Well, she’s done it again. Laura Purcell is truly deserving of being the reigning queen of gothic fiction. Her ability to create a sense of place, a version of the past where something ‘other’ could just be real is unparalleled.

This is the tale of a woman, with a Past (capital P) currently named Hester Why. She’s desperately discreet, starting work at a remote, spooky house. Over the course of a twisty, yet totally coherent, narrative you learn why she’s on the run, and uncover a mystery of an old woman who guards a room full of china for fear of the havoc it’ll wreak.

A throughline in her work is her ability to show both sides of life and how they interact and relate to the differing problems we all face. We saw the relationship between extreme privilege and women’s prison life in The Corset, but she’s upped the ante to examine terminally ill prisoners here! But it works.

For many writers a time spanning tale with alcoholism, supernatural pottery, consumption epidemics and mental illness (to start) would be rambling and incoherent. In Laura Purcell’s hands you are gifted a tense, richly detailed well drawn gothic character study.


Excellent.

I couldn’t wait to get my hands on this title as I absolutely loved the author’s two previous titles and it didn’t disappoint. Ms Purcell is firmly in my must-read list. “Gothic” tales are currently in vogue and this is a great addition to the genre. Well-written, good pacing and illustrative narrative all add to the slow build-up of tension. Set on the coast of Cornwall, it evokes the feeling of wild, unharnessed nature at its more raw. Divulging anything more will spoil the plot.
It will appeal to fans of the recent novels Frannie Langton, The Binding, Wakenhyrst and Mrs Hancock besides the more obvious Sarah Perry/Jessie Burton/Natasha Pulley novels. A huge thumbs up from me.

There’s no doubt that Laura Purcell can write a gripping gothic tale with creepy elements dangling like spiders on each and every page. I shiver just thinking about her words, her pacing, her stories. This one is no different. Chillingly atmospheric…..

What are the magical ingredients for such a read? Remote Agign manor house, Cornish cliffs, a housemaid required for work, a lady who needs care…..and all the while, the whispers from the walls can be heard along with the wailing of the winds outside.

This is one immersive read. The plot centres around Hester who has moved from her previous job and who now joins the house. Her journey to the house is slow and has a strong sense of foreboding…You just know something is wrong…. and that Hester herself may not be what she seems….

That house has some secrets! Secrets of medical experiments and secrets Louise Pinefield has in her past. This is a story of how ripple effects richochet through history.

The Cornish setting is exquisitely drawn and the title …well when that comes in to the novel, prepare for some really exciting and chilling moments. My granny had that same willow pattern plates and the scenes around this were very interesting. That’s it without spoilers though!

Glorious atmospheric writing with whispers of the supernatural, the fairy folk and a dark dark Cornish coast….

Bone China is another atmospheric historical gothic novel by Laura Purcell, suffused in superstition and illness. Hester Why arrives at Morvoren House in Cornwall to take up a lady's maid position with secrets surrounding her flight from London. What she finds there isn't an escape, however, but a strange situation: Miss Pinecroft, sitting in a freezing room full of china, unwell and looking older than her years. An old servant obsessed with fairies and a mysterious ward add to the weirdness. And forty years previously, Louise Pinecroft and her father move after consumption ravages their family, hoping that the sea air will provide the answer to her father's experiments on ill convicts, but the new maid tells her tales of fairies and the dangers they pose.

It is exciting to have a historical gothic novel that focuses on contemporary medicine that is set during the Regency and before rather than the usual Victorian setting. The tension between scientific ideas, passed down knowledge, and otherworldly magic provides a good backdrop for a novel also about the power structure of servants and those above them and the different things that keep people locked up, whether literally or not. These concepts of power and imprisonment fit well with actual gothic novels of the period in which the book is set, and the genre is used well to start to explore these (though it would've been interesting to see Hester's reliance on alcohol and laudanum developed further). There are some threads that don't feel fully explored in the novel, but this does allow it more ambiguity and gives space for mystery.

Fans of Purcell's other novels will likely enjoy this one, which uses similar gothic tropes but also engages with the period of the earlier gothic novels (with references to Wordsworth, Byron, and the Prince Regent serving as reminders to this). It combines medicine and superstition in interesting ways and offers a morally complex point of view character who proves that the gothic isn't just a genre centred around helpless, innocent women.

Laura Purcell has definitely mastered the art of creepy. She seems to go from strength to strength with each book.
This one is my favourite.
It takes the every day and sends a slight shiver down your back.
Nicely tying threads up from two different timelines,and weaving in stories of fairies that were all to readily believed back in the day.
This book is packed with atmosphere,and a decent amount of tension.
Superb.

I am a huge fan of Laura Purcell's first two novels and was incredibly excited to read Bone China. Unfortunately, it seems like Purcell has developed a formula for story-writing that she's sticking to rigidly. This book was not as frightening as The Silent Companions, or as shocking as The Corset, but a number of scenes seemed to have been ripped word-for-word from either book. I love Purcell's attention to detail, particularly concerning historical fashion, and the queer undertones in her protagonists' relationships. However, all of her novels so far have featured a sceptical protagonist, a house filled with strange servants, and a possibly-supernatural threat. I felt the flashback chapters occurred too late and the characters that featured in them were not sufficiently fleshed-out for me to care. The book felt 50-100 pages too short; I would have happily read more about Rosewyn, Creeda, Ernest, and the convicts on the beach. I would love to read another truly scary, richly detailed book.by Laura Purcell, but I fear she's run out of ideas.