Margaret Prior is a proper lady in 1870's Victorian England. After her Pa dies, she becomes a "Lady Visitor" at Millbank women's prison to help deal with her grief. And while visiting the various inmates there, becomes quite taken with a spiritualist named Selina Dawes, whom she comes to feel was wrongly imprisoned.
The atmosphere was very dark and gothic, and Ms Waters has a great talent for writing that really pulls you into that place. While the first 50-60% of the story was rather slow and plodding, the next half, once Selina began to pull Margaret in, began to pick up the pace. Unlike one of my other friends who reviewed this book, I didn't see this ending coming and was quite surprised and distraught by how things turned out.
If you like dark tales of Victorian England, then you'll probably like this, even the slower beginning which help to build a very strong atmosphere. While I didn't like it as much as some of Waters other novels like Fingersmith and Tipping the Velvet, I still found it quite worth the read.
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