Afterimage

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Inspired by the Victorian photography of Julia Margaret Cameron, Canadian author Humphreys creatively invents the world behind the images of a costumed house maid. Acknowledging a debt to Jane Eyre, Humphreys sets her beguiling tale in the mid-19th-century English countryside, where doe-eyed Annie Phelan comes to work at Middle Road Farm. What she encounters there is alien to her strict, religious upbringing as a servant after her family died in the Irish famine. Her new mistress, Isabelle, is the unconventional daughter of local gentry and a passionate artist attempting to prove her skill in the new medium of photography. Isabelle uses her house staff as models in elaborately concocted photo shoots and discovers the obedient Annie to be an expressive and intriguing portrait subject. Viewing Annie dressed up as Ophelia, Sappho or the Madonna, 30ish Isabelle begins to feel an attraction to the younger woman the kind of attraction she no longer feels for her husband, Eldon. He is a mapmaker with ambitions to be a world explorer, and he also admires Annie, whom he calls "Phelan" when she becomes a participant in his imaginary expedition to the Arctic. He also helps her to satisfy her own obsession, which is reading, by allowing her to borrow books from his library. The atmosphere that encloses this evolving love triangle is sometimes erotic, sometimes poignant and always complicated by Victorian class issues. A fiery denouement causes Annie to question her past and reconsider her future with Isabelle. Humphreys, author of four books of poetry and the acclaimed novel Leaving Earth, has an impeccable command of imagery, and her prose finds strengths in its subtlety. A hauntingly beautiful reproduction of a Cameron photo on the jacket should pull readers to this finely wrought novel. (Apr.) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

The year is 1865, and Annie Phelen, an Irish maid who reads Jane Eyre, arrives at the country home of Isabelle and Eldon Dashell in the south of England. The Dashells are an unusual couple for their time they have cast aside God, embraced Darwin, and are anxious to explore new worlds. Eldon, a cartographer, wishes to explore the Arctic. Isabelle's fascination with art and technology has lead her to a creative career as a photographer (her character is modeled on Julia Margaret Cameron). Each vies for Annie's heart and soul, but the more powerful Isabelle re-creates Annie into a model, muse, and finally lover. Canadian writer Humpreys, who has published another imaginative novel, Leaving Earth, as well as poetry, has produced a fascinating novel that works on many levels. It is at once moody and humorous, while (only occasionally too self-consciously) exploring the nature of art, creativity, and technology. Highly recommended for academic and larger public libraries. Mary Margaret Benson, Linfield Coll. Lib., McMinnville, OR Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.