Glass of Time (Cox)

The Glass of Time
Michael Cox, 2008
W.W. Norton & Co.
544 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780393337167


Summary
Like The Meaning of Night, its "beguiling" and "intelligent" (New York Times Book Review) predecessor, The Glass of Time is a page turning period mystery about identity, the nature of secrets, and what happens when past obsessions impose themselves on an unwilling present.

In the autumn of 1876, nineteen year-old orphan Esperanza Gorst arrives at the great country house of Evenwood to become a lady's maid to the twenty-sixth Baroness Tansor. But Esperanza is no ordinary servant. She has been sent by her guardian, the mysterious Madame de l'Orme, to uncover the secrets that her new mistress has sought to conceal, and to set right a past injustice in which Esperanza's own life is bound up. At Evenwood she meets Lady Tansor's two dashing sons, Perseus and Randolph, and finds herself enmeshed in a complicated web of seduction, intrigue, deceit, betrayal, and murder.

Few writers are as gifted at evoking the sensibility of the nineteenth century as Michael Cox, who has made the world of Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins his own. (From the publisher.)

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Author Bio
• Aka—Matthew Ellis; Obie Clayton
• Birth—1948
• Where—Northamptshire, England, UK
• Education—Cambridge University
• Currently—lives in Northamptonshire, England

Michael Cox was born in Northamptonshire in 1948. After graduating from Cambridge in 1971, he went into the music business as a songwriter and recording artist, releasing two albums and a number of singles for EMI under the name Matthew Ellis and a further album, as Obie Clayton, for the DJM label. In 1977, he took a job in publishing, with the Thorsons Publishing Group (now part of HarperCollins). In 1989, he joined Oxford University Press, where he became Senior Commissioning Editor, Reference Books.

His first book, a widely praised biography of the scholar and ghost-story writer M.R. James, was published by Oxford University Press (OUP) in 1983. This was followed by a number of Oxford anthologies of short fiction, including The Oxford Book of English Ghost Stories (1986) and The Oxford Book of Victorian Ghost Stories (1991), both co-edited with R.A. Gilbert, The Oxford Book of Victorian Detective Stories (1992) and The Oxford Book of Spy Stories (1997). In 1991 he compiled A Dictionary of Writers and their Works for OUP and in 2002 The Oxford Chronology of English Literature, a major scholarly resource containing bibliographical information on 30,000 titles from 4,000 authors, 1474–2000.

In April 2004, he began to lose his sight as a result of cancer. In preparation for surgery he was prescribed a steroidal drug, one of the effects of which was to initiate a temporary burst of mental and physical energy. This, combined with the stark realization that his blindness might return if the treatment wasn't successful, spurred Michael finally to begin writing in earnest the novel that he had been contemplating for over thirty years, and which up to then had only existed as a random collection of notes, drafts, and discarded first chapters. Following surgery, work continued on what is now his debut novel, The Meaning of Night. His second novel, The Glass of Time, was published in 2008.

Michael Cox still lives in his native Northamptonshire with his wife Dizzy. (From Barnes & Noble.)

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Book Reivews
An entirely wonderful mock Victorian novel, written in something like the style of...Wilkie Collins, author of The Moonstone and The Woman in White. It's a melodrama, of course, chock-full of revenge, romance, duplicity, concealed identities and murder most frequent—but melodrama on a grand scale. By any sensible standard, Englishman Michael Cox's convoluted plot is somewhere between outrageous and preposterous. Few characters are who or what they seem, and one key figure has five distinct identities. And yet the novel's fierce suspense and endless surprises, burnished by Cox's gorgeous prose, make it irresistible.
Patrick Anderson - Washington Post

Those who have not yet encountered the author's erudite and intricate fictions have a treat in store.... This is a mystery worthy of Wilkie Collins, combining all the ingredients of a Gothic romance—disinherited heroines, dissolute heroes, revenge and remorse—with a very modern sense of pace.
London Times

Brilliant storyteller.... He crafts an intelligent page-turner with the sorts of dark, dirty secrets that modern readers have come to expect of the supposedly virtuous Victorians.... [No one] manages to better his exquisite period detail, scope and sheer readability.
Independent (UK)

A terrific modern-day Victorian novel, and a true page-turner in the manner of the great works of that era.... The author has woven an enormous and intricate tapestry.... Take a chance and dive into Cox's delightful and deep sea of words.
Edmonton Journal (Canada)

