Review: Martha Peake, by Patrick McGrath

Rating:

🦴🦴🦴🦴

First Response:

This book isn't really about Martha. It's about her story. It's a story about the story of Martha.

One Sentence Summary:

Ambrose Tree goes to Drogo Hall at the request of his uncle, and there hears the story of "Cripplegate Giant" Harry Peake, and his daughter Martha.

Tell Me More:

This book wasn't as affecting as yesterday's Asylum, which is why it's getting 4 'stars' instead of 5. It was still beautifully written, but rather heady-- after the tradition of Asylum-- and honestly, I think I need to take a break from these intense gothic literary books for a while. I like McGrath, but two-in-a-row was a touch too much.

Martha Peake has two plotlines: the first follows Ambrose Tree, who is summoned to his Uncle's estate at Drogo Hall. Uncle William is in rather poor health, nearing the end of his life, and Ambrose expects he has been summoned to make final arrangements-- including arrangements for his inheritance of the estate. The second plotline follows the Peakes; first Harry, then his daughter Martha. Their story is relayed to Ambrose by Uncle William, who knew them personally; and later, after Martha is sent to America for reasons I won't divulge here for spoiler-y reasons, Ambrose takes it upon himself to continue her narrative himself with the help of letters Martha sent William from America.

I don't want to dive too deeply into the plot because it would definitely spoil the experience for those who might wish to read this book themselves-- and IMO, the plot isn't what's interesting about this book. There is a interesting twist at the end, but the twist only really works because of what this book is doing with narrativity. The story of the Peakes is hearsay from Uncle William, and Ambrose makes it clear from early in the novel that he doesn't trust William's version of events. He feels like his uncle is holding back information, and twisting the narrative in favor of the English gentry (he doesn't say it in as many words, but this is a story of the American Revolution, and the English/American divide is prevalent, particularly in the latter half of the novel). Later on, when Ambrose takes it upon himself to reconstruct and tell the American chapter of Martha's story, he is working from a collection of letters that have been long neglected by Uncle William, and therefore crumble to the touch. The writing on them is also long faded, and if a reader doesn't keep this in mind, they could easily get swept up in the narrative that follows. Ambrose has a strong Romantic bend in his storytelling (and even admits this to himself in the text), so it's important to remember that his version of events is exactly that: his version.

Never mind the fact that he wasn't there. And neither was Uncle William.

This book is all about prejudice, unconscious bias, and how these affect the stories we tell-- sometimes to fatal effect. The big twist I mentioned earlier revolves around how much of Ambrose's version of events is true, and how much is untrue. What is less than he believes, and what is worse.

Martha Peake reminded me of two other novels I've read: one is Wuthering Heights, by Emily Bronte-- and the resemblance is not so much narrative as vibe. Both books capitalize the gothic imagery of an English manor standing stately over the dreary, windswept moors (It's been a minute since I read Wuthering Heights, so it might be wrong, but that's the image that lives in my brain). The second novel is Confessions of a Thug by Philip Meadows Taylor. I read Confessions for a Victorian Literature class in grad school, and was similarly struck by how the book used its narrators to make it's point more forcefully than the plot alone would allow. Maybe I'll re-read it and do a write up at some point in the future.

Without it's interesting unreliable narrators, this book would probably have been a 3 'star' read for me, but as it stands, I'm giving it 4. The questions it raises about who gets to tell whose stories, and the effects of our prejudices and biases influence our understanding of those stories, are questions worth revisiting.

But maybe not for a while.