An Unseen Attraction

Starred review from February 20, 2017
A particular pleasure of Charles’s work is spending time with her articulate (and often scathing) protagonists, who skewer their interlocutors and make agonizing admissions with fluency that is a joy to behold. Now, in contrast, comes Clem Talleyfer: neuroatypical, mixed race, and dependent on the begrudged help of others to maintain his painstakingly crafted niche as a boardinghouse keeper in 19th-century Clerkenwell, England. For eight months he has wordlessly courted one of his lodgers, Rowley Green, who has a taxidermy shop next door. Rowley has no problem with words; he simply chooses not to reveal his well-armored heart. What they see in each other is a generosity of spirit revealed in everyday gestures—more often than not, considerate silence. But they are not immune to silence’s corrosive effects, and when a fellow lodger is murdered, toxic secrets spill. Charles (A Gentleman’s Position) indulges in a plot that’s unabashed pulp, made poignant by its effects on the two bruised souls at its center. Agent: Courtney Miller-Callihan, Handspun Literary.