There is a quickness of perception in some, a nicety in the discernment of character, a natural penetration, in short, which no experience in others can equal…

— This, from late in Persuasion. It provides for a comparison of Lady Russell to Anne Elliot. Lady Russell is far less gifted with natural penetration than Anne. Given the events of the book, that’s no large-scale surprise. But I find the passage interesting as it bears on Pride and Prejudice —and on Elizabeth Bennet.

Elizabeth fancies herself richly gifted with this natural penetration but she is mistaken. Her mistake leads to her entanglements with Wickham and to all the “contradictions and varieties” of her relationship with Darcy. (Of course, Darcy bears his share of blame for that too.) Anne Elliot’s richer gift, less encumbered by vanity and prejudice, less forward and assertive, penetrates character more deeply, more accurately. Self is less likely to engross her than Elizabeth. Anne resists her version of Wickham — Mr. Elliot — despite the powerful temptations he represents: most notably, of installing Anne in her mother’s place at Kellynch Hall, of making Anne Lady Elliot. Of course, Anne and Elizabeth’s situations are not identical, and it is true that Anne in her book is seven or eight years older than Elizabeth in hers, but Anne’s described penetration was early displayed in her choice of Wentworth (at around Elizabeth’s age). Anne gave him up then, yes, but not out of a failure of penetration, a change of mind about or a misunderstanding of his character, but as the result of her fear that she would encumber him, repress his chances, retard his advancement. She did it for his sake, for the sake of the character she discerned him to have.

5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing Read!

Reviewed in the United States on December 27, 2023

A five-star rating, it has been said, is reserved for stories that create an emotional reaction. A book hangover, if you will. Be prepared for that. A quick read, but immense and intense depth.

A mystery, a romance…perfectly balanced and intertwined.

I wrote The Vanishing Woman as a Christmas story, ultimately as a reflection on the season.  I hoped to write a tale that would stand in a relation to the holiday much as Dickens’ Christmas tales do. I decided to write a romantic mystery, one that was contemporary but tinseled by laughter and nostalgia. Once I decided to center the story on a Christmas train trip, I then decided the story should recall old movies, both mysteries and screwball romantic comedies, old movies that feature trains — and should recall old mystery novels, like A. A. Milne’s wonderful The Red House Mystery. The plot gradually became clear to me.  You might say that the story train begins with Alfred Hitchcock, the engine, and ends with Preston Sturges, the caboose, with some Milne in the middle, the sleeper car. It’s a funny, romantic, fast-paced and dialogue-driven story of a man and a woman, strangers, meeting on a train, and of the two of them winding their way to each other. 

The cover art for The Vanishing Woman is by my friend, Syd Edwards (who also did the cover art for Big Swamp).  The drawing is entitled, Wishes. I sent Syd an early copy of the book and he read it, and we talked generally about the themes of the book and about how they might be represented, but the remarkable drawing is ultimately all Syd.  Although the story centers on a contemporary train trip, it’s nostalgic and it makes reference to The Polar Express — and so Syd chose an older, iconic engine as the centerpiece of the drawing.  The drawing is a marvelous study in circles — and the circles too, reflect themes of the story.  

My new novel, The Vanishing Woman, is due to be released tomorrow. Here’s a sneak peek from the publisher:

This novel has a long, peculiar history — most of it spent in a dark drawer.

I had the idea in graduate school, the basic plot and setting. I even wrote three chapters, although I put them away and lost them during a move. At the time, the book was to be called Bring My Coffin Along, a line I lifted from Celine’s Death on the Installment Plan, if I remember correctly. That line is now the title of the first section of Heaven and Hell. (The others are The Hells are Everywhere and Beatific Visions?)

When I finally returned to the idea and wrote the book a few years ago, I realized I had written a book that, although a Western, was more than a simple addition to that genre, and so a book unsimple to publish. Unsure what to do with it, I eventually slipped it into a drawer, consigning it to darkness. Later, by chance, I got Norton to read it. They didn’t take it but they were gracious in declining praise, themselves unsure what to do with it. It went back into the drawer. And then, tired of it nagging me from the dark, I decided that I would publish it as a Newton Priors novel, given the prior existence of my pseudonym. So a few days ago I did.

An editor friend was one of the first readers of the final draft, and her comment today, after posting a review, was: “I didn’t want to mention too much about your literary allusions, which were fabulous, because I think the story stands without them. I also enjoyed the theological material, it was beautifully done. Really, you put this off as ‘just something I wrote,’ but it is really special. I would love to have written something like this!”

Bear in mind that, although there is a love story at the heart of H&H, I am using ‘Romance’ in the title as Hawthorne used it in House of the Seven Gables.

There’s a link to the book on the Fiction page.