The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories

I loved the dry humour of Clarke's tales, as sharp on one side as her dark, grotesque menace is on the other. It was pleasing to see her reference to Sylvia Townsend Warner's Kingdoms of Elfin, as that book is a definite predecessor of Clarke's conception of fairy.

One story which seemed very familiar as I was reading it was revealed as a retelling of the folktale "Tom Tit Tot", which sent me to Katherine Briggs's wonderful A Dictionary of Fairies: Hobgoblins, Brownies, Bogies and Other Supernatural Creatures to re-read the original.

The final story had hints of The Mabinogion tales crossed with J.R.R. Tolkien's Farmer Giles of Ham, and was a nicely humorous sign-off.

While the Austenesque flavour of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell is much show more in evidence, especially in the title story in which Strange appears (and I'd happily read a novel about the Three Ladies), there is a well-judged diversity in tone and style between the stories.

If I've emphasised the similarities with other authors' works, that's not to suggest Clarke is derivative, rather that, as in Piranesi, she is skilful at unpicking the threads those others have woven and of reworking them into her own tapestry. show less

I finally sat down with Clarke's second, the Ladies of Grace Adieu. I'm fairly certain I waited as long as I did because I was afraid I'd be disappointed. Because Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell is one of my favorites.

And I kind of was and kind of was not. The short story collection definitely did not blow me away. But it was also really well done, really well written, well imagined. Each of the stories advances the world Clarke's created, or a version of the world. It feels almost like anecdotes that you might have heard told by characters from Jonathan Strange's world... fables, tales, stories.

The writing is, of course, immaculate. The story-telling is good.. great, even. The collection read quickly, and each story felt complete in its show more own right. I'm not sure what more I wanted, but it seems that I did want something more. When I was done, I felt it was sort of anti-climactic.

So, I would definitely recommend to Clarke fans and people who would be Clarke fans (but who just haven't had the good sense to read her yet ;)), but with the note that it is good, really good, great, but not as satisfying and fulfilling as Strange & Norrell...

Overall, FOUR of five stars. show less

"Magic, madam, is
like wine and,
if you are not used
to it, it will make
you drunk."

Those of you who have read my blog in the past may have realised that I have fallen head over heels in love with Susanna Clarke's writing. I did not cope well with Dickens at school and to this day have never finished any of his novels. Then I discover Ms Clarke, who writes like a modern day Dickens, and her fabulous book, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. A mysterious journey through the Napoleonic era, following the rivalry of two magicians, and their effect on the fate of English magic. Now one of my favourite novels, and reviewed here, it left me wanting more.

The Ladies of Grace Adieu is a collection of short stories set in the same world as magic and show more faery as Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. There are eight stories, each written in the same delectable style, and each delving into a different faery story.

The Ladies of Grace Adieu is perhaps the story most reminiscent of Clarke's first novel, introducing us to a trio of female magicians and their struggle to get accepted by their male counterparts. Jonathan Strange himself makes an appearance in this glorious tale of magic, superstition and vengeful owls.

On Lickerish Hill is the tale of a sly woman who sells her daughter to a nobleman, under the proviso that in the last month of the first year of their marriage, she must spin five skeins of flax every day. The young woman, as cunning as her mother, devises a way to fulfill her husbands demands, by making a deal with a fairy. All she has to do, is discover his name, or her life will be his.

Mrs Mabb is the sad tale of a young woman who loses her love to the mysterious Mrs Mabb. Only her determination can rescue her love.

The Duke of Wellington Misplaces His Horse is an amusing story, set in Gaiman's fictional village of Wall. There in The Seventh Magpie Inn, the Duke of Wellington quarrels with a local villager over a pair of embroidery scissors and is later forced to cross the Wall to retrieve his stallion, released in spite by the angry man. There he discovers a small house where a young woman is embroidering some beautiful images of the Duke's past and possible future. When faced with his own death in gloriously coloured thread, the Duke must take matters into his own hand.

Mr Simonelli or The Fairy Widower, is a series of extracts from the diary of a young Italian man, who takes a position as cleric in a small town, where he has hopes over marrying well and creating a good home for himself. There he encounters a Fairy Widower, only to learn and discover more about his heritage and future destiny.