(Starred review.) Set in 1876, Cox's gripping second gothic thriller (after The Meaning of Night) follows the fortunes of 19-year-old orphan Esperanza Gorst, whose guardian charges her to go undercover as a lady's maid. Without knowing precisely why she's doing so, Gorst insinuates herself into the inner circle of Baroness Tansor, the fiancée of the preceding volume's villain, Phoebus Daunt. The fake maid soon learns that her mistress has many secrets, and may, in fact, have been complicit in the death of a former servant. Cox excels at conveying his heroine's conflict over deceiving her employer, especially after learning the role the lady played in her own difficult personal history. While readers unfamiliar with the first book will find themselves deeply engaged by the elegant descriptive prose, those with the benefit of the full context and nuances of The Meaning of Night will better appreciate this sequel.
Publishers Weekly

When orphaned 19-year-old Esperanza Gorst is hired as a lady's maid by Baroness Tansor of Evenwood in 1876, she does not understand her role in a complex plan to restore the Duport family succession. Lady Tansor, the former Emily Carteret, still mourns for her fiancé, Phoebus Daunt, murdered two decades earlier. Through clever spying, Esperanza uncovers information about the murders of Emily's father and Daunt and about Emily's marriage and children. Letters and documents from Esperanza's guardian and others reveal the stories of her own parents and how she had been cheated of her inheritance. Yet, despite realizing that she cannot trust Emily or her unscrupulous associates, Esperanza feels affection and sympathy for the beleaguered Lady. Jealousies among Emily's sons and Esperanza fuel more misunderstandings. Speculations and explanations fill the pages of this novel, which is depicted as Esperanza's secret notebook discovered and annotated by the same editor who presented The Meaning of Night, Cox's debut, which was written from the perspective of Daunt's killer. Cox neatly incorporates the discovery of that manuscript into Esperanza's account, one of myriad connections of plot and characters that make this book an essential read for fans of the first novel. But this atmospheric and engrossing work also can stand alone as a treat for anyone who enjoys Victorian thrillers. Strongly recommended.
Kathy Piehl - Library Journal

(Starred review.) Cox so cleverly incorporates the plot of his first novel that his new one can be read by both those who are familiar with The Meaning of Night and those who have never read it. Great period atmosphere, a cunning plot, and an intelligent narrator make this one a special treat for those who like some history with their mystery. —Joanne Wilkinson.
Booklist

Cox's second pastiche of Victorian sensational fiction is doubly remarkable for its sure grasp of the genre's idiom and its strange relationship to his first (The Meaning of Night, 2006). Nineteen-year-old Esperanza Gorst arrives at Evenwood on September 4, 1876, to interview for the position of personal maid to Emily Duport, the widowed Baroness Tansor. The advertisement in which Esperanza announced her search for such a post constitutes the first of many deceptions Cox's characters practice on each other, for it was placed not by her, but by her Parisian guardian, Madame de l'Orme, and her old friend Basil Thornhaugh, Esperanza's tutor. Their successful attempt to insinuate Esperanza into Lady Tansor's service is only the first step in what they call "the Great Task," a plot so deep-laid that they can disclose its terms to her only over a period of months. Esperanza, whom everyone recognizes as far too cultured and perceptive to be a lady's maid, soon catches the eyes of both Tansor sons, the Byronic heir Perseus and his more easygoing brother Randolph, and cultivates an ever more intimate relationship with Lady Tansor, still mourning her fiance Phoebus Daunt, a bombastic poet who was murdered by his estranged Eton friend Edward Glyver more than 20 years ago. All the while Esperanza burns with curiosity to know the reason her protectors have sent her into this haunted household. But readers who recognize Daunt, Glyver et al. will be far ahead of Esperanza, who doesn't realize that her author has pressed the plot of The Meaning of Night into service as the backstory of what would otherwise be a mystery in the mold of Wilkie Collins and Mary Elizabeth Braddon. A sequel that will provide utterly different but equally rewarding experiences for readers who have and haven't read its equally leisurely predecessor.
Kirkus Reviews

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Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:

• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)

Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for The Meaning of Night:

1. On his website, Michael Cox says that The Glass of Time is concerned with the nature of identity. How does Esperanza discover her own identity and its connection with Lady Tansor? Did you figure it out before she does? Actually, though, what is even meant by "the nature" of identity? Is identity provisional, i.e., temporary, open to change? Is it fluid, changing with circumstances or knowledge? Is it definitive—we are who we are?

2. What is "The Great Task" which Esperanza is sent to Evenwood to complete? Talk about her divided loyalties, her moral dilemma at the heart of the story.

3. Another theme Cox says he explores in the novel is the "enduring power of the past." How does that theme play out in The Glass of Time? In other words, how does the past continually interrupt and affect the present? Notice, too, how the narrative jumps between time periods. Did that enhance the story for you...or did you find it distracting? And, of course, talk about the significance of the book's title.

4. The novel also explores, as Cox puts it, "the corrosive effects of concealing guilty secrets." What does he mean by that statement as it relates to The Glass of Time?

5. The novel's characters are rich and memorable. Which ones did you sympathize with, dislike, distrust, find fascinating?

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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