Synopsis:
Grim Wolds, England: Winifred Notty arrives at Ensor House prepared to play the perfect governess―she’ll dutifully tutor her charges, Drusilla and Andrew, tell them bedtime stories, and only joke about eating children. But long, listless days spent within the estate’s dreary confines come with an intimate knowledge of the perversions and pathetic preoccupations of the Pounds family―Mr. Pounds can’t keep his eyes off Winifred’s chest, and Mrs. Pounds takes a sickly pleasure in punishing Winifred for her husband’s wandering gaze. Compounded with her disdain for the entitled Pounds children, Winifred finds herself struggling at every turn to stifle the violent compulsions of her past. French tutoring and needlework are one way to pass the time, as is admiring the ugly portraits in the gallery . . . and creeping across the moonlit lawns. . . .
Patience. Winifred must have patience, for Christmas is coming, and she has very special gifts planned for the dear souls of Ensor House. Brimming with sardonic wit and culminating in a shocking conclusion, Victorian Psycho plunges readers into the chilling mind of an iconic new literary psychopath.
Review:
Stories with callous, emotionless, cruel and unhinged main characters are ones in which I delight, and right now, I can’t think of a more delicious example than Virignia Feito’s “Victorian Psycho.” Winifred Notty is venomous. A brutal yet hilarious character study, and a commentary on what it is to “Be a lady,” that is naughty, nasty and nauseating from page 1- it had my sides aching and my stomach churning. Austen meets Easton-Ellis in this vivisection of the corseted bourgeoisie. To put it bluntly, if you’re quite alright with horrible things happening to horrible, rich Victorians, then you may find the same guilty catharsis and reserved satisfaction that I did in this vile and indulgent little book.
Their last governess having departed suddenly, the Pounds children need instruction, writing, reading and French amongst other things. Drusilla’s education of course is to be appropriately limited- she should spend a lot of her time practicing her needlework, but Andrew needs grooming for boarding school. Well, theoretically. If his little life proceeds as planned. Of course, something terrible could happen between then and now, and rest assured, something terrible does. 3 months after the arrival of the Pounds children’s new governess, Winifred Notty, everybody in Ensor House will be dead.
Winifred Notty is beyond the “supporting women’s wrongs,” sub-genre, regardless of whether or not the world is a better place without some of the Pounds’. She is beyond morally-grey, instead, a true, matte, pitch black. Despite that all encompassing darkness, her hypnotic, sardonic, perverse, blunt and emotionless account is almost beautiful, Feito’s prose rich, lyrical and unreserved. Despite the bizarre and grotesque things that we’re subjected to in terms of plot, that voice is what makes this novella excellent. She speaks with the precision of a surgeon and the detachment of a mortician, a truly, deeply strange inner-monologue that I can’t help but revel in. I am not somebody who annotates books because my handwriting is abysmal, my highlighting is shaky and my past attempts have been nothing short of vandalism, but if I were, my paperback would be fluorescent to the point where it’s soggy and may even glow in the dark. A horrifying nightlight.
“It fascinates me, the fact that humans have the capacity to mortally wound one another at will, but, for the most part, choose not to.”
I have been filleted and flayed and generally violated by this novella. I couldn’t recommend it enough. That being said, “Victorian Psycho,” is a book that demands silence, not because there’s nothing to discuss (that is far, far from the truth) but because you need to bear the full brunt for yourself. Whilst it seems linear, a plot that can only feasibly end in one way (the way that it does) it’s anything but predictable. It’s audacious and malicious, from page 1, to the inevitable denouement, which we are dragged toward kicking and screaming and writhing. I will be sending my therapy bill to 4th Estate books, along with my heart-felt thanks for my copy. Those of you in the U S of A can devour this one as of the 4th of February, and in the UK, it hits shelves on the 13th. Clear your schedule, and leave yourself at least a week on either side.
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