“My gripe is not with the lovers of truth but with truth herself. What succour, what consolation is there in truth, compared to a story? What good is truth, at midnight, in the dark, when the wind is roaring like a bear in the chimney? When the lightening strikes shadows on the bedroom wall and the rain taps at the window with its long fingernails? No. When fear and cold make a statue of you in your bed, don’t expect hard-boned and fleshless truth to come running to your aid. What you need are the plump conforts of a story. The soothing, rocking safety of a lie.”
------ The Thirteenth Tale, by Diane Setterfield
Eyes sore, legs numb, the discomfort of sitting straight for three hours reading crept in. I put the book on the glass coffee table after sliding a red ribbon book separator between the pages. As I stood up, stretching my legs and arms, sensation returned: the numbness in the legs was gone, and I was gleaming with a silent smile, the kind that often appears after a satisfying cup of nostril-tingling, steaming coffee on a crisp winter morning.
The book is The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield. It’s a fulfilling page-turner, similar to crime fiction I often read, like One Shot by Lee Child and Divine Justice by David Baldacci. I enjoy stories with unique characters maneuvering through ever-changing, rollercoaster events from page one to the end. Don’t get me wrong, I do read other genres like poems and essays as well.
Sometimes, I push myself to explore more “literary” works, such as the PEN/Faulkner Award-winning author E. Annie Proulx’s novel Postcards and the Pulitzer-winner Barbara Kingsolver’s short story collection High Tide in Tucson. However, my experience with these award-winning, “literary” works has been disappointing. I often find myself distracted by the lengthy description of the weather, landscape, and the emotional state of a character during events. To me, it seems as though the authors are simply filling the pages, akin to talking to someone about the weather after the conversation ends in silence after pleasantries. As a result, I often find myself unable to finish reading and have to put down the book.
My learned distaste for the literary books category continues to this day. However, after reading The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy, I began to reexamine my position and the sample size from which I drew the conclusion about literary books. Hardy tells a compelling story and skillfully exploits the English language, exhibiting expertise of the language without disrupting the flow and the discourse of the main events.
And now, The Thirteenth Tale is another one, a masterpiece. Setterfiled crafts a captivating story, with layers that themselves have their own tale to tell in the form of books and ghosts. Most importantly, I realized that I do appreciate some ‘literary’ work but only the rare, exceptional ones.
So The Thirteenth Tale begins with Margaret Lee, a bookworm teenager who helps her father in his antique bookstore when she is not at school. One day, she receives a letter. Initially, the handwriting appears to be either of a child with “heavily embellished capitals and curly flourishers” or of an invalid with “untrained letters with uneven strokes which are either very faint or heavily etched into the paper.”
However, the letter turns out to be from the famous author Vida Winter. Margaret later discovers that the letter was written by the author’s left hand, as her right hand was damaged in a house fire that also claimed her twin sister when Vida Winter was still a teenage girl.
In the letter, Vida Winter reveals that she had been telling stories for years and finally decided to share her own true story after avoiding it for so long. She asks Margaret to visit and be her biographer.
Margaret is “spellbound” by the letter and contemplates its power: “There is something about words. In expert hands, manipulated deftly, they take you prisoner. Wind themselves around your limbs like spider silk, and when you are so enthralled you cannot move, they pierce your skin, enter your blood, numb your thoughts.”
Margaret is surprised. Vida Winter is “the world’s most famous living writer. She is the best-loved writer in England; considered the century’s Dickens; published one book a year for fifty-six years; and arguable, sold more books than the Bible.” So Vida Winter is famous. Yet, despite the fame, very little is known about her.
Margaret wonders why such as famous writer asks her, a teenage girl, to write her biography, and why now?
Out of curiosity, and to get out off the sight of her bereaved and distant mother, Margaret accepts the invitation and spends weeks on Vida Winter’s estate. There, she attentively listens to her stories and diligently checks facts.
She learns that the famous author was impressed by an essay Margaret published in a local newspaper about twins. This revelation explains why Vida Winter asked her to write her biography, as her lost twin sister is a significant part of her life.
Old and ailing, Miss Winter shares some part of her story. However, Margaret also learns additional details by investigating.
“Miss Winter paused, her eyes set fixedly on the corner of the room, where her past presented itself to her with more reality than the present and me. At the corners of her mouth and eyes flicked half-expressions of sorrow and distress. Aware of the thinness of the thread that connected her to her past, I was anxious not to break it, but equally anxious for her not to stop her story.”
It is a story of love, family, tragedy, loss, and grief. In addition to Margaret and Vida Winter, the book features various vivid and memorable characters and scenes. Through excellent storytelling, the narrative is filled with instances of “not telling but showing.”
I have read that book! I appreciate your take in it…. Your writing is nice to read too.
I had forgotten the name of the book and maybe I read it awhile ago.
I just read The Women by Kristen Hannah. It’s about the Vietnam war and a woman who enlists in the army as a nurse. I really liked it because of the US history there and how families were affected by all that.
Yes I appreciated the book The 13th Tale and how fortunate she was to interview and record the life of the author. Fictionally but I love fiction.
I recommended The Water Dancer today to a friend and recommend it to you! By Ta Nehisi Coates. 📚🌞