A wonderfully baffling book, all atmosphere and nuance, leaving precious little to grip on to. I adore the vagueness of it, the ethereality. It’s a shadow spotted through the trees on a moonlit night, seen at a glance and then lost. Describing it is like trying to catch smoke with a butterfly net, and that is why I love it so much. Go in asking nothing of it but beauty, and you will be rewarded.

A woman travels to an unnamed country to keep house for, and serve, her older brother who is a successful man of some standing in the small community. She is meek and obedient to an extreme degree, having always been made to believe she is of no value (her place in history also informs this view of her worth, or lack thereof). We follow her thought processes and contemplations as she considers her place in the world - or if she even has a place. But, is there more going on here than she, as our only narrator, is letting on? Are the misfortunes suffered by the local livestock merely coincidental with her arrival? Certainly the townsfolk seem to fear and resent her. From being a contemplative musing on a mistreated woman's solitary life, this delightfully curious little novel starts to evoke a disquietude along the lines of The Wicker Man or The Midwich Cuckoos!

A beautiful look into being othered. Full of language that appears impenetrable but actually aids in the portrayal of an interal dialog and perception of othering relating vividly the environment our narrator finds themselves in.