The Tailor's Daughter

August 7, 2006
How much can one middle-class Victorian-era woman endure? Plenty, as evidenced by this engrossing second novel from Graham (Firebird
). A tailor's daughter living on London's Savile Row, Veda Grenfell expects that one day she will marry up and shed her status as a tradesman's daughter. But as she comes of marrying age, her brother dies in a riding accident, her mother and unborn sibling die during childbirth and a bout of typhoid fever leaves Veda deaf. Realizing her deafness will ward off suitors, Veda goes to work at her father's shop, where she proves herself a talented seamstress, and intrigue and possible romance simmer. Charismatic Lord Ormelie is interested in more than Veda's stitch work; the repellant Balducci, the head cutter at Grenfell's, uses Veda to further his position at Grenfell's; and Mr. Nicholls, a clergyman hired by Veda's father as a tutor, is prone to caustic jealousy of other men who pay attention to Veda. Veda's deafness is smartly played, and Graham's depiction of the tailor shop's inner workings is instructive. Though the litany of setbacks Veda endures makes it seem like the world has it in for her, the redemptive ending will please fans of the genre.