The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories by Susanna Clarke

Having fallen in passionate love with Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, I obviously immediately started looking for other things that Susanna Clarke has written, and unfortunately discovered that this collection of stories, which take place in the same world as the novel, is the only one (understandable, I imagine Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell is the labour of a lifetime). Honestly, I was disappointed, not because this book was bad, but because it wasn't as good as Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. Both books share a similar fault: Clarke has a serious problem with plot. There's something very unsatisfying about her narratives, they lack cohesion and resolution and sort of crumble into pieces. Since these are short stories, which need to be streamlined and to the point, this problem is much more obvious here than in the novel. Many of these stories also lack much of the novel's humour. I feel like Clarke was trying specifically to respond to two criticisms of the novel: lack of strong female characters and lack of sex, and she got so concentrated on those issues that she forgot to be funny. Or as funny as she is in the novel. The great strength of this book (and of the novel) are the digressions, notes and descriptions, which can be absolutely hysterical and delightfully inventive. My favourite story was probably 'John Usglass and the Cumbrian Charcoal Burner' because it follows the structure of a typical Irish fairy tale of the kind Yeats collected (complete with conversations with saints peeking out of heaven) and has a lively spark of wit and originality. Among the other stories, I particularly enjoyed Mr. Simonelli's discovery that his father was not, in fact, an Italian serial seducer, but a fairy, and his engagement to five young women at once, and the hilarious explanations of fairy culture in 'Tom Brightwind'. 'The Duke of Wellington Misplaces His Horse' is another concise and hilarious little gem that blends romance and fairy tale themes with the practicality and comical self-important of the Duke of Wellington (familiar from Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell). Probably because of the increased stress on female characters, embroidery and other work with cloth is a theme that runs through the whole book, and is very interesting in light of recent scholarship about material culture and the power it gave women. However, it really bothered me that the conclusions and resolutions (particularly of the longer stories) were very unsatisfying and things often seemed to happen for no reason, their fairy tale logic wasn't quite believable. I can't really explain it, but when in Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, Strange briefly moves an entire city to America and then back again, absurd though this is, it somehow seems to make perfect sense. However, in 'Mrs. Mabb', Venetia attempts to track down the fairy seducer of her beloved and her house mysteriously changes in size and her coven of witches becomes a bunch on insects, and it just seems unnecessary and confusing. There's something about the logic and narrative of many of these stories that misses the mark and feels like a letdown.