Brookhouse (author of How It Was) infuses this novel with creative richness as the enigmatic characters exude an air of loneliness, all while housed in a picture-perfect castle. Theo encounters the promiscuous Martha, who still has imaginary friends well into her teenage years, and whose sexual overtures often challenge him; Milo’s unhappy wife Calla, who yearns for the long-lost intimacy of her marriage—and hopes to find it in Theo; and the reclusive writer Milo, who, at the fall of his literary fame, lives more in his typewritten fantasies than in reality. Theo’s search for truth coincides with the plot of Milo’s current work in progress, as Brookhouse succinctly introduces a story within a story—one that draws parallels to the family’s disarray and casual infidelities.
While the goal of coaxing Martha to be baptized by the outside world takes center stage, much of the novel’s strength lies in something deeper implied to have been lost—perhaps happiness, love, or the permanence of both. As Martha reflects that people outside her castle walls “loved one story, then cast it aside and loved another. They loved a person, then cast the person aside and loved another,” readers will catch the glimmer here of something as equally meaningful and tragic as Theo’s central mystery.
Takeaway: A quest for substance in a dysfunctional family, with a sensual twist.
Comparable Titles: A.S. Byatt’s Possession, Kate Morton’s The Forgotten Garden.
Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A
