The Thirteenth Tale by Diane SetterfieldAtria Books, 2006

This is a story of neo-Gothic intrigue, the story of a decaying pile of a mansion and the falling-apart family that lives in it, a story of reading and writing. In the first few pages I decided it had a few things going for it: the reference to The Water Babies (yay classic kids’ books) on page four, the revelation, on page thirteen, that it’s set in Cambridge (England, not Massachusetts), so I could picture the river and the punts and the little street where the antiquarian bookshop where the protagonist works would be. I wanted this book to be smarter, less pop-fiction and more literary-fiction—but that didn’t keep me from not wanting to put it down. It turned out to be very good to read during a week of all-day meetings at work, the kind of week where I take notes all day long and then get on the train and just want to get lost in a story, the kind I don’t mind reading a little too quickly because I’m reading for plot, really, not for beautiful/original language or new ideas. It’s the kind of book where, even reading too quickly, there were revelations I could see coming (but at least one that I didn’t); it’s the kind of book where, if things sometimes felt flat, I just read faster, to get to the next plot twist, and enjoyed it all the while.