit random.