Tom Brightwind or How the Fairy Bridge Was Built at Thoresby is the tale of a young Jewish doctor and his fairy friend, travelling to visit a sick patient, when they come upon the poor begotten village of Thoresby. Tom is persuaded to build a fairy bridge across the river with unforeseen results.

Antickes and Frets is the tale of Mary, Queen of Scots, thrown into prison by her cousin, Elizabeth, and who ends up in the care of the Earl of Shrewsbury and his ambitious wife. She soon begins to suspect that the Countess had gotten where she was through dark means in her embroidery. Mary endeavours to use the same means to get rid of her cousin and thus usurp the throne of England.

The final story, John Uskglass and the Cumbrian Charcoal Burner, is an amusing tale of a Charcoal Burner (and his pig Blakeman!), whose life is rudely interrupted by the Raven King himself, and who enlists Saints to have his revenge on Uskglass.

Clarke's style is perfect for me. She manages to write about a world so unusual and unfamiliar to us, yet makes it so evocative and believeable that I for one, got completely sucked in. Her writing is a sheer delight to read, and I found myself having to take breaks after each short story, just as I would with a great novel, in order to really digest and enjoy the experience. My fear was that the next story would never be as good, but each was as good as the last.

A fabulous collection by a wonderful author. I cannot recommend these stories enough, and dearly hope that Susanna Clarke writes more very soon. show less

It isn’t fair to compare an author’s second book to their first, particularly when it must follow the phenomenal Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, but the comparison is inevitable when Strange returns for a cameo appearance in The Ladies of Grace Adieu, Susanna Clarke’s collection of short stories (now available in paperback). One title character (Strange) meets the others in the first of these stories set in the same England/Faerie as Clarke’s debut novel. The Duke of Wellington and John Uskglass the Raven King are likewise featured again, and Mary, Queen of Scots, joins the ranks of nobility who find their paths crossed by fairy magic. “On Lickerish Hill” is a retelling of the fairy tale of Rumpelstiltskin with more emphasis show more on the fairy tale.

The best story in the collection, “Mr Simonelli or the Fairy Widower,” is one which bears no striking resemblance to any of its predecessors. It is comprised of a letter from Reverend Simonelli proclaiming his innocence to an influential parishioner, Mrs. Gathercole, the mother of five unmarried daughters, followed by his own journal entries recounting his remarkable encounters with an insidious fairy incongruously named John Hollyshoes. Simonelli took drastic measures to protect the Gathercole family from the fairy, and it is these measures which he must justify to their mother.

The three magical ladies of Grace Adieu cannot match the abilities of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, and the same can be said of their eponymous books. The Ladies of Grace Adieu seems to be an expansion of the ubiquitous footnotes found in Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell rather than a stand-alone work. That may not bother some readers, but Clarke’s second spell is less potent than her first. show less

Disclosure: I adore Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell so much I bought a hardcover and have read it three times, and will no doubt read it again. I also loved her sleek, atmospheric Piranesi. So I was pleasantly surprised when one of my local libraries (the only one in a very large suburban system) had a copy of Ladies on the shelf. I will confess that had I begun with this, I might not have pursued Clarke's work in any hurry, though I would have gotten to it eventually.

I see this collection as an interesting look into Clarke's voice, her imaginative wit, her writing gifts and fascinations that exploded into the marvel that is JS&MN. The stories feel like test runs, explorations, and sometimes an almost offhand "hmm, here's a thought - show more let's see where this might have come from... or where this might go." Tom Brightwind clearly is of the same ilk as the fabulous Gentleman with the Thistledown Hair. Clarke also uses her opportunity to present "ladies" in a way JS&MN didn't fully afford - I especially liked the title story of three quietly sly and independent ladies with a certain affinity with owls. Clarke turns needlework and embroidery - those traditional pursuits to which ladies of her favored era were often doomed - into clever and mordantly funny exercises in power. And she has fun with wrangling or upending classic fairy-tale tropes like Rumpelstiltskin or the "poor fool" who outwits a mighty king into tales that are at least entertaining if not completely original.

