Mrs. England

December 20, 2021
Familiar tropes dampen the chilling effect of Halls’s promising excursion (after The Foundling) into the haunting and harrowing halls of domestic traumas set in the Yorkshire moors of Edwardian England. Newly graduated from the prestigious Norland Institute for the Training of Ladies as Children’s Nurses, Ruby May turns down an offer to move to Chicago for a job in 1904 and instead tends to the four children of Charles and Lilian England, wealthy cotton mill owners, at the isolated Hardcastle House. Ruby instantly surmises that “something’s not right” with the innocuously charming father and the enigmatic, seemingly addled mother who occasionally sleepwalks. Lost letters, an accusatory message smeared on a bathroom mirror, locked doors, and a nearly fatal scare involving a gaslight shroud bigger secrets. Flashbacks detail Ruby’s disquieting childhood, and the treacherous landscape of raging rivers, craggy hillsides, and deep, dark woods create an eerie atmosphere and add to the heart-stopping conclusion. The sort of ordeals Ruby faces as the beleaguered nanny have been seen before, but Halls does a nice job highlighting the imbalance of power determined by gender and class, and the deceit that follows psychological manipulation of daughters, mothers, and wives. Astute readers may suss out the plot early on, but it still offers a beguiling, leisurely diversion.

March 15, 2022
Ruby May, graduate of the Norland Institute for the Training of Ladies as Children's Nurses, has just left one London placement and returned to Norland for another. Mrs. England needs a nurse for her four children in far-off Yorkshire. Upon arrival, Ruby detects that something is amiss in the England household. Mrs. England seems confused by Ruby's arrival, and the other servants are cold to her. Mr. England and the children welcome her warmly, however, and Ruby gets to work managing her charges. As Ruby spends more time with the family, the feeling of something not right in the household intensifies. Ruby, who has secrets of her own, slowly begins to understand what she must do to protect the children and herself. Ruby is the standout of this book--strong, vulnerable, intelligent, yet susceptible to flattery that causes her to make big mistakes. While most readers will see where the plot is ultimately headed, Halls writes convincingly of the Edwardian time and of the lack of power women had to control their own fates. Recommended for all historical-fiction collections.

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