A Fatal Likeness

by Lynn Shepherd

[empressbrooke]

I read an advance copy of this novel received through LibraryThing's Early Reviews program. I had originally signed up to receive a copy because I had just read [b:Frankenstein|18490|Frankenstein|Mary Shelley|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1311647465s/18490.jpg|4836639] for the first time a few months ago, and I was intrigued by the idea of reading a mystery spun around the author and her husband. The copy of Frankenstein that I read contained biographical information about the pair, but nothing that really addressed anything personal about who they were.

I also read Lynn Shepherd's book [b:The Solitary House|13147813|The Solitary House|Lynn Shepherd|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1333577737s/13147813.jpg|18325458] in preparation for reading this one, since they both followed the same main character, private investigator Charles Maddox. That ended up not being necessary, since they are stand-alone stories. A Fatal Likeness does make small references to the first book, and the exposition about Charles Maddox and the other characters in his household is not really repeated for a new reader's benefit. However, while The Solitary House was very much so about Charles and his household, A Fatal Likeness uses them only to serve as the backdrop for focusing on the Shelleys. I forgot much of the time that Charles was part of the story.

Lynn Shepherd emphasizes in her afterword that this was a fictional novel. However, she also takes the time to lay out what biographers and contemporaries of the Shelleys have said about them, and she explains where and why she added her own fictional solutions to the gaps in our knowledge about the pair. One thing that Shepherd conveys that I didn't appreciate from the biographical information included in my copy of Frankenstein was just how young these people were, and how at odds they were with the rest of society at the time. She also did an excellent job bringing them to life and injecting personality into them. While this may or may not be an accurate reflection of them, since this IS fiction, it made for a wonderful read. It's also made me very interested to learn more about them, and Shepherd recommends a good number of books that she relied on for her research for anyone wanting to read more.