If you're already a fan, this collection is fun and enjoyable. If not, this may not change your mind. But try JS&MN anyway because that is her "mistress-work." show less

Clarke's debut novel Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell made such a positive impression on me that I can't really imagine away that context when reading this collection of short stories which share its fantasy worldview. They are individually lovely, though, and they bode well for the rumored prospect of a sequel novel of some sort. My favorites were perhaps "Mr Simonelli or the Fairy Widower," composed in the form of a journal, and the hyperfolkloric and rather Cabellian "John Uskglass and the Cumbrian Charcoal Burner." There is an academic conceit in the fictional introduction by "Professor James Sutherland, Director of Sidhe Studies, University of Aberdeen," but the longish "Tom Brightwind" is the only one of the eight stories to take up show more the footnoted form that gave some readers such alarm in Strange & Norrell.

In "The Duke of Wellington Misplaces His Horse," Clarke sets a tale in the village of Wall, originally created by Neil Gaiman for his short novel Stardust. (Clarke is evidently friends with Gaiman, and Stardust illustrator Charles Vess contributes drawings to The Ladies and Others--much more beneficially than Portia Rosenberg did in Strange & Norrell.) Gaiman's story was in turn conspicuously dependent on Lord Dunsany's King of Elfland's Daughter. In contemplating this filiation, it occurred to me that much of what makes Clarke's fairy fantasies distinctive is their inclusion of realistic historical context with social minutiae, which is exactly what Dunsany expunged from his in order to achieve the sort of quasi-mythical exoticism that was his hallmark.

If Clarke keeps this sort of thing going for another decade or so, I suspect it will get to the point that it seems natural to readers for fairy fantasy to incorporate English Restoration comedy of manners, in much the same way that Anne Rice eventually made it natural for vampires to be erotic and morally ambiguous. show less

Rating: four very satisfied stars of five

The Publisher Says: Following the enormous success of 2004 bestseller and critics' favorite Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, Susanna Clarke delivers a delicious collection of ten stories set in the same fairy-crossed world of 19th-century England. With Clarke's characteristic historical detail and diction, these dark, enchanting tales unfold in a slightly distorted version of our own world, where people are bedeviled by mischievous interventions from the fairies. With appearances from beloved characters from her novel, including Jonathan Strange and Childermass, and an entirely new spin on certain historical figures, including Mary, Queen of Scots, this is a must-have for fans of Susanna Clarke's show more and an enticing introduction to her work for new readers. Some of these stories have never before been published; others have appeared in the New York Times or in highly regarded anthologies. In this collection, they come together to expand the reach of Clarke's land of enchantment--and anticipate her next novel.

My Review: What a delectable cocktail peanut of a book. I wish it had been available before Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, because it would have made a perfect gateway drug to the longer, more intense, and more exhausting high of the Big One. But that's like complaining that you only won $10 million in the lottery..."oh shut up" is the best response.

Nine stories set in Miss Clarke's vastly improved nineteenth-century England, the one where magical beings are and the operations of magic happen to all the people. These operations aren't always pleasant, or even kind ("Mrs Mabb", "Antickes and Frets"); sometimes, though, the balance of justice gets a magical turbocharge with satisfying results ("Tom Brightwind or How the Fairy Bridge Was Built at Thoresby", "John Uskglass and the Cumbrian Charcoal Burner"); and for the rest? Sheer pleasure to read.

Clarke creates this magical England carefully, a term I use despite its connotations of grindhood and laborious tedium; the care, gratefully, is virtually invisible to the reader. It shows itself in the effortless naturalism of these clearly contra-natural stories. It is a sign of a master storyteller working at close to peak performance. One never thinks, "Oh c'mon!" about the antics of the magical characters, since they are provided with clear, though sometimes skewed, motives for their actions. It's a pleasure to meet John Uskglass and see his interaction with the mundane world in all its bilateral confusion and misunderstanding! Tom Brightwind and Dr. Montefiore are the classic mismatched buddies that I do honestly meet in real life; even though one is a fairy that doesn't change their dynamic.

The physical book, the hardcover edition that I have anyway, is as pleasurable to possess as the stories themselves are. The handsome cloth binding, stamped with Charles Voss's beautiful floral illustration, begins the pleasure; beautiful oxblood colored endsheets are rich, inviting, somewhat unsettlingly colored; then the line drawings within the text and the handsome, clear typography complete the impression of careful, thoughtful presentation of these delightful tales.

Anyone who quailed at the sheer massiveness of the tome Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell should read these stories, and understand that equal pleasures of a more sustained sort await between those widely separated covers. Anyone who simply loves good storytelling and good stories told should run and get this book. It's very much worth your time and money.


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