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3.73 AVERAGE
3.73 AVERAGE
A well-written debut novel, Mazzola does a wonderful job portraying the annoyingly sexist and often hypocritical views of the judicial and clerical system of London in the early 1900's. Everywhere you turn, there's someone explaining with an all-knowing tone the vices of the female sex. These glaring sexist remarks and prejudice are glaring examples of how far we've come and how far we have yet to go in our fight for gender equality. This novel not only is a gripping whodunit mystery, but also is a sharp example of the consequences of presupposition due to the gender of the person(s) in question.
Please read my full review here: http://mwgerard.com/review-the-unseeing/
Not only is The Unseeing crime fiction – not a genre that I typically gravitate towards, but it is also ‘true crime’, a sub-genre that always leaves me uncomfortable. The Unseeing is based on the real Edgware Road murder of 1837, when Hannah Brown was brutally murdered on the eve of her wedding and her dismembered body was scattered around London. Hannah’s intended husband James Greenacre was quickly arrested, first pretending he had never known her and then finally claiming that she had died by accident and that he had simply panicked and disposed of her body since suspicion was likely to fall on him due to the deaths of his previous two wives. Also convicted alongside him of being an accessory was Sarah Gale, one of the central characters in this novel. An unmarried mother, Sarah had been Greenacre’s housekeeper and live-in mistress until a few weeks before the murder when he decided to marry Hannah Brown, who appeared to have an individual fortune. After Hannah’s disappearance, Gale resumed her place in Greenacre’s household and was seen to be attempting to pawn Hannah’s belongings and wearing several of her clothes. Ultimately, unsurprisingly, Greenacre was found guilty and hanged but after a petition for mercy, Sarah Gale’s sentence was commuted to transportation, with both she and her son sent to Australia. Sarah never returned but in The Unseeing, Anna Mazzola speculates about what went on to get Sarah Gale her petition and also about how far she was truly responsible for the death of Hannah Brown.
The central premise of The Unseeing reminded me of Alias Grace – a woman in prison being interviewed by a man who is trying to determine her true nature. Both novels are based on true events, on crimes where a woman lives on in infamy – did she seduce a man into murder? Was she forced into abetting a crime? Our expectations of women are so different to those we have of men, a woman ought to be caring, nurturing, protective, so that this idea of a woman who kills or who manipulates others into doing her bidding is all the more deviant. The young lawyer Edmund Fleetwood is elated to receive a commission from the Home Secretary to examine whether there are grounds to give Sarah Gale a pardon – she is a mother, she was only charged with abetting, the evidence is circumstantial at best, Elizabeth Fry has taken up her cause, the Home Secretary is considering public opinion – but as the novel goes on, Fleetwood himself seems to fall under her spell.
With recent legislation surrounding coercive control, we are as a society more ready to give credence to the notion of someone committing a crime due to being forced by a partner – but yet figures such as Myra Hindley and Maxine Carr still attract a huge degree of vitriol from the public. Things have not changed so very much. Edmund Fleetwood attempts to discover the truth of what Sarah was and was not aware of, of exactly what she is concealing. He visits her erstwhile lover James Greenacre before his execution, he speaks with her sister. Yet always there is the question of whether or not she is telling the truth, of whether he is getting to the truth of the woman – is she as innocent as she appears to be? Sarah Gale is not a cardboard cutout victim, Mazzola cleverly keeps the extent of her culpability ambiguous with carefully timed revelations that prevent the scales from tipping too far in either direction.
The strength of Mazzola’s writing comes in her description, vividly evoking the putrid atmosphere and stench of Newgate prison. The conditions are truly horrendous – given the less than thorough approach to justice, it was frightening to imagine how easily someone might end up here. Newgate is a place that changes those that enter it and not for the better. Rehabilitation is an entirely alien concept – this is the era of the Poor Law, the workhouses and those who slipped beyond the realms of respectability were not to be redeemed. One character remarks on the notion of the ‘fallen woman’ that it is a ‘funny expression’ since most in this bracket are ‘pushed.’ Who is the greater sinner, Sarah the fallen woman or the men whose selfishness and insensitivity have trampled her to the ground?
