Superstitions abound in Essex of the return of a beast from folklore, the Essex Serpent. There's been just too many deaths and unexplained disappearances of livestock and people for it not to be so. In the middle of The Trouble as he refers to it, the local vicar Will Ransome tries to keep a lid on the speculations and belief in it. Not helped by an old pew carving of the serpent in his own church, which if he felt courageous enough he'd have removed.
Meanwhile in London Cora Seabourne, recently bereaved, is feeling greatly relieved by the death of her oppressive, manipulative husband. She's re-engaging with her life as an independent woman, able to freely follow her enthusiasms and interests. Starting to live her own life, however unconventional others might see it. Moving out to Essex to take herself away from her old self, that life and those circumstances.
Cora's fascination with fossils and paleontology becomes obsessed with the idea of the serpent, as a possible lost species waiting to be rediscovered. Through the recommendation of her friends Charles and Elizabeth she visits and befriends Will and his family. What starts off as a series of combative conversations with Will about ideas, facts and beliefs turns eventually into something with a much deeper and profound consequence. Liable, should they let it, to overturn everyone's life and sense of propriety.
The scope of this novel set in Victorian England is wide and panoramic. The broad sweeping descriptions of the Essex landscape and of scientific inquiry are matched by the well described emotional realm its characters inhabit. As much at home with intellectual ideas and debates, as the emotional conflicts between self, duty and expectations. Its a beautifully executed novel, pushing at the conventions of the period set novel, whilst honouring its legacy from the likes of Dickens, Wilkie Collins and Elliot. A thoroughly engrossing read.
CARROT REVIEW 6/8
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