The Thirteenth Tale (Spoiler Alert!)

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SYNOPSIS:

Angelfield House stands abandoned and forgotten. It was once the imposing home of the March family - fascinating, manipulative Isabelle, Charlie, her brutal and dangerous brother, and the wild, untamed twins, Emmeline and Adeline. But Angelfield House conceals a chilling secret whose impact still resonates ... Now Margaret Lea is investigating Angelfield's past - and the mystery of the March family starts to unravel. What has the house been hiding? What is its connection with the enigmatic author Vida Winter? And what is it in Margaret's own troubled past that causes her to fall so powerfully under Angelfield's spell?

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REVIEW (5 STARS)

This is an ode to the book lovers.

The story is extremely captivating and the writing is phenomenal. Honestly, it's what made me give it five stars because I have to admit the pace is sometimes a bit slow for my taste. Diane Setterfield can write about whatever she wants with an ease I haven't seen in a while. It's like she doesn't dwell on words or with her thoughts - she writes simply, beautifully and yet not with many flourishes. She doesn't go around in circles to get to the point: she goes straight to it, saving you time.

Although sometimes I found some bits too descriptive, I don't think I ever felt too bored to continue (mind you, this is my personal taste - I don't like long descriptions of things).

My favorite moments were the ones about Vida Winter's life. I liked to know about Margaret Lea as well, about her life at the shop, her love for classic literature and her moments with Shadow, but she was an extremely heavy character for a narrator and I found this heaviness, more than once, transferred to me. She was sad, grieving still (as one should after the death of one's sister) and I felt her sadness and grief since I too have a sister and I can't even imagine the pain I would feel were I to lose her.

However, this was not the only factor that made me prefer Winter's story. Margaret often "saw" her dead sister and that killed the vibe for me E-V-E-R-Y time. Everything else in the story made sense and was "plausible", so these "paranormal" moments (maybe I'm exaggerating, but I hate creepy stuff and it doesn't take much to scare me) were a bit too much.

Even so, this was not enough to persuade me to give this book less than five stars and the plot twist at the end assured me, not only because of its unpredictability but also because it didn't give us all the answers. Usually, I hate this, but with this particular book I loved not knowing who survived the fire - every other loose end was tied except for this one, which I found beautiful. Does it really matter who died? In the end, they both needed help to survive because of their psychological problems and their inability to take care of themselves. Winter took care of her sister because she was always unsure of who she was - if she did, maybe things had gone differently. Sometimes, ignorance is bliss.

Setterfield mastered the ability to weave a mystery that didn't end with her story and kept on living beyond it. She thought about every detail, every piece of this chess game and before I knew it, she checkmated my king and I lost to her wonderful mind.