This is Sarah Perry’s next book after The Essex Serpent, and she’s evidently trying to continue with the chilling, mystical theme. This time the myth surrounds Melmoth the Witness, who has been doomed to walk the earth bearing witness to humanity’s failings, because she bore false witness at the Resurrection.
The writing has the curious impact of feeling like a Victorian gothic novel, while at the same time being set in the present day, which is clever. The protagonist Helen is living a frugal sort of half-life in Prague, where she denies herself any enjoyment, sleeps on a bare mattress, and has no friends bar one – a couple Karel Prazan and his English partner Thea, whose rich mutual love sustains her.
But something dark is coming. Karel becomes consumed by a story told him by a fellow library user of a woman who appears at times of great stress, especially to those of us who are overwhelmed by guilt, who have born false witness. He both loves this apparition and is terrified by her, and she brings human disintegration and destruction in her wake. The novel ranges between times and places, sketching out different ways in which individuals have given false witness. There is a sense of impending doom, and we understand that Helen herself is suffering from some terrible guilt. I'm not usually a reader of ghost stories, but I did enjoy the book. there's a rather hefty-handed narrator, which is perhaps a nod to the gothic genre, and some of the description of Melmoth when she aoears does get a bit repetitive (often heralded by the appearance of ravens) but Sarah Perry provides enough sleight of hand that we are never quite sure; has the phantom appeared or is she the result of debilitating guilt, coupled with our need for atonement and the workings of powerful folklore.
