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The Wood at Midwinter by Susanna Clarke
First of all, a note on physical book design: One thing I really dislike about new books is that most of them are absolutely massive hardbacks which I find really awkward and unwieldy to hold and keep open; The Warm Hands of Ghosts, for instance, when I got it from the library was a whopping 24cm high, and even Clarke's Piranesi is 22cm. They also tend to have dust jackets, which I dislike (these at least can be removed, although not from library books). My ideal format for a book is a small hardback with no dust jacket which lies more or less flat on the table; many of the older books I own are just that, and I lament the change in publishing practices. Imagine my satisfaction, therefore, when The Wood at Midwinter turns out to be a mere 20.5cm high, nicely cloth-bound, with no dust jacket. More of this, please. It also has a gorgeous cover design.
This is not really a new book. Firstly, it's not new; it was written in 2022 for broadcast on the radio (and is in fact still available now; I've not listened yet) and is now only newly published in print. Secondly, it's not substantial enough to call a book. It's novella-sized, but much of the page space is taken up by illustrations around which the fairly large-font text is artistically arranged, and the actual amount of the text is short story-length.
The cover design is, as I say, lovely, and the endpapers likewise. The style of the illustrations themselves, which are by Victoria Sawdon, is not so much to my taste as that of Portia Rosenberg's illustrations for Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (I think it's an unpopular opinion of mine in JSMN fandom that I really like the illustrations)—they're sharp in style without being as precise in detail, especially botanical detail, as I would have wanted—but on the whole it's a nice, effective way to present the story.
The actual story, then! It's about Merowdis Scot, a young autistic woman in the nineteenth century who goes to the local wood at midwinter, has a significant vision, and later does something very strange. It is definitely a Christmas and/or midwinter story—it's about Christmas in the same way that 'The Holly and the Ivy' is about Christmas—and I'm not sure why the decision was taken to publish it in October, but never mind. I'll re-read it in December! It wouldn't be strictly accurate to summarise it as 'turns out the Virgin Mary was John Uskglass all along, who knew???', but it's not not that, and I love this about it. It has the same peaceful, self-contained logic that makes Piranesi so memorable, and the landscape and ideas are very much those of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. In fact it's set in the same universe as JSMN, which I failed to realise until the afterword because I didn't read the back cover blurb to avoid spoilers, and it makes a very fitting addition to it. I think Merowdis and John Uskglass probably meet at some point after the story, and quietly approve of each other before going on their different ways.
I was ready to criticise the story for not having enough actual woodland history in it, and indeed there isn't much, but there doesn't really need to be, and the setting in John Uskglass's world provides a reason for that; this wood may actually be one of the four magical woods set by Uskglass around his capital city and mentioned in I think a footnote somewhere in JSMN. The presence of bears is slightly inexplicable—not only is the plot-important cub definitely there, but the people around Merowdis are apparently aware of bears in general as a recognised danger of going into woods alone, while in real history the brown bear had been extinct in Britain for well over a thousand years by this point—but perhaps justified by the setting: I can imagine this wood being a route to/the same as a wood in Faerie, and who knows what wildlife lives there.
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell was the first fandom I really participated in, and it and its world still feel like a sort of fannish home. This story was a lovely chance to revisit it again, and I'm glad Clarke has written and published it.
This is not really a new book. Firstly, it's not new; it was written in 2022 for broadcast on the radio (and is in fact still available now; I've not listened yet) and is now only newly published in print. Secondly, it's not substantial enough to call a book. It's novella-sized, but much of the page space is taken up by illustrations around which the fairly large-font text is artistically arranged, and the actual amount of the text is short story-length.
The cover design is, as I say, lovely, and the endpapers likewise. The style of the illustrations themselves, which are by Victoria Sawdon, is not so much to my taste as that of Portia Rosenberg's illustrations for Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (I think it's an unpopular opinion of mine in JSMN fandom that I really like the illustrations)—they're sharp in style without being as precise in detail, especially botanical detail, as I would have wanted—but on the whole it's a nice, effective way to present the story.
The actual story, then! It's about Merowdis Scot, a young autistic woman in the nineteenth century who goes to the local wood at midwinter, has a significant vision, and later does something very strange. It is definitely a Christmas and/or midwinter story—it's about Christmas in the same way that 'The Holly and the Ivy' is about Christmas—and I'm not sure why the decision was taken to publish it in October, but never mind. I'll re-read it in December! It wouldn't be strictly accurate to summarise it as 'turns out the Virgin Mary was John Uskglass all along, who knew???', but it's not not that, and I love this about it. It has the same peaceful, self-contained logic that makes Piranesi so memorable, and the landscape and ideas are very much those of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. In fact it's set in the same universe as JSMN, which I failed to realise until the afterword because I didn't read the back cover blurb to avoid spoilers, and it makes a very fitting addition to it. I think Merowdis and John Uskglass probably meet at some point after the story, and quietly approve of each other before going on their different ways.
I was ready to criticise the story for not having enough actual woodland history in it, and indeed there isn't much, but there doesn't really need to be, and the setting in John Uskglass's world provides a reason for that; this wood may actually be one of the four magical woods set by Uskglass around his capital city and mentioned in I think a footnote somewhere in JSMN. The presence of bears is slightly inexplicable—not only is the plot-important cub definitely there, but the people around Merowdis are apparently aware of bears in general as a recognised danger of going into woods alone, while in real history the brown bear had been extinct in Britain for well over a thousand years by this point—but perhaps justified by the setting: I can imagine this wood being a route to/the same as a wood in Faerie, and who knows what wildlife lives there.
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell was the first fandom I really participated in, and it and its world still feel like a sort of fannish home. This story was a lovely chance to revisit it again, and I'm glad Clarke has written and published it.
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Oh, how fortunate :D Yes, it is really lovely, highly recommended for a holiday read.