Mazzola is no Margaret Atwood and The Unseeing is only ever a thriller – yet it still has a compelling narrative within its genre. I confess I was hoping for more about the locket with the eye in its centre and I also never felt that Mazzola quite fleshed out the motivations of Greenacre, but nonetheless the characters were well-drawn, their motivations and back-stories convincing and the conclusion satisfying. Mazzola manages to stay within the boundaries that the true events have set her but still constructs a credible interpretation of the crime without ever appearing to show disrespect for those real people who lived through these events. By this I mean, the myriad fictionalisations of the Ripper murders have always seemed to serve only glamourise the mysterious murderer and disparage his victims as faceless prostitutes – this is a common approach. Hannah Brown was not a pretty woman, nor perhaps a very wise one and she does not even appear to have been as wealthy as she wanted people to believe – yet she believed that she had finally found a man who loved her and was ready to risk it all for a chance of happiness. Whatever the truth of the matter, Mazzola shows respect to that lady’s memory through not trivialising her suffering.
The central premise of The Unseeing reminded me of Alias Grace – a woman in prison being interviewed by a man who is trying to determine her true nature. Both novels are based on true events, on crimes where a woman lives on in infamy – did she seduce a man into murder? Was she forced into abetting a crime? Our expectations of women are so different to those we have of men, a woman ought to be caring, nurturing, protective, so that this idea of a woman who kills or who manipulates others into doing her bidding is all the more deviant. The young lawyer Edmund Fleetwood is elated to receive a commission from the Home Secretary to examine whether there are grounds to give Sarah Gale a pardon – she is a mother, she was only charged with abetting, the evidence is circumstantial at best, Elizabeth Fry has taken up her cause, the Home Secretary is considering public opinion – but as the novel goes on, Fleetwood himself seems to fall under her spell.
With recent legislation surrounding coercive control, we are as a society more ready to give credence to the notion of someone committing a crime due to being forced by a partner – but yet figures such as Myra Hindley and Maxine Carr still attract a huge degree of vitriol from the public. Things have not changed so very much. Edmund Fleetwood attempts to discover the truth of what Sarah was and was not aware of, of exactly what she is concealing. He visits her erstwhile lover James Greenacre before his execution, he speaks with her sister. Yet always there is the question of whether or not she is telling the truth, of whether he is getting to the truth of the woman – is she as innocent as she appears to be? Sarah Gale is not a cardboard cutout victim, Mazzola cleverly keeps the extent of her culpability ambiguous with carefully timed revelations that prevent the scales from tipping too far in either direction.
The strength of Mazzola’s writing comes in her description, vividly evoking the putrid atmosphere and stench of Newgate prison. The conditions are truly horrendous – given the less than thorough approach to justice, it was frightening to imagine how easily someone might end up here. Newgate is a place that changes those that enter it and not for the better. Rehabilitation is an entirely alien concept – this is the era of the Poor Law, the workhouses and those who slipped beyond the realms of respectability were not to be redeemed. One character remarks on the notion of the ‘fallen woman’ that it is a ‘funny expression’ since most in this bracket are ‘pushed.’ Who is the greater sinner, Sarah the fallen woman or the men whose selfishness and insensitivity have trampled her to the ground?
Mazzola is no Margaret Atwood and The Unseeing is only ever a thriller – yet it still has a compelling narrative within its genre. I confess I was hoping for more about the locket with the eye in its centre and I also never felt that Mazzola quite fleshed out the motivations of Greenacre, but nonetheless the characters were well-drawn, their motivations and back-stories convincing and the conclusion satisfying. Mazzola manages to stay within the boundaries that the true events have set her but still constructs a credible interpretation of the crime without ever appearing to show disrespect for those real people who lived through these events. By this I mean, the myriad fictionalisations of the Ripper murders have always seemed to serve only glamourise the mysterious murderer and disparage his victims as faceless prostitutes – this is a common approach. Hannah Brown was not a pretty woman, nor perhaps a very wise one and she does not even appear to have been as wealthy as she wanted people to believe – yet she believed that she had finally found a man who loved her and was ready to risk it all for a chance of happiness. Whatever the truth of the matter, Mazzola shows respect to that lady’s memory through not trivialising her suffering.
