Sarah Waters - The Little Stranger...any opinions?

Just finished it and like a previous poster, I reached a point where I didn't care anymore and started skimming. I liked the themes and the vagueness of who TLS might be (agree that I thought it was Faraday) but I wasn't ever gripped by it - I was waiting for it to become scary, but it never did which disappointed me. It's a polished book, but ultimately disappointed me.

I thought it was excellent - havn't read any other SW but look forward to it now

i thought Faraday was the little stranger, he didn't fit anywhere, had lost his working class roots, but didn't belong to the gentry

I loved Affinity too BBL. I agree she is great at capturing and engaging you in her stories and the lives of her characters. I also like the uncertainty of her stories and love to be kept guessing

I don't think she'll win. I think it'll be Byatt or Mantell, but what do I know?!

Theyoungvisiter, great comments, I do like your scenario that Faraday was a victim of the 'little stranger', and not the little stranger himself. Very possible. I loved the book too, btw Yes, she's made the booker shortlist... lets see if she wins it.

did you see it's made the Booker shortlist?

I'm still reading it but am nearly at the end and have already skipped ahead so knew about the content of the spoilers.

I'm on page 462 at a point in the book where my view of the main character completely changes. I don't like the book as much as I enjoyed Tipping the Velvet and Fingersmith, or the Night Watch - I still have to read Affinity which for some reason I've not yet got round to. I think that's perhaps not a reflection on the author or her writing, but I don't find the main character or the setting as compelling somehow. But she's taken a risk in creating a narrator very different from the protagonists in her previous books, and I think really good writers shouldn't just keep writing the same book over and over. It's certainly a thought provoking novel.

joining this late as I've only just finished the book and didn't want to read the spoilers!

SPOILER

I too thought Faraday was probably the little stranger. Either he was a Jekyll narrator and the little stranger was Hyde, operating through his unconscious, or he psychically "made" things happen, or both.

I thought it was very significant that all the events worked towards him getting what he really wanted - the Hall for himself. And he started the destruction of course, by chipping off the acorn.

But there's also an argument for saying that the little stranger is Sukey (or the house itself or something else) and that Faraday's attitude at the end is just the house bending and twisting him - in the same way that it used Rod's and Mrs Ayres' weaknesses to send them mad. It's supposed to be deliberately vague, I think, like The Turn of the Screw.

I loved it btw! I thought she'd got a lot better and more confident in her writing and characterisation.

I'm going to see a dialogue between Sarah Waters and Andrew Davies next month, and they will be discussing TLS. I finished the book last night and agree that Faraday is The Little Stranger.

I will report back after the event if you like?

Oooh, I am so delighted Becky. I thought it was blindingly obvious who TLS was from about halfway through. So the ending was, for me, a touch underwhelming.

One other thing about the book - has anyone noticed how SW's verbal tics and tricks in her earlier work - the brilliance of the Victorian sex trade slang in Tipping the Velvet, the awfully perfect lingo in wartime Nightwatch - completely vanish in this book? There's no linguistic interest at all, or even attempt to make the words fit the period. Sad.

Worse, all the Ayres talk like Surbiton folk of the 1960s. Every bit of their dialogue is filled with class clangers. Mrs Ayres asks for "a sherry", refers to her past as "having relationships", and talks about how her feet hurt. Now, I'm not pointing this out for snob reasons, but the gentry - then and now - really don't speak or behave like that. As even, say, a documentary on Channel 4 would bring to your attention. Makes you wonder if she made up the Victorian and WWI Istuff.

Stalker profile (about Faraday). Very true.

Joining this thread late but really torn about 'The Little Stranger' - I loved Fingersmith but in retrospect loved Night Watch even more. I thought the first half of this was brilliant but felt it didn't maintain the momentum in the second half. Yes, was a bit scary/tense in bits but actually I found myself not really caring too much what happened by the end of it, which I was really surprised at. FWIW, agree with those who thought Faraday an unreliable narrator, definitely stalker profile with respect to both the family and the house. Still, for all that criticism I did enjoy it just not as much as I'd expected to.

I loved this book. I've read all of Sarah Waters' stuff and I think she's one of the only authors I have come across who is consistently excellent.

I enjoyed the way that she leaves it open at the end. I feel it would have marred the book to go either down the "Woo - scary ghost episode" or "Woo - big reveal of the psycho" - both of those are far too trite.

I suppose each of us wants different things from reading. And also different things from different books. And also- different things at different times in our lives! I could go on of course. So there's no definitive answer is there. Some people love open endings. Others hate them. Also: sometimes open endings are done well (and I feel in this book the open ending was done relatively well). Other times open endings are done appalingly.

I think what she she tries to achieve by leaving us unsatisfied is to create the question about the existence or non-existence of ghosts. I don't think she herself is convinced about ghosts (I have to admit I heard her say this on Woman's hour!) She would like to believe ghosts exist, on some level, and she clearly loves ghost stories. But on another level she would hate it if ghosts exist, ifswIm. So she leaves it open for us to decide. Fine by me.

What did frustrate me, though, if one thing did, is this: if we accept the version that Faraday was the 'little stranger' then how exactly did he do the things he did? I'm not just talking about the ending, but about all the occurences in the book. I suppose the fact that he's an unreliable narrator makes this question irrelevant: he could simply have not told us half of what happened, or his involvement in it. But in any case, that was the slightly frustrating thing for me.

Ah Maria - you've opened opened up can of worms there re why we read, what we want from the experience, how narrative affects us etc etc.
Which begs the question; what does S Waters achieve by leaving (some of) her readers frustrated/dissatisfied?

Littlepollyflinders: but maybe that was exactly the point? (that we were never going to get a definitive answer). I know it's frustrating, but I really think S. Waters left it open on purpose.

The thing that bothered me was it being so unclear what the hell all that was about.
I was disappointed because I was expecting a ghost story - and if you look at the acknowledgments S Waters had done a lot of research into poltergeist activity - so to then leave it as if 'might have been might not have been' was really infuriating.

However well that whole 'unreliable narrator' thing works, my personal feeling is that the author made a bad choice in using it. We were never going to get a definitive answer from his point of view and there simply wasn't enough evidence for us to completely dismiss his version.

Ninjacat: very true about the rising middle classes versus the declining way of life. At our book group this was exactly the aspect we focused on. And yes, very true too that Faraday was essentially the 'little stranger'. Perhaps the poltergeist (or whatever it was) was a metaphor and Faraday was the real issue.

Spoiler

BBL my reading of it was quite similar to yours. Faraday the embodyment of the rising of the middle classes seeks to possess a declining way of life and in so ding destroys it all together. Even at the end he possesses the house but he can never truly reach that status.
There's also the idea that Modernity (or the council houses) are litrally (sp?) encroaching into the gentries land reducing the physical and metaphysical space between the classes.

Yes I would say the ending made it quite clear he was an embodyment of the families decline. For me Faraday was definitly the little stranger from the moment he snuck through the curtain as a young boy, pushing his place and class beyond that barrier.

in the middle of fingersmith, fab. just finished the night watch which was also good.

Have skimmed the thread as I am waiting for my copy to be delivered. It is set where I live so I am hoping to recognise some places.

I loved the ending and didn't find it meh at all. Was it really ambiguous or just a little more complicated than at first sight??
In the middle of Affinity now which I'm also enjoying.

if you live in london you can join ours (it started a couple of months ago & basically is made up of MNers).