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A review by octavia_cade
Otto mesi a Ghazzah Street by Hilary Mantel
4.0
Closer to three and a half stars, I think, but I'm rounding up.
The back cover has a quote from a review comparing this to The Turn of the Screw, and I think that's an accurate comparison. Not in subject, but in a sort of sinister muddling of reality, as the main character adapts to life as an un-person, essentially, in a repressive religious environment. She sees truths and half-truths both, and can never quite get anyone to take her seriously - even her husband and fellow expatriates start slowly treating her as less-than, though they'd honestly deny it.
Quietly horrifying, and informed by the author's own experiences of Jeddah.
The back cover has a quote from a review comparing this to The Turn of the Screw, and I think that's an accurate comparison. Not in subject, but in a sort of sinister muddling of reality, as the main character adapts to life as an un-person, essentially, in a repressive religious environment. She sees truths and half-truths both, and can never quite get anyone to take her seriously - even her husband and fellow expatriates start slowly treating her as less-than, though they'd honestly deny it.
Quietly horrifying, and informed by the author's own experiences of Jeddah.