Affinity, by Sarah Waters

Affinity

Sarah Waters

Margaret tried to kill herself  after her father died and the friend with whom she was in love married her brother.  Her overprotective mother is dubious when an old friend of her husband suggest that Margaret might find volunteering as "a lady visitor" at the prison where he works healing.  The women's prison and its inmates are a revelation to her, but none more than Selena, a spiritualist convicted of assaulting a young woman who had come to her for help with depression.  Margaret befriends Selena, becomes obsessed with her, and Selena seems to return the regard.  Ultimately Margaret agrees to help Selena escape prison.  The odd thing is that Margaret is willing to believe that Selena has powers that will allow her to dematerialize in prison and come through a "spiritual cord" to her.

The use of dual first person in this novel is effective because it is in the form of two separate journals, Margaret's and Selena's from before she was imprisoned.  Since everything that happens is reported immediately after its occurrence, the reader is fed the story gradually, so impressions and deceptions are credible.  It is  not a matter of someone telling the story sometime later, which always makes one wonder how they can be so objective about earlier events knowing the conclusion of the matter.    In Margaret's journal you hear her reasoning for accepting what she does, while with Selena's the reader gets an unfiltered look into what happened in her life but without much insight on the part of the young woman.  Thanks to this you will find yourself going back to reread earlier parts and reinterpreting them in light of later knowledge.

That is as close as I am going to come to a spoiler.  All I will add is a recommendation to look at every prop as a symbol.  Especially look at symbolism around clothing.

Besides being a wonderfully written and terribly chilling story, this novel offers a look at the prison system in Victorian England, one that is run on religious principles, harsh and far from enlightened thought.  The women inmates and their lives are complex and range from pathetic to outright repulsive, but the prison matrons are no better.  Margaret can be credited with the self knowledge that because of her class her attempted suicide makes her a candidate not for prison but for medical help..

This is an intelligent, thoughtful and compelling novel that will haunt you for a long time.