I like Sarah Waters' books because she manages to produce something unexpected at the end and this one was no exception. Plenty of passion, excitement and a gripping story line. ( )

Spooky, sexy and suspenseful - the perfect book to curl up with over a dreary weekend. Waters explores familiar tropes here, for those who have read her other novels: lesbians, Victoriana,  betrayal, and sensuality in unlikely places. In this case, she takes us to a perfecly imagined Victorian women's prison in London, where a emotionally distraught 'lady visitor' becomes attached to (and then obsessed with) Selina, a seductive medium who longs to be set free. ( )

Tonight I will sleep fitfully, haunted more by a young spiritualist than by her spirits. Artfully crafted, using imagery that springs to mind so vividly one would think it a memory, Sarah Waters has fashioned yet another masterpiece.

The year is 1874. Selina Dawes, a mysterious and powerful young spirit-medium is imprisoned in a monstrous and daunting women’s gaol, Millbank. Jailed after a botched spirit-communication lead to the death of her patron, Selina is visited by no one but her spirit friends until a local mistress comes to visit the prisoners.

The visitor, Margaret Prior, is a young lady of London, highly educated and brought up as assistant to her late father, an arts professor. Despairing his absence from her life, Margaret travels about in something of haze—looking for something she knows not what. When she encounters Dawes, Margaret is simultaneously scared witless by the girl and entranced by her power. The women’s relationship builds with Margaret learning more about Dawes from newspapers and first hand accounts, than from her fleeting and bewildering encounters with Selina.

Interspersed with short journal entries from Selina’s days as a burgeoning spirit-medium conducting séances, the story follows Margaret’s research as she seeks to uncover the mystery of Selina’s past, her powers, and why she is so affected by her. Although the reader is not privy to Selina’s current thoughts, her journal entries, coupled with her unexplainable powers and knowledge of the spirit realm make her enticing and irresistible. In stark and painful contrast to her exciting prison visits, Margaret’s everyday life unfortunately is constantly rearing its ugly head. Her sister is getting married and the preparations fill her days with a dreary stupor.

Although Affinity could hardly be called frightening, it is nevertheless haunting. Descriptions of landscapes, buildings, rooms, etc. feel so intensely ominous that they end up being far scarier than accounts of the spirit encounters. Affinity’s characters can be trusted to illicit your empathy, pity, sorrow, hatred, wonder, love and lust (and in my cast jealousy). Being at once a tale of impropriety and youthful indiscretion between girls, and a bildungsroman of Margaret’s spiritual and sexual development, one cannot but feel compassion toward its struggling young lovers. ( )

A gently-bred woman with scholarly inclinations becomes involved in a plot to break a medium out of prison.

I'll say this for Sarah Waters: she is damned good at evoking whichever time period she turns her hand to. This book feels exactly like a book set in 1870's London should feel. The characters' attitudes and reactions are spot on. The setting is beautifully realized. The whole thing even smells like the 1870's, with its thick fogs and coal-burning stoves, cold prison walls and richly decorated parlors. And the spiritualism? My goodness, is it ever interesting stuff! Seriously, people, you'll feel like you're there. It's brilliant.

Unfortunately, the rest of it doesn't quite live up to the set dressings. All the blurbs emphasize the tension, the subtlety, the clever twists and turns. And maybe this book is tense, subtle, and cleverly twisted if you don't know the story.... but COME ON, people! This's one of the classics! This story's been told a thousand times! I know it pretty damned well. I'd wager you do, too. I mean, yes, there's a lesbian twist, and that's a nice thing to see, but the bones are the same.

That's not to say that the story can never, ever work. It has been told a thousand times, after all, and some of those tellings are pretty durned compelling. I've thought about it a lot since I finished AFFINITY, and I've decided that it's a matter of trust. The author has to make you trust the story. She has to make you believe in the characters. And, in doing so, she needs to convince you that this is not the same story. This couldn't be the same story, because it if is... well, it's not, so we're not going to go down that road. You have to forget all about that. You have to trust the story.

Did I trust AFFINITY? Not for a bloody moment.

I think I might have, though, if I'd been able to feel for Margaret. There were a couple of times where Waters punched me in the gut, but for the most part I just couldn't connect with her. I wanted to. I tried my hardest. I told myself that I found her scholarly leanings, her repressed sexuality and her romantic failures heartwrenching, but I never really did. And, worst of all, I can't really tell you why that was the case. Characterization is a slippery slope. There is nothing wrong with Waters' portrayal of Margaret--in fact, it's quite remarkable, on a technical level--and yet she did very little for me.

So that's that. I'll leave it there, because I'm sure I've said too much already. This isn't a bad book, but it could have been much, much better. If you're a hardcore Waters fan, you probably want to check this out, regardless of my poor opinion; others, you'd do better to read FINGERSMITH or TIPPING THE VELVET instead. They've got a lot more going for them.

(A slightly different version of this review originally appeared on my blog, Stella Matutina). ( )

Affinity by Sarah Waters combined so many exquisite storytelling elements –colorful characters, a plot that kept you guessing and a Victorian setting that framed the story perfectly. If you love Victorian novels, then Affinity is a novel not to miss.

Margaret Prior was an unmarried lady who was mourning the death of her father and the marriage of her childhood lover, Helen. To find a purpose with her life, she became a “Lady Visitor” at Millbank Prison, specifically to the troubled female prisoners who could benefit from visits by a society woman. During her visits, Margaret found a special attachment to one inmate – Selina Dawes – a medium arrested for allegedly beating a young girl and causing the death of her guardian.

Learning more about Selina’s plight, Margaret became more interested in spiritualism, and Waters masterfully wove Victorians’ obsession with ghosts and mediums into the story, allowing the reader to learn more about this aspect of Victorian culture. Eventually, Margaret’s interest in Selina became more deep and attached – to the point that Margaret agreed to aid Selina’s prison escape.

Margaret and Selina proved to be characters that were sympathetic and unforgettable. Margaret was emotionally fragile, unsure about her sexual orientation in a sexually repressed society – the perfect candidate to assist Selina. The young medium was depicted as someone lost; her innocence slightly suspect, but a character you hoped the best for (she reminded me of Margaret Atwood’s Grace in Alias Grace). Together, their relationship was emotionally charged and great to read.

I selected Affinity to read as my first book of October because of its ghostly elements. I was pleasantly surprised that I got much more than a ghost story. Affinity was a great psychological thriller and historical fiction novel. If you love these genres, then make sure to put this book on your TBR list. ( )