Edinburgh in the 1930s. The Lennox family is having trouble with its youngest daughter. Esme is outspoken, unconventional, and repeatedly embarrasses them in polite society. Something will have to be done.
Years later, a young woman named Iris Lockhart receives a letter informing her that she has a great-aunt in a psychiatric unit who is about to be released.
I find one of benefits of writers that make a name for themselves is that, because you've read a number of titles by them and know you like their style and the kind of subjects they deal with, you can pick up a book by them, not read the blurb, and have a reasonably good chance of enjoying it. The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O'Farrell was one of those books for me.
There's something great about reading a novel when you have no idea what it's about, it's sort of how it should be.
As you know by now, I'm a big fan of Richard Yates. Aside from being in love with his writing, I really like the way he approaches domestic subjects. That's such a stale way of putting it but I have the same thing with Maggie O'Farrell. She's just brilliant at getting into people's homes and writing a whole family. In this novel one of the most important characters has only a handful of pages worth of airtime but O'Farrell makes sure the reader is armed with a perfect understanding of this woman's character, her public face, her lurking motives.
This is not a ghost story, but it almost kind of is. O'Farrell's writing is wonderfully haunting. You can't help but soak up the sinister atmosphere surrounding Esme Lennox and her mysterious life. There's also humour and just the right amount of odd to make this a truly unique read.
For a relatively short read, you really get involved here; ostensibly this is a snapshot of Iris's life, but there's plenty more on offer here.
I really liked this book. It gets 7.5/10 from me.
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