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Ghostwalk

by Rebecca Stott

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Ni said: " Gothic novel, courtroom drama, forbidden romance? A spooky house built on a glassworks that with a presence, half-finished manuscripts, a prism, time travel, dreams, letters, unexplained reappearances, this must be a Gothic novel, like Frankenstein, Gothic novel, courtroom drama, forbidden romance? A spooky house built on a glassworks that with a presence, half-finished manuscripts, a prism, time travel, dreams, letters, unexplained reappearances, this must be a Gothic novel, like Frankenstein, Moby Dick, Dracula. But wait, biographical insights, ghostly interventions, writing about writers, it’s all here. The story closely resembles Luchino Visconti’s Death in Venice: with red coats, drownings, blood appearing, an [almost] blind fortune teller hypnotist, strains of Mahler at the funeral, and a trip to where else but Venice.
Then it has a flavour of romance with married Cameron. ‘No I won’t kiss you, I kissed you.’ Shades of Grey.
Sorry Rebecca, Rebecca? Am I even here? The novel is interrupted by frequent questions: What have I forgotten? Did you forget? Did I forget? Did I? You may have taught Creative Writing at East Anglia but rule number one is: show not tell, and please limit questions to one at the most not seven on each page! When you answer questions it feels like you’re explaining too much: the meaning of alchemy, even: “these manuscripts are important” be wary of sentences like these which read like quotes from comics and remember that as readers we take them some lines literally: “Look this is more than ridiculous,” “So it doesn’t make sense”.
Dreams, at most one in a novel, a string of dreams smells of woo, distraction, padding even. And although our first person narrator is clearly highly distractible, the inclusion of some verbatim documents, street directions and incidental events such as crows flying past seem designed to prolong our frustration rather than fill the gaps in the plot. It feels partly biographical ‘But I live in Brighton’ and you travel to East Anglia via Cambridge, also every one of the characters seems to be a writer, yawn, yawn, writers write about writers, imaginative…Playing Leonard Cohen’s ‘End of Love’ when Cameron is unmasked might be considered too literal as well.
The Gothic building vanishes in my reading into long sequences of dialogue. For possibly fake fortune tellers, go to Beyond Black by Hilary Mantel, a masterful, hilarious, even take on the genre and its subterfuges. So no sorry, falls far short of my expectations. ...more "

Mar 31, 2026 01:35PM · see review