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e_phemerart61) Starling, Belinda. THE JOURNAL OF DORA DAMAGE. Bloomsbury: 2007.
Belinda Starling's debut novel is a startling vision of Victorian London, juxtaposing its filth and poverty with its affluence. In Dora Damage we meet a daring young heroine, struggling in a very modern way against the constraints of the day. With her husband ill and crippled, his book-binding business in debt and his family in danger of entering the poorhouse, Dora resolves to rescue her family at any price - and finds herself illegally binding expensive volumes of pornography commissioned by aristocrats. Then, when a mysterious fugitive slave arrives at her door, Dora realises she's entangled in a web of sex, money, deceit and the law.
I enjoy books about books, and the descriptions of the bindings Dora creates were lovely and sensuous (as opposed to the contents of the texts being bound). Which I suppose was kind of the point.
Belinda Starling's debut novel is a startling vision of Victorian London, juxtaposing its filth and poverty with its affluence. In Dora Damage we meet a daring young heroine, struggling in a very modern way against the constraints of the day. With her husband ill and crippled, his book-binding business in debt and his family in danger of entering the poorhouse, Dora resolves to rescue her family at any price - and finds herself illegally binding expensive volumes of pornography commissioned by aristocrats. Then, when a mysterious fugitive slave arrives at her door, Dora realises she's entangled in a web of sex, money, deceit and the law.
I enjoy books about books, and the descriptions of the bindings Dora creates were lovely and sensuous (as opposed to the contents of the texts being bound). Which I suppose was kind of the point.
