An egotistical ringmaster gives his “monsters” a chance to shine in this glittering follow-up to The Doll Factory
Elizabeth Macneal’s bestselling 2019 debut of art and obsession, The Doll Factory, was set against the backdrop of the 1851 Great Exhibition; lurking behind it was John Fowles’s terrifying The Collector, also a spider-and-fly battle of the sexes. Several texts underlie her follow-up, again an atmospheric Victorian tale: Frankenstein is a favourite of manipulative circus owner Jasper, while Nell, the protagonist, sees uncanny echoes of her own fate in Hans Christian Andersen’s tale “The Little Mermaid”.
Mottled head to toe by birthmarks, Nell is plucked from her lowly trade of making candied violets to appear in Jasper Jupiter’s Circus of Wonders. To grip the imagination of a freak-sated public, Jasper prides himself on creating irresistible backstories for his collection of “monsters”. “Leopard girls” are old hat, so Jasper retrains her as a star-dappled aerialist, Nellie Moon, swinging above the crowd on ropes hauled by Jasper’s downtrodden brother, Toby. Jasper sees himself as Daedalus, the master inventor, as well as Victor Frankenstein, but doesn’t perhaps pay enough attention to the fate of Icarus.
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