Fanny Imlay, Mary Shelley's half-sister, lies dead in distant Swansea. But did she really die? A cache of letters from 1816 suggest that like Shelley's Frankenstein, Imlay had a second life, similarly misunderstood, used and rejected. Who is the mysterious owner of the letters and can they be believed? Cease Upon Midnight is a gothic tour de force.
It's the 1970s, and a mysterious woman has a cache of letters to sell. They claim to tell the story of the death of Fanny Imlay, half-sister of Mary Shelley and daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft. Did Fanny really commit suicide in an inn in Swansea in 1816, as historians thought? The letters instead suggest a faked death and an escape from Fanny's fraught family life. It could have been an independence of which Fanny's mother would have been proud. But the letters also suggest the re-born Fanny remained misunderstood, mis-used and rejected, in the manner of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein monster.
The women's intertwining narratives begin to reflect each other as the mysteries multiply and resolve. Gothic body-swaps, dark mansions and unexpected deaths merge with 70s politics and feminism in this tour-de-force by Jerwood Prize-winning author Jo Mazelis.
Jo Mazelis's first novel 'Significance' (Seren, 2014) won the 2015 Jerwood Fiction Uncovered Prize. Her collection of stories, 'Diving Girls', was shortlisted for the Commonwealth 'Best First Book' and Wales Book of the Year. Her second book, 'Circle Games', was long-listed for Wales Book of the Year. Her stories have been broadcast on BBC Radio 4, published in various anthologies and magazines, and translated into Danish. Her third collection of stories 'Ritual, 1969' (Seren, 2016) was shortlisted for Wales Book of the Year and longlisted for the Edge Hill Prize 2017. 'Blister & other Stories' was shortlisted for the International Rubery Award.
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