The Thirteenth Tale

Diane Setterfield

10/6/2007

Margaret Lea spends most of her time in her father's antiquarian book store. She loves 19th century literature and majored in it while at University. As she says, it usually has a beginning, a middle, and an end - something that can't be counted on in 20th century literature. Occasionally she supplements her income by writing essays on unknown 19th century authors. Then she calls herself a biographer of the dead.

Vida Winter is the best selling author of fiction of all time. In the past 50 to 60 years she has published about that many novels. Margaret has never read them, although she's seen her father doing so. One day she receives a strangely lettered envelope in the mail. Miss Winter has finally decided to tell her true past history, one she has never told. She admits she lies. In fact, Margaret starts doing some reasearch. She quickly finds at least 15 "pasts" that Miss Winter has invented for herself. Then Magaret starts reading Miss Winter's books. She is hooked.

Margaret travels to Miss Winter's home. She meets the amazing old woman who is the author of novels that captured the world's fascination. The old woman is dying and wants to tell her story. Margaret is reluctant until Miss Winter admits her story is about twins. Now Margaret has to hear it all. She herself is a twin whose sister died at birth. Miss Winter's story doesn't appear to be a happy one, so Margaret identifies.

Thus begins a strange tale of odd families and twinness. Vida Winter tells a story of twisted personalities, seclusion, ghosts, old family homes, and peculiarities. Margaret is the first person narrator of the overall book, but the Winter biography is told from the old woman's skewed point of view. Diane Setterfield has put together a fascinating novel that not only tells a strange story but also has insights into the world of reading and readers.

I can identify with Margaret's thoughts in passage from The Thirteenth Tale: "I [was] longing for the comfort of a story where everything had been planned well in advance, where the confusion of the middle was invented only for my enjoyment, and where I could measure how far away the solution was by feeling the thickness of pages still to come." Margaet wanted to find out what happens to the Winter twins but has to wait for Miss Winter's own timing, which was frustrating her. No matter how good the book is, a reader knows how soon the end will be just by the number of pages left beneath the fingers. Throughout the novel Setterfield captures the essence of a reader as well as telling an intriguing story.

Vida Winter's story intertwines with Margaret Lea's story, keeping the reader sucked in. The Thirteenth Tale has lots of substance and is sure to satisfy.

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