Tuesday, August 05, 2014

Marschel Paul's The Spirit Room, a novel of cultural fads and women's lives in 1850s New York

The “spirit room” of the title, a rented space above a milliner’s shop in Geneva, New York, is a place where deceptions are initiated and innocence is lost. In Marschel Paul’s engrossing coming-of-age epic, set in the late 1850s, Isabelle “Izzie” Benton is seventeen and her sister Clara thirteen when their family moves to the Finger Lakes town. After their mother’s death – by drowning, possibly a suicide – their opportunistic father sees his chance to make money by forcing his daughters into the latest cultural craze. He sets them up as mediums, like the celebrated Fox Sisters, and they learn the best tricks for duping gullible audiences.

Their rise in popularity in the local Spiritualist community marks only the beginning of their adventures. If dealing with pressure from their controlling Papa isn’t enough, Izzie and Clara must protect Clara’s twin, Billy, from his abuse and care for their youngest sister, Euphora. At the same time, other men start noticing the attractive young women. Then a sudden decision made by Izzie pulls the sisters apart and leads them both into dark, shocking situations as they struggle to gain independence and find each other again. Revealing any more would dampen the pleasures of this unpredictable, wildly entertaining tale.

The historical atmosphere intriguingly combines small-town quaintness and mid-19th century fads and trends – “reform dress,” suffrage meetings, institutes for water-cure therapy – with a sobering look at women’s experiences. Paul doesn’t draw back from depicting the adult circumstances her sympathetic heroines face, and their stories have added poignancy because their viewpoints remain appropriate to their ages while their eyes open to the world’s realities.

Delightful period idioms make the background even more convincing, and although the novel is almost 600 pages long, the pacing never drags. The editing and production are top-notch, too. This is a fabulous read for fans of American women’s history.

The Spirit Room was self-published under the Wasteland Press imprint in 2013 ($19.95, trade pb, 587pp, or $2.99 on Kindle).  This review first appeared in the Historical Novel Society's indie review section in August 2014; as part of the guidelines, reviewers are asked to comment on layout and production quality. 

This novel was a personal purchase which had sat on my shelf for about a year until I picked it up on a whim last month and got drawn into the story immediately.  I volunteered to write up a review for it, which indie managing editor Helen Hollick accepted, and she also made it an Editors' Choice title for the quarter.  I should also add that despite the characters' ages, this is definitely adult fiction.

13 comments:

  1. This one immediately grabbed my attention by its subject-matter, and I'm all the more delighted to see it's self-published! Thanks for the review.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I was happy to find this book because America's fascination with spiritualism in the 19th century interests me, and the last novel about it that I'd picked up - one about the Fox sisters - was so disappointing I couldn't get through it.

      The author's website says The Spirit Room was honored in two different awards competitions (finalist in one, honorable mention in the other). The Kindle price is a bargain!

      Delete
    2. I'm also fascinated by the spiritualist craze (and all the weird religious experiments that were going around at the time). I went ahead and bought the Kindle version. Since I also self-publish, mind if I ask you an insider question--how did this novel come to your attention?

      Delete
    3. I wish I remembered for sure. I think we ended up following each other on Twitter, and I recognized the author's name from attending past HNS conferences. I used to handle registration and sent out many letters and emails, so most attendees' names are familiar to me. After I heard about the book, I checked it out on Amazon, read the sample, and bought it. That happens a lot!

      I'll be curious what you think of the book whenever you get a chance to read it.

      Delete
  2. A subject I know very little about. Intriguing definitely.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree. For such a small corner of upstate New York in the 19th century, there was a lot going on - the growth of spiritualism with the Fox Sisters (1848), the Seneca Falls convention in support of women's rights (also 1848)... both of which created widespread movements that continued through today, though spiritualism isn't as pervasive now as it was then. It all makes for good fodder for a novel.

      Delete
  3. I've speculated that one reason for the spiritualist craze of the later 19th century that it was a form of PTSD for a civilian population that had lost so many dears ones in the Civil War, a war that changed their worlds profoundly in so many ways beyond that as well, from a single currency to industrialism.

    This is speculation only. I have no data.

    Love, c.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That explanation makes sense to me too.

      Delete
    2. But there was a concurrent movement in the UK...also the rise of the mourning industry, made fashionable after the death of Prince Albert. Perhaps also influenced by the spread of religious doubts...

      Delete
    3. Good points - and the movement really started spreading in the 1850s (when this novel takes place), which was before the Civil War and Prince Albert's death, though both may have contributed to its influence. Re: the spread of religious doubts... I can see how that would lead people to seek scientific explanations and evidence for their spiritual beliefs. So mediums and seances, who supposedly could demonstrate such evidence, had a built-in audience for their work.

      Delete
    4. Which still happens...all those ghost hunter programs my husband watches are based on the belief that science & technology can provide evidence of the supernatural. Without, apparently, much reflection of what 100% solid evidence of the supernatural would mean to our lives...if we were absolutely certain there were life after death, wouldn't we be MORE religious?

      Delete