Good things come not only in small packages but sometimes in unique
ones as well. The first thing a reader of Susanna Clarke's latest
work, THE LADIES OF GRACE ADIEU, will notice is that the publisher
flaunted contemporary convention by offering this hardcover without
the obligatory dust jacket. The cover image is pressed directly
onto the book: viney pink flowers on a dark gray background. The
design immediately sets the book apart. And once the cover is
opened and the spine cracked, the contents will surely continue to
surprise and please readers.
THE LADIES OF GRACE ADIEU is written in the same genre-challenging
prose of Clarke's previous bestselling book, JONATHAN STRANGE &
MR NORRELL. It is not historical drama, though it's mostly set in
18th and 19th century England. It is not quite fantasy, though it's
mostly concerned with magical and mystical creatures. And it's not
a collection of fairy tales, though it's concerned with fairies.
Or, more properly, Sidhe, as we are told in the introduction by
Professor James Sutherland (another character of Clarke's). The
Sidhe, Sutherland explains, "impinge upon our quotidian world" and
Clarke's tales "create a sort of primer to Faerie and
fairies."
All the stories are whimsical yet have a dark and deadly serious
undercurrent; they are about the romance and appeal of magic but
also its danger. Some tales in the collection are, of course, more
successful than others. The title story is one of the best; in it,
readers meet three women in the small village of Grace Adieu in
Gloucestershire.
These ladies are more powerful than they first appear and wise in
traditional magic and the ways of the Raven King. When the famed
and charming magician Jonathan Str