The Unseeing is well-written and kept me interested throughout. The MC, Sarah, was compelling and I thought the author drew her and Edmund rather well. I admit that I kept thinking there would be a bigger reveal than there was, but it was only a minor disappointment. I really enjoyed the historical setting and felt the author managed it effectively.
Really enjoyed my latest book club read. Set in London in 1837, The Unseeing tells the story of Sarah Gale, a single mother who is sentenced to death for her part in the murder and dismemberment of Hannah Brown, who was found in several pieces around London. Told from the POV of Sarah and Edmund Fleetwood, the lawyer who is tasked with handling her appeal against hanging and trying to sort out the truth. Based on the true story of the Edgware Road murders, this is a good imagining of the details not known about the case and includes good descriptions of what life was like in London at that time and the conditions in Newgate prison where Sarah was kept.
This book is based on the true story of the murder of Hannah Brown who it is alleged was killed by her fiancé James Greenacre and his previous partner Sarah Gale. Hannah was murdered during Christmas and was then dismembered by James Greenacre and parts of her body turned up for the next few months as they were found in canals, and reed beds. It was alleged that Sarah Gale helped Greenacre to cover up the killing and dismemberment of Hannah for which the punishment was to be hanging for them both. This book focuses on a young man called Edmund Fleetwood who has been given the task of looking into the Sarah's case after she and others called for mercy given that she has a small child and actually had nothing to do with the murder or the cover up.
I found this novel to be excellent and found it hard to believe that it's a debut novel! The pacing of the story was excellent with occasional tidbits dropped into the story from various people about what really happened to Hannah. The historical elements of the book really made me feel like I was in Victorian London, both in the streets with Edmund and then in the prison with Sarah. I honestly do not know how accurate these elements were but they felt so real to me as a reader which is honestly the most important part of reading an historical novel. I enjoyed that this was based on a true crime, but that Anna made it her own with her speculation about what might have happened without making it feel too like she had modernised the tale. I loved that everything including the way people spoke and interacted with each other felt so realistic.
You could definitely tell that the author is a person who knows about criminal law, everything in this book was laid out so well and precisely it did feel like a police procedural but set in Victorian times. As I was reading I noticed that she really did bring out the patriarchal nature of this time period, basically if you were a woman you had no actual power over your own actions. Now this could be useful for and against a woman in prison or being accused of a crime depending on how your lawyer used this. Along with this depth of knowledge of the time period and the laws Anna has also created some incredibly sharp characters that you just want to know more about.
Overall I cannot wait to read another book by this author!
*I received a copy of this book directly from the publisher in return for an honest review*
I found this novel to be excellent and found it hard to believe that it's a debut novel! The pacing of the story was excellent with occasional tidbits dropped into the story from various people about what really happened to Hannah. The historical elements of the book really made me feel like I was in Victorian London, both in the streets with Edmund and then in the prison with Sarah. I honestly do not know how accurate these elements were but they felt so real to me as a reader which is honestly the most important part of reading an historical novel. I enjoyed that this was based on a true crime, but that Anna made it her own with her speculation about what might have happened without making it feel too like she had modernised the tale. I loved that everything including the way people spoke and interacted with each other felt so realistic.
You could definitely tell that the author is a person who knows about criminal law, everything in this book was laid out so well and precisely it did feel like a police procedural but set in Victorian times. As I was reading I noticed that she really did bring out the patriarchal nature of this time period, basically if you were a woman you had no actual power over your own actions. Now this could be useful for and against a woman in prison or being accused of a crime depending on how your lawyer used this. Along with this depth of knowledge of the time period and the laws Anna has also created some incredibly sharp characters that you just want to know more about.
Overall I cannot wait to read another book by this author!
*I received a copy of this book directly from the publisher in return for an honest review*