Afterimage

Set in Victorian times, this is the story of three intimately intertwined lives, those of Isabelle and Eldon Dashwood and their maid, Annie. Isabelle is a free spirit, an emancipated, pioneering Victorian lady, a pre-modernist who dreams of becoming a great photographer, breaking away from the constraints of representational art. She wants to capture the fleeting image of life itself but feels trapped into using cultural icons that are useless and irrelevant. Her husband, Eldon, wanted to be an explorer. He suffered from ill health and now dreams of being a famous cartographer, of mapping out the boundaries of the known world and inventing the unknown. Into their isolation comes Annie, whom both Eldon and Isabelle grow to need and love. She is an Irish orphan raised in servitude who since childhood has developed a passion for the written word and consumes everything she can lay her hands on. She possesses a rare intelligence and understanding which, under the influence of the uniquely free relationship offerred by the Dashwoods, is slowly awakened to the possibility that she can change the circumstances of her own life; that she too can dream. Restrained sensuality battles with intellectual yearning in all three lives, creating a profoundly moving story. The novel lingers over frozen images like the photographer's lens, then overlays them with indistinct impressions so that the fluidity of emotional experience is felt as an ever-changing quality rather than a fixed meaning. It is rare to read such an intelligent novel which instructs, educates and explores new ways of seeing the world around us, all at the same time. Highly recommended. (Kirkus UK)