The Paying Guests

by Sarah Waters

'There came the splash of water and the rub of heels as Mrs Barber stepped into the tub. After that there was a silence, broken only by the occasional echoey plink of drips from the tap...'Frances had been picturing her lodgers in purely mercenary terms - as something like two great waddling shillings. But this, she thought, was what it really meant to have paying guests: this odd, unintimate proximity, this rather peeled-back moment, where the only thing between herself and a naked Mrs Barber was a few feet of kitchen and a thin scullery door. An image sprang into her head: that round flesh, crimsoning in the heat.' It is 1922, and London is tense. Ex-servicemen are disillusioned, the out-of-work and the hungry are demanding change. And in South London, in a genteel Camberwell villa, a large silent house now bereft of brothers, husband and even servants, life is about to be transformed, as impoverished widow Mrs Wray and her spinster daughter, Frances, are obliged to take in lodgers. For with the arrival of Lilian and Leonard Barber, a modern young couple of the 'clerk class', the routines of the house will be shaken up in unexpected ways.
And as passions mount and frustration gathers, no one can foresee just how far-reaching, and how devastating, the disturbances will be. This is vintage Sarah Waters: beautifully described with excruciating tension, real tenderness, believable characters, and surprises. It is above all a wonderful, compelling story.

• ISBN10: 0349004366
• ISBN13: 9780349004365
• Publish Date: 28 August 2014
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 20 August 2015
• Publish Country: GB
• Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group
• Imprint: Virago Press Ltd
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 576
• Language: English

Reviews

[brokentune]

"They had no idea how decency, loyalty, courage, how it all shriveled away when one was frightened."

So, days after finishing The Paying Guests I am still shaking my head in disbelief. Disbelief that a book can have the power to torment me and make me feel like it tied me to the rear bumper and dragged me backwards through vast wilderness of human emotions.

The story is set in London of the 1920s complete with luscious descriptions of fashion and day-to-day details of the post-war life. Left in difficult financial circumstances, Frances Wray and her mother have decided to take in lodgers to support their income.

What follows in the first half of this book is the slow but steady build up of tension which left me hanging on to every page with anticipation of when that tension would be released. If it would be released.
There is the tension between the characters. There is the issue of social tension, the contrast between the conventional and the modern, the question of roles. There is regret and the promise of making up for past mistakes. There is deceit and there is the test of courage. And...

"Didn't they almost have a duty to make one small brave thing happen at last?"

What The Paying Guests offers is a masterful web spun by Waters' meticulous detail and beautiful use of language. It's a psychological thriller in the tradition of Patricia Highsmith or Alfred Hitchcock, except that Waters' characters are more lifelike, likable, and that the full picture is not revealed until, ... well, not until, you have been taken on this rollercoaster ride, and have progressed through the trials that the characters face, and not until you have worried with them, lived with them, and loved with them.

"But for now there was this, and it was enough. It was more than [I] could have hoped for."

Needless to say, Sarah Waters has just claimed her spot on my "favourites" shelf.
This was a difficult review, not just because there are so many aspects to this novel that I am unable to summarise but also because when reading The Paying Guests it pays off to know nothing about it. However, there is one passage which I would like to quote but really do not want to spoil the reading experience for anyone.

So only read on if you either have read the book or have no intention of reading it:

"They faced each other in the silence broken by the trickle of a faulty cistern, by the flutter of pigeons in the light-well. The room smelt of bleach and of sour wet mops. But Lilian looked back at her with eyes grown silvery with tears, and for a moment, the room, the trial, Leonard, the summer, their whole affair, it was as if none of it had yet happened. As if their love were to be done again, but done properly. As if they were back in Frances' bedroom the day after snakes and ladders, that imaginary stake just drawn from her heart. But across the moment there came from out in the hall the clanging of a bell, almost instantly followed by footsteps."

Review first posted on BookLikes: http://brokentune.booklikes.com/post/1014612/the-paying-guests

[Michael @ Knowledge Lost]

The Paying Guests is something a little different for Sarah Waters; set in 1922 London, it is a period of history I don’t expect from this author. The novel tells the story an impoverished widow and her spinster daughter who are struggling to keep their large Camberwell villa after the loss of her husband and sons due to the war. They take in a modern young couple, Lilian and Leonard Barber to help make ends meet. True to Sarah Waters form, The Paying Guest is full of tension and mystery, but there was something missing.

Granted I have only read Tipping the Velvet (I really should read Fingersmith) but what I know and expect from Waters is something set in the 1800’s. Needless to say this was an enjoyable novel, exploring the differences in classes and the effects of World War I on the people in London. This period of time is an interesting one; the results of the war and the modernisation of London make for an interesting backdrop.

What I think Sarah Waters does best is create incredibly complex characters and The Paying Guests in no exception. Told from the point of view of Frances Wray, all the characters within the novel slowly take form, as secrets and new facts are revealed about them. This is an effective way to build a character and allows them to grow with small reveals that are both expected and unexpected.

The main focus of this novel is the blossoming romance between Frances and Lilian, this is expected from Waters and where she really excels. The idea of forbidden love is a heavy theme, not just because a lesbian relationship would be taboo but also the fact that Lilian was stuck in a marriage she wasn’t happy with. This allows the reader to explore the concepts of love and relationships in interesting ways; should we be encouraging the relationship between Frances and Lilian when one is married?

As I said earlier, I still think there was something missing in this novel. There is a gothic element that runs through The Paying Guests which starts off well, with all the secrets that slowly began to be revealed. However this stopped working for me when the plot became too predictable. I’m not opposed to a predictable plot; the focus on the character development was effective enough. The problem was the whole gothic aspect became clunky and the basic plot didn’t allow this theme to really go anywhere and just left me wanting more.

Comparing this novel with Tipping the Velvet is probably a little unfair; this is a completely different type of book. Having read one great Sarah Waters book, I expected a little more. I like the way Sarah Waters writes characters and captures a time period; I would have liked to see her do more with a gothic theme. Somehow The Paying Guests was on track to being another great novel by Waters but for me, it fell a little short. Maybe someone new to Sarah Waters would enjoy this one more, as it gives a little tamer introduction to what this author does best. Having said that, I’m still excited to read everything written by Waters; she is a great author.

This review originally appeared on my blog: http://literary-exploration.com/2014/09/17/the-paying-guests-by-sarah-waters/