Molly Pohlig’s The Unsuitable is a fierce blend of Gothic ghost story and Victorian novel of manners that’s also pitch perfect for our current cultural moment. Iseult Wince is a Victorian woman perilously close to spinsterhood whose distinctly unpleasant father is trying to marry her off. She is awkward, plain, and most pertinently, believes that her mother, who died in childbirth, lives in the … childbirth, lives in the scar on her neck.
Iseult’s father parades a host of unsuitable candidates before her, the majority of whom Iseult wastes no time frightening away. When at last her father finds a suitor desperate enough to take Iseult off his hands–a man whose medical treatments have turned his skin silver–a true comedy of errors ensues.
As history’s least conventional courtship progresses into talk of marriage, Iseult’s mother becomes increasingly volatile and uncontrollable, and Iseult is forced to resort to extreme, often violent, measures to keep her in check.
As the day of the wedding nears, Iseult must decide whether (and how) to set the course of her life, with increasing interference from both her mother and father, tipping her ever closer to madness, and to an inevitable, devastating final act.
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I’ve just read a book about a girl who believes her dead mother lives in the scar on her neck. And I liked it.
Most definitely a page turner, this one starts off weird. It finishes weird, too, but you’ve got the sense of and embrace the weird well before then. I liked the characters. Iseult, Mrs. Pennington, Jacob. As troubled as she was, I was rooting for Iseult and was intrigued by her plight.
I’m glad to have had the opportunity to read a copy before its release and recommend it.
And now someone please tell me how to pronounce Iseult as they would in Surry?
The Unsuitable is vivid, bloody, and above all, wholly singular. It is impossible to not feel for Iseult as she struggles for a glimmer of independence that both the living and dead are hellbent on smudging out. With this debut, Molly Pohlig establishes herself as a startling force.
The Unsuitable is a weird neo-Victorian fever-dream with a prickly, haunted heroine and an ending you won’t see coming.
The Unsuitable is a gruesome, stabby, wincing book about the ways in which women are influenced, hindered, hurt, and taught to hurt themselves. There is a rebellious glee in Iseult’s response to the powers that be, and great humor amidst the glittering darkness. This is a comedy of manners marvelously turned upside down.
Molly Pohlig has written a true stunner with The Unsuitable. A novel that takes the body and upends it, all the while focused on the how our interior worlds are oftentimes prolifically shaped by our parentage. On the sentence level it is both gorgeous and messy; a bloody delight. There isn’t another book like it. Pohlig has crafted a wonder.
Set in Victorian England, this novel is about Iseult and her hateful father. Dear dad has been trying to marry off Iseult for years. Iseult likewise hates her father so much you can almost taste the vile emotions rising from the book’s pages. Victorian, Gothic, full of psychosis (or IS Iseult really haunted?), and self-mutilation with dread on every page . . . I loved it!
PROS:
Iseult’s solitary musings are SO real and SO deep with pain and ennui (yet incredibly captivating to read, in a voyeuristic way).
I was puzzled by the cover at first because Iseult isn’t a seamstress or anything. Then about 20 percent into the book, I understood the cover art and thought it was brilliant.
The novel’s structure is rather evident as you’re reading, but I didn’t mind. It made me feel like I was in the hands of a capable author.
This book has the vibe of other fabulous stories like The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters, We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson, and The House on Cold Hill by Peter James. If you like any of those, I think you’d enjoy The Unsuitable.
CONS:
If you don’t care for slow burns with disturbed characters and little action, this isn’t the book for you. (On the other hand, if you like character-driven stories full of rich, poetic language and symbolism, you’ll love this book.)
OVERALL:
Five brilliant, intelligent, captivating stars!
**Trigger warning: self-harm, cutting, suicide**
Iseult is probably the most interesting character that I have encountered in a while. She’s very shy and self-conscious and unable to function on most days. You can’t help but feel bad for her though. She was raised by her father who despised her and never had a female role model. It’s sad that Mrs. Pennington, her housemaid, didn’t try to teach her more. I do blame her father for that. I believe that Mrs. Pennington was afraid of him. His words toward Iseult angered me and I can see how she would fear him.
Jacob Vinke is the sweet gentleman who agrees to marry Iseult. Although his skin is silver due to a treatment for a skin condition, he is still kind and thoughtful. He has lived shunned by society like Iseult, but has handled it much better, possibly because he has both parents who have helped him. I really liked Jacob. I think he really liked Iseult and he treated her so well. He never talked down to her or made comments about her odd behavior.
The ending has a shocking twist and a sad outcome. It wasn’t rushed though. The scenes played out and explained many things.
The only issue I had with the book, and I hope it gets fixed before final printing, is the conversations between Iseult and her mother. The dialog was choppy with no punctuations. It really made it hard to read. I do like how the author changed the font during the conversations so the reader knew who was talking.