254. Sarah Waters

Sarah Waters has published five novels: Tipping the Velvet, Affinity, Fingersmith, The Night Watch and The Little Stranger. I couldn't finish The Little Stranger, due to an incident involving an elderly labrador that made me both weepy and angry. But I've read all the others, and I think she's a genius.

She calls herself an old-fashioned writer, because she cares about characters and plots. Which makes me an old-fashioned reader, because if a novel doesn't have great characters and a plot worth following, why would I read it? (John Banville, please take note.)

Tipping the Velvet is both hilarious and ridiculous, but you can't deny the authenticity of it, nor the take-no-prisoners pace.

Affinity is my least favourite, I think.

Fingersmith is just fantastic - one of the best stories I have ever read.

I love The Night Watch too, now, but it has grown on me. I wasn't sure about it at first, and the TV adaptation was No Good, but I find I go back to the book quite regularly now, when other novels pall.

I like not being able to see, hear or feel the writer pulling the strings, and Sarah Waters is very good at getting herself out of the way. The writing is never showy, or flashy, but some of her sentences are as good as any produced by more 'literary' writers. I'm starting to really hate literary fiction, by the way, but that's for a different blog.

I hope she's busy at work on number six. It's